ENDICOTT, NY (WIVT/WBGH) – A comedy opening at the Cider Mill Stage this weekend imagines the process as three titans of the Golden Age of Hollywood wrestle with turning a literary blockbuster into a major motion picture.

Moonlight and Magnolias depicts what may have taken place when legendary producer David Selznick, director Victor Fleming and screenwriter Ben Hecht lock themselves in Selznick’s office for five days developing a script for Gone With The Wind.

Chris Nickerson portrays Hecht who hasn’t read the book.

That leads to Selznick and Fleming acting out scenes from the novel while Hecht furiously types.

Nickerson says, “The two of them are going to act out the book for me. David Selznick is playing Scarlett O’Hara and somebody’s playing Prissy. There’s a lot of humor in them trying to play all of these characters for me to see what the scenes were like.”

As an interesting aside, Nickerson himself has never read the book nor seen the movie.

Jan DeAngelo is Selznick, Isaac Weber is Fleming and Hillori Schenker plays Mrs. Poppenghul, Selznick’s devoted secretary.

Moonlight and Magnolias opens Friday and runs for 2 weekends, with performances at 7:30 on Fridays and Saturdays and 2:30 on Sundays.

Tickets are $25 and can be purchased at cidermillstage.com.