|
 I
certainly was in for a surprise when I wound tape #12 onto the Ampex and turned
it on. Seems Annie had just come back from the local movie theater, where a
newly released version of Gone With the Wind was playing. Apparently, Annie had
not viewed the film before, much less read the book.
"I just seen a movie about the Old South," she blabbed into the
microphone. They shore dressed funny back then. Don’t know how them women
stood it in all them skirts and underwear."
Let me add that Annie was infamous for wearing as little as possible, and as
I recall her once describing her choice of lingerie, her underwear usually
consisted either of fishnet pantyhose or those awful split-at-the-crotch numbers
that Frederick’s of Hollywood pioneered.
However, Annie’s main interest was in Scarlett O’Hara and the men in her
life. It became apparent that her evaluation of the South’s best-known
literary heroine found poor Scarlett somewhat lacking in taste.
"Lordy! Look at all them sorry men she took up with!" Annie said,
ignoring the cardinal grammatical rule about ending a sentence with a
preposition. "Who in the world would want to marry that jerk Charlie
Wilkes? (!) Talk about a mamma’s boy! Scarlett was shore lucky that Charlie
hauled off and died of the whoopin’ cough or the measles or whatever as quick
as he did. She’d have spent the rest of her life pickin’ cotton and
nursemaidin’ that guy. What a loser!"
Annie then took on Scarlett’s endless, non-reciprocal lust for the scion of
Twelve Oaks. "Wonder what it was that made her want that Ashley so
much?" she pondered. "I shore don’t see it. He lost his house and
farm to the Yankees, he wasn’t no good as a clerk, and all he wanted to do was
walk around kinda dreamy like and talk about the good ole days. Phooey! Best
thing about most ‘good ole days’ is that they are gone!
"Can’t decide who was the worstest choice-—Charlie or Ashley. Maybe
it woulda been better if Charlie and Ashley had teamed up. That sorta thing
musta been goin’ on back then. Only question is, which one of them would have
been the ‘wife’?"
On this pregnant thought, Annie dropped her explosive concept and advanced to
another idea.
It came as no surprise to me that Annie was fascinated by Belle Watling, the
Atlanta madam. She liked Belle’s bleach-from-the-bottle hair, her gaudy,
low-cut gowns and her easy way with men.
"Now, I can identify with that Belle," Annie said. "She had a
real fancy cat house, too. Not like them dumps here in Zenobia that I have to
work from."
The only place where Annie parted ways with Belle was when Belle donated some
of her tainted money for The Cause.
"Damned if I would give a nickel of my hard-earned cash to them snooty
Atlanta society dames," she said with a snarl. "Not even to that
mamby-pamby Melody! (!!) She was just too kissy-sweet for my tastes! I ain’t
at all surprised that Melody had such a time givin’ birth to that baby. Maybe
if Melody had pulled a few shifts at the sock factory like my ma did, she’d
have popped that baby out and then got up and fixed supper for everybody!"
Wow! What a scene that would have made in the movie. Where was Annie when
David Selznick was dictating the script? Or when Margaret Mitchell was writing
the book?
Gerald O’Hara—-Scarlett’s father-—was one of Annie’s favorites. She
admired his bluster and unabashed fondness for his daughters-—especially
Scarlett. However, Gerald’s Irish accent tended to throw her, and she
commented that he certainly didn’t talk like people do today.
"Guess he oughta have took a few ridin’ lessons, since he kept running
them horses at fences and hedges. Shoulda known he’d end up ass over elbows
and on the ground sooner or later," she added.
I was bemused to hear that Annie showed great interest in and support for the
carpetbagger Jonas Wilkerson and the Slattery woman he had impregnated and later
married. After all, these were people who were typical for Annie, and this also
was behavior that was common, normal and natural in her less-than-elevated
society. In fact, she said it was a downright shame that Scarlett was able to
save Tara from Jonas Wilkerson’s clutches.
"Them O’Haras had their time at bat," Annie observed with
unwavering blue-collar logic and empathy, unaware of the inappropriate sports
comparison she used. "And them Wilkersons and Slatterys shoulda had a go at
runnin’ the farm. Wish my folks had had a chance like that! I can name plenty
of stuck-up people right here in Zenobia that I would be glad to kick outta
house and home!"
Well! So much for Southern solidarity in the face of the enemy.
She dismissed Scarlett’s desperate marriage to Frank Kennedy with a snort.
