Author Spotlight

Leonard Leff

Leonard Leff, emeritus professor of English at Oklahoma State University is the author of three books, including Hitchcock and Selznick (University of California Press, 1999). His essay on African Americans and Gone With the Wind appears in The Best American Movie Writing 2001 (Avalon, 2001).

2 Results
Selznick International’s Spellbound
In 1940 and 1941, David O. Selznick won back-to-back Academy Awards for Best Picture. In 1942, unsurprisingly, he was depressed. His wife, Irene, persuaded him to seek help, and, less than one year later, hale and hardy, he was eager to share with ot…

By Leonard Leff

Rebecca
As David O. Selznick put Gone with the Wind into production in the late 1930s, he realized that he needed help with other pictures on the studio schedule. He had soon hired a rotund Englishman as director and producer, but Rebecca—the first of four…

By Leonard Leff