The Yorkshire Post complains about the
arguable overdose of costume drama in the BBC:
The BBC is churning them out at an industrial rate, too. No sooner did Mrs Gaskell's Cranford roll off our screen than Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility (for the umpteenth time) rolled on to it. (...)
Aren't we in danger of historical drama fatigue? The plots are starting to merge together and become confused in my head: what did Becky Sharp ever see in Mr Darcy? Why is Heathcliff banging the table in The Way We Live Now? How come Wackford Squeers is tutoring the Bennet sisters? Whether it is Eliot or Thackeray, Wilde or the Brontës, the adaptation comprises either all, or most of, the following: several horses, a cab, a palatial country home, a Georgian terrace, a drawing room with elephantine furniture and delicate chandeliers, a man with a port-coloured face and grey whiskers as thick as a privet hedge, a demure and delicate young woman with skin the colour of alabaster, and a darkened hovel or two to remind you that the poor are always with us. (...)
Television, and the Corporation in particular, used to specialise in one-off plays that were either about contemporary life in the raw or refreshingly experimental; that's essentially how Dennis Potter established himself, and Ken Loach learnt his trade.
Nowadays, the BBC timidly turns to the classics.
Very recently, I overheard a frustrated scriptwriter describe wheedling a commission out of the BBC as being "more difficult than sending a firework to the moon".
Rather than tackle the issues that define and dominate modern Britain, our public broadcaster neglects them.
Reader, I will switch off. (Duncan Hamilton)
Readers, what do you think?
The Halifax Evening Courier reports episodes of gang violence in Southowram, a place related to the Brontë story:
Southowram has long had a reputation as a quiet village, well away from the urban sprawl of Halifax. Emily Bronte taught at a local school in 1837, and some say it was the inspiration for Wuthering Heights.
Emily Brontë was a a governess at Miss Patchett's Ladies Academy at Law Hill School leaving after about six months due to homesickness.
The San Francisco Chronicle informs of the death of
Sun Daolin:
Sun Daolin, a leading figure in Chinese movies and theater since World War II, died in Shanghai's Huadong Hospital on Dec. 28, 10 days after his 86th birthday. (...)
Mr. Sun also translated and adapted many Western plays for Chinese audiences, including "Wuthering Heights" and "Arsenic and Old Lace," and did voiceovers for many Western films. (Robert Hurwitt)
Another decease to be reported is
James Costigan's:
In 1958, for “The DuPont Show of the Month,” he wrote a widely praised adaptation of “Wuthering Heights”; it starred Richard Burton and Rosemary Harris. (Margalit Fox in The New York Times)
The Virginian Pilot adds to
the other reviewers that have compared
Atonement 2007 to Wuthering Heights:
Think Wuthering Heights, but with modern subtlety from the actors. (Mal Vincent)
The Guardian reviews Diane Athill's new book
Somewhere Towards The End and reminds us of the following:
But above all, she learned from Jean Rhys, whom Athill helped to rediscover in 1957, when Rhys had not yet finished Wide Sargasso Sea - a book which would very likely not have been published without Athill's perseverance and nursing, astute advice and friendship. Rhys would say, "'cut, cut, cut. Keep it down as much possible.' She used to overdo it, even."
On the blogosphere today: A Glass Castle im Rosengarten discusses Jane Eyre 2006 (and the book itself):
To wrap up, I'd say that this version does not exactly conform to the book, but it's enjoyable enough once you forget the crumpled and sinister-looking beginning (the Lowood scenes were so awfully scary!). I would describe it as a-too-forward-Jane version. (Dornroeschen)
Doniferous writes an ineffable
Response to Jane Eyre. Tankar och Vattenskvalp and
A vadå? talk about Jane Eyre 2006 and other versions in Swedish. And
Postman's Horn posts a letter from Charlotte Brontë to Ellen Nussey from July 6th, 1835.
Categories: Emily Brontë, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wuthering Heights
I definitely don't agree with historical drama fatigue! The BBC does them so brilliantly and I for one never tire of watching them!
ReplyDeleteIgnore those period drama naysayers; they always seem to want to spoil the fun for everyone. These people are the very same who criticise Poliakoff and Jimmy