Gone with the Wind is a novel by American writer Margaret Mitchell, first published in 1936. The story is set in Clayton County and Atlanta, both in Georgia, during the American Civil War and Reconstruction Era. It depicts the struggles of young Scarlett O'Hara, the spoiled daughter of a well-to-do plantation owner, who must use every means at her disposal to claw her way out of poverty following Sherman's destructive "March to the Sea." This historical novel features a coming-of-age story, with the title taken from the poem "Non Sum Qualis eram Bonae Sub Regno Cynarae", written by Ernest Dowson.
Susan Alexandra "Sigourney" Weaver is an American actress. Prolific in film since the late 1970s, she is known for her pioneering portrayals of action heroines in science fiction and horror films. She is the recipient of numerous accolades, including a British Academy Film Award, two Golden Globe Awards, and a Grammy Award, in addition to nominations for three Academy Awards, four Primetime Emmy Awards, and a Tony Award.
Ellen Burstyn is an American actress. Known for her portrayals of complex women in dramas, she is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Tony Award, and two Primetime Emmy Awards, making her one of the few performers to achieve the "Triple Crown of Acting". She has also received a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe Award.
Sidney Sheldon was an American writer. He was prominent in the 1930s, first working on Broadway plays, and then in motion pictures, notably writing the successful comedy The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947), which earned him an Oscar in 1948. He went on to work in television, where over twenty years he created The Patty Duke Show (1963–66), I Dream of Jeannie (1965–70), and Hart to Hart (1979–84). After turning 50, he began writing best-selling romantic suspense novels, such as Master of the Game (1982), The Other Side of Midnight (1973), and Rage of Angels (1980).
Bonnie Blair Brown is an American theater, film and television actress. She has had a number of high-profile roles, including in the play Copenhagen on Broadway, the leading actress in the films Altered States (1980), Continental Divide (1981) and Strapless (1989), as well as a run as the title character in the comedy-drama television series The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, which ran from 1987 to 1991. Her later roles include Nina Sharp on the Fox television series Fringe and Judy King on the Netflix series Orange Is the New Black.
Laura Leggett Linney is an American actress. She is the recipient of several awards, including two Golden Globe Awards and four Primetime Emmy Awards, and has been nominated for three Academy Awards and five Tony Awards.
Breathing Lessons is a Pulitzer Prize–winning 1988 novel by American author Anne Tyler. It is her eleventh novel and won the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Jonathan Raymond, usually credited Jon Raymond, is an American writer living in Portland, Oregon. He is best known for writing the novels The Half-Life and Rain Dragon, and for writing the short stories and novels adapted for the films Old Joy, Wendy and Lucy, and First Cow, all directed by Kelly Reichardt, with whom he co-wrote the screenplays.
Allan Gurganus is an American novelist, short story writer, and essayist whose work, which includes Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All and Local Souls, is often influenced by and set in his native North Carolina.
The Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Limited Series is an award given by the Screen Actors Guild to honor the finest acting achievements in Miniseries or Television Movie.
North and South is a 1980s trilogy of best-selling novels by John Jakes which take place before, during, and after the American Civil War. The saga tells the story of the enduring friendship between Orry Main of South Carolina and George Hazard of Pennsylvania, who become best friends while attending the United States Military Academy at West Point but later find themselves and their families on opposite sides of the war. The slave-owning Mains are rural gentleman planters while the big-city Hazards live by manufacturing and industry, their differences reflecting the real divisions between North and South which ultimately led to war.
Jack O'Brien is an American director, producer, writer and lyricist. He served as the Artistic Director of the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, California from 1981 through the end of 2007.
Robert L. Freedman is an American screenwriter and dramatist. He is best known for his teleplays for Rodgers & Hammerstein's Cinderella (1997) and Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows (2001), and for his Tony-winning book and lyrics of A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder (2014).
Sir Colin Nigel Callender is a British television, film and theater producer. He is the CEO at Playground Entertainment, a production company with offices in New York and London.
Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All is a 1994 American television miniseries written by Joyce Eliason and based on the 1989 novel by Allan Gurganus. It was directed by Ken Cameron and starred Diane Lane, Donald Sutherland, Cicely Tyson and Anne Bancroft.
The Briar Street Theatre is a theatre located in Chicago, Illinois, and is home to the long-running Blue Man Group. Originally the carriage house for the Marshall Field and Company horses, the space was purchased by Walter Topel and reconstructed into a theater. The Briar Street Theatre is most notably associated with the Blue Man Group act, which began performing at the Briar Street Theatre in 1997 and, as of January 31st, 2024, is still performing there.
Joyce Eliason was an American television writer and producer. She was best known for writing TV miniseries including Titanic and The Last Don, and for the TV film The Jacksons: An American Dream. Eliason was one of the writers for the hit television series Love, American Style and wrote her first screenplay Tell Me a Riddle in 1980.
Pam MacKinnon is an American theatre director. She has directed for the stage Off-Broadway, on Broadway and in regional theatre. She won the Obie Award for Directing and received a Tony Award nomination, Best Director, for her work on Clybourne Park. In 2013 she received the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play for a revival of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? She was named artistic director of American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, California on January 23, 2018.
Flowers in the Attic is a 2014 Lifetime movie directed by Deborah Chow, starring Kiernan Shipka, Ellen Burstyn, Mason Dye, and Heather Graham. It is the second adaptation of V. C. Andrews’ 1979 novel of the same name.
At least four widows of veterans of the American Civil War are known to have survived into the 21st century. All were born in the 20th century and married their husbands while the women were still young and the men were in advanced age. This practice was not uncommon at the time due to the possibility of receiving pensions as dependents of Civil War veterans; the pensions were known for their generosity. Some of these unions were in name only, while others lived together as married couples.
