The most famous line in the classic American film Gone with the Wind (1939) is “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” It is spoken by Rhett Butler (played by Clark Gable) to Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh) at the film’s conclusion, when Rhett refuses Scarlett’s entreaties for him to stay at Tara, her family’s plantation. The line almost never made it into the film: The word damn was forbidden by Hollywood’s restrictive Hays Code at the time. Several alternatives were floated, including “It makes my gorge rise” and “My indifference is boundless.” However, after much lobbying by producer David O. Selznick, the film was granted an exemption to use the original wording from the book.
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