Vivien Leigh Book

Laurence Olivier saw Leigh in The Mask of Virtue, and a friendship developed after he congratulated her on her performance. While playing lovers in the film Devouring Over England (1937), Olivier and Leigh developed a strong attraction, http://www.indigopublishing.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=44 and after filming was completed, they began an affair. Olivier was at that time married to the actress Jill Esmond. During this day Leigh read the Margaret Mitchell novel Gone with the Wind and instructed her American agent to suggest her to David O. Selznick, who was planning a film version. She remarked to a journalist, "I've cast myself as Scarlett O'Hara", and The Observer's film critic C. A. Lejeune recalled a conversation of the same period in which Leigh "stunned us all" with the assertion that Olivier "won't mask Rhett Butler, but I shall play Scarlett O'Hara. Wait and see."

Gone with the Wind brought Leigh immediate attention and fame, but she was quoted as saying, "I'm not a film star – I'm an actress. Being a film star – just a film star – is such a false life, lived for fake values and for publicity. Actresses go on for a lengthened continuance and there are always marvellous parts to play." Among the ten Academy Awards won by Gone with the Wind was a Best Actress award for Leigh, who also won a Modish York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress.