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BRITISH-American actress Olivia de Havilland has died at the age of 104 in Paris.
De Havilland played Melanie Hamilton Wilkes in Gone With the Wind and was the film's last surviving cast member.
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Her character competed against the protagonist Scarlett O'Hara for the affections of Ashley Wilkes, played by Leslie Howard.
The 1939 film has long been hailed as a cinematic masterpiece, but it has also faced increasing scrutiny for its glorification of the American south during the Civil War.
De Havilland rose to prominence in the early 1930s starring in adventure films such as Captain Blood and The Adventures of Robin Hood.
But her career took off after her role as Melanie in Gone With the Wind and her portrayal earned her an Oscar nomination.
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Although she received heaping praise for playing a damsel in distress, she was wary of being typecast.
She went to war with Warner Bros when the studio tried to extend her seven-year film contract as a penalty for refusing roles, according to Entertainment Weekly.
De Havilland eventually won her case and saved herself in the landmark ruling that's still known today as the "de Havilland law."
Her fight helped end Hollywood's archaic studio system, which she said amounted to "peonage", according to TMZ.
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The Gone With the Wind star's case upended the balance of power in the film industry and allowed actors to negotiate better contracts as a result.
De Havilland was born in 1916 to an English professor and stage actress in Japan.
She was raised in Tokyo during the early years of her life before her mother moved the family to California.
She had lived in Paris since 1960, but was rarely seen in public.
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Despite her attempts to remain out of the public eye, her feud with sister and fellow actress Joan Fontaine, who died in December 2013, was well-documented in the press.
De Havilland reportedly stoped speaking to her sister in the mid-1970s.
The actress sued FX network in 2018 over their portrayal of her in their 2017 miniseries Feud: Bette and Joan, claiming that the show runner Ryan Murphy had cast her in a "false light."
A California judge eventually canned her lawsuit, writing in a 38-page opinion that she "does not own history."
The silver screen icon was a two-time Oscar winner for best actress: she won her first in 1947 for starring in To Each His Own and her second three years later for The Heiress.
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MOST READ IN NEWS
De Havilland made a rare Hollywood appearance to celebrate her 90th birthday at a splashy celebration thrown by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences in 2006.
Read More on The US Sun
In photos shared on social media, she was seen celebrating her 104th birthday earlier this month with a leisurely bike ride.
"Still rides a bike like a boss," the tweet from an Angela Lansbury account read.