Lost in Austen UK broadcast in September
The Telegraph has an article about why-we-keep-adapting-Jane-yada-yada that contains the somewhat interesting news that Lost in Austen will be broadcast in ITV in September.
Lizzie enters our modern world through a portal in the Bennet wardrobe and ends up in a bedsit in Hammersmith; while Amanda moves into 19th-century Longbourn with the rest of the Bennet family. It’s every teenage girl’s fantasy: sleeping in a bed with Jane, curling Lydia and Mary’s hair. Bingley makes a pass at you, while Darcy smoulders and mentally ravishes you. The plot pretty much writes itself. You just step into the pages of your favourite book.
Why don’t they just name the main character Mary Sue and get it over with?
The audience’s desire for courtly love is fine. It doesn’t even matter if they play loose with the plot. Janeites are horrified by the inappropriate kissing, but the final frames of Adrian Shergold’s extraordinary 2007 film Persuasion, where Sally Hawkins literally ran to claim her love, pounding along the streets of Bath as the camera whirled and swooped, were brilliant.
Hmm.
The audience’s desire for courtly love is fine. It doesn’t even matter if they play loose with the plot. Janeites are horrified by the inappropriate kissing, but the final frames of Adrian Shergold’s extraordinary 2007 film Persuasion, where Sally Hawkins literally ran to claim her love, pounding along the streets of Bath as the camera whirled and swooped, were
brilliantreally weird.
There, fixed that for you.
And master adaptor Andrew Davies is a modern god for putting the sex and violence back into Austen’s novels.
Put it BACK into Austen’s novels? What?
The recent rape scene that opened Davies’ BBC adaptation of Sense and Sensibility stopped any of us swooning over Willoughby.
We were too busy trying to figure out what the heck was going on.
But you know casting is not the same as character. Impressionable middle-aged men may fawn over Keira in Pride and Prejudice, but casting Billie Piper (all tits and pout) in Mansfield Park was a grievous mistake. She’s a lovely young actress, but playing moralistic Fanny Price? Someone should be shot. So I’m not losing sleep over the Bond girl in Lost in Austen.
Casting is the least of their problems, really.
It’s late and we’re tired. Dorothy has the Cluebat; feel free to swing away.
July 25th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Sometimes I wonder if I’m watching the same thing as these journalists. I’m glad you were able to fix his Persuasion error, though the entire thing could use a revisit.
July 25th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Bingley, make a pass at the main character?!!!! Bingley, make a pass at anyone?!!!! NOOOO!!!! This is terrible! Let’s hope that the final product will be much better and that this reviewer has been “utterly misinformed” (to quote Anne P3).
July 25th, 2008 at 11:24 am
Or, to quote Jane Bennet: “They have both been deceived, I dare say, in some way or other, of which we can form no idea.”
July 25th, 2008 at 11:40 am
Oh, just wait.
Y’all think ol’ Negative Mags is just doing the purist stuck-up snobby tar-hearted Janeite spinster thing. Juuuuuuust wait.
July 25th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Well Lizzy seems to be getting the raw end of the deal–she’s stuck with a bedsit in Hammersmith while Amanda gets to romp through Longbourne (even if it is entailed).
And I resent the comment about the casting of MP. Billie Piper certainly brought more to the role of Fanny than “tits and pout”–she also added funky hair and some admirable dentition to the character. Not to mention some skill at waltzing…
July 25th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
“admirable dentition”. Oh, my. You just made my Friday, possibly my whole weekend. Priceless.
July 25th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Great link! I thought the most fascinating observation in this article was actually its conclusion drawing parallels between “Persuasion” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” I hadn’t really thought of those together. But you know…
July 25th, 2008 at 6:18 pm
Wait, that was a rape scene? It didn’t seem that clear cut to me.
Also, Davies didn’t immediately reveal the aggressor was Willoughby, so the uninitiated might be left in suspense.
July 25th, 2008 at 6:22 pm
QUOTE- Sue Says:
July 25th, 2008 at 2:52 pm
“admirable dentition”. Oh, my. You just made my Friday, possibly my whole weekend. Priceless.
Indeed! This film was Fanny “Priceless”! Where was the Fanny from the book may I ask?
July 25th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
So that was a rape scene? I think that’s a bit of a strong word to describe it; but if that was what Davies intended, then he really needs to take a step back from this JA adaption business. And it really was a most confusing way to begin the movie.
July 25th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Where was the Fanny from the book may I ask?
You may well ask, Sylvia. Unfortunately, this was Mansfield Park: The Alternate Reality Years. You know, the one that also features the Yenta-Mrs. Bertram, the lobotomized Mrs. Norris, and the Edmund who gets turned on by purple colored yarn.
The real Fanny was probably hiding with the real Lady Bertram and the real Mrs. Norris–somewhere other than in this sorry adaptation….
July 25th, 2008 at 7:24 pm
I just can’t believe that hack loved the end scene in Persuasion ‘07….after the subtlety in Persuasion ‘95…you gotta laugh, I guess. Well either that or take a good hard swing at them with the cluebat…hmm decisions, decisions!
As for Lost in Austen, let’s just say I hold no hopes. With a plot like that, it’ll be a miracle if I don’t throw something at the TV.
July 25th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
I started the morning highly annoyed with the Telegraph article, which I read online, here on the East Coast. “Clueless” is a kind adjective for some of the ignorant, snarky stuff that passes for “reviews” or “criticism” in the press.
It’s nice to close the day on this lovely blog peopled by Janeites and their vivid insights and humor. That cardiovascular jog in “Persuasion” was worse than “weird,” it was tiresomely silly.
The comments on “dentition” — I’d never heard of Billie Piper (and barely recognized “Mansfield Park” in that incarnation) so I don’t know, are those her real teeth? And Mrs. Bertram? who WAS that philosophic lady dispensing marital wisdom? Aunt Norris was medicated in this adaptation, right?
July 26th, 2008 at 5:48 am
The person who wrote this article may have made some very strange remarks, but I agree on his point that there are too many Jane Austen related television programs and films (most of them very bad, or very inaccurate) lately. I never thought I’d say that, but it’s true, in my humble opinion. As long as the quality of these productions is good, it’s fine. But sadly that hasn’t always been the case these last few years…
July 26th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
But Franka, if they were good, we’d never get enough.
July 26th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
This ‘Lost in Austen” thing sounds like a 14-year old girl’s fan fiction or a modified “Choose your own Adventure” book.
July 27th, 2008 at 4:48 am
Yes Mags, that’s exactly what I was trying to say!
July 27th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
Oh dear God! Maybe Bingley is a misprint for Wickham? You would not think that these two characters could be confused but in 1995 someone writing ina newspaper about the (then forthcoming) P&P adaptation managed to do it. It would appear this adaptation is going to be shown when I am out of the country (JASNA AGM and associated visits to friends in Michigan and Illinois) and I will have to humiliate myself by asking someone to tape it for me.
July 27th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Oh dear God! Maybe Bingley is a misprint for Wickham?
I think the whole point is that Mary Sue, er, Amanda is “messing up” the plot of P&P so I’m afraid not. Being Mary Sue, she is, of course, more beautiful and desirable than the Bennet sisters combined, so of course all the gentlemen will fall at her feet.
And this IS from ITV, who brought us the Bath 5K and Toothy!Fanny. Nothing will surprise me in this one.
July 27th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
I have just been reading everyones’ comments and have been crying with laughter :). I agree with what everyone has said and only wish I was half as good at writing so I could write a letter to the Telegraph and ITV expressing my feelings on the article and the adaptations.