Annie saw him as little more than a middle-aged version of "Charlie"
Wilkes and virtually cheered as she alluded to Frank’s death on the Decatur
Road. "Serves him right for gettin’ mixed up with somebody like that
Scarlett," Annie said smugly. "I’d of shot him myself, if I’d had
to marry that mealy mouthed ol’ merchant!"
Annie’s keen eye for premium maleness zeroed in on Rhett Butler. She
immediately saw his allure and commented caustically about Scarlett’s failure
to gravitate toward Rhett until it was too late. Annie’s scorn for
Scarlett’s stupidity knew no bounds. Still, she realized that the breakup of
Scarlett and Rhett’s marriage was a foregone conclusion.
"Anybody with two glass eyes could see that Red (!!!) just wasn’t
right for Scarlett. And I don’t mean because he was always runnin’ with the
likes of Belle Watling. Plenty of deacons in the First Baptist Church of Zenobia
have done business with me and none the worse for wear. But that Red! He was
such a softie. Look at all them goo-goo eyes he made over that little girl of
his--Barney Blue. (!!!!) It was plain as day he would always place that child
over its mother. Plus, ol’ Red always wanted to go back to Charleston and make
up with the folks there. Scarlett would never have fit into that scheme."
Annie paused for a few seconds and concluded her Rhettian evaluation by
theorizing that maybe Rhett intended to put Scarlett on that stumble-bum pony
instead of his daughter. She added, "Why, if Barney Blue had just kept her
little mouth shut, her daddy could have knocked off his hussy of a wife, and
they would have moved to Charleston in style! Instead, Barney Blue hopped on
that pony and got her neck broke for the trouble!"
My imagination did flips as I sought manfully to digest this proposed
resolution to something Margaret Mitchell surely left unexplored in her novel.
On the other hand, why not? Maybe "Barney Blue" would have grown up in
Charleston and would have married a cadet from the Citadel, and "Red"
would have gotten his name on a marble plaque to be mounted inside the French
Huguenot Church.
I fully expected Annie’s movie review to end at this point. Such was not
the case, and I should have known. With Annie, the unanticipated is always
unexpected.
"Of course, them people who wrote the movie got it all wrong,"
Annie announced firmly. "Scarlett never should have had to put up with the
likes of Charlie, Ashley, Frank or Red. There was only one man who woulda’
been worth Scarlett’s time and effort, and they let her shoot him!"
What!? Annie wanted Scarlett’s big romance to be with the Yankee soldier
who was stealing her mother’s earbobs?
Unfortunately, Annie’s evaluation of Gone With the Wind ended on this
enigmatic note. I could not let it terminate like this, and I have projected
what Annie undoubtedly had in mind.
Ike Awalt of the First Ohio Irregulars and Bummers Brigade breaks into Tara
and rifles a jewelry box. He is confronted by an armed Scarlett, but he yanks
the pistol from her hand before she can pull the trigger. Ike slaps Scarlett
around just to show her who’s boss. Scarlett loves it. This is what she’s
been seeking and not getting from all those other guys. Ike kidnaps her and
heads north, on the way commandeering a horse and carriage once owned by
"Red" Butler.
They eventually arrive in Lancaster, Ohio—-Ike’s home town. The two are
now married, and Ike gets a job at the local glass factory. There, he assists
the Union cause by helping manufacture whiskey bottles and Mason jars.
Ever the social climber, Scarlett rejects a frame house near the glass
factory and pushes Ike to acquire a more expensive dwelling on East Main Street,
where the Lancastrian elite reside.
Fate has it that the Awalts move into a house next door to Lancaster’s
favorite son, Union General William Tecumseh Sherman. The Civil War ends, and
the Great Incendiary comes home only to discover his golden years must be spent
with Mrs. Ike Awalt glaring at and badgering him from next door.
In this scenario, Georgia is avenged, and Billy Sherman learns the hard way
that Peace--like War--is Hell.
Now, that’s the way Annie would have written it!
Copyright 2005 Maxwell Courson
*
* * * *
“Pulpwood Annie Meets Scarlett
O’Hara” is a chapter from a yet-to-be-completed novel titled The
Pulpwood Annie Tapes by Max Courson. His current novel, which
precedes The Pulpwood Annie Tapes,
is The Pulpwood Annie Chronicles,
and it is scheduled for release on or before the first week in July.
|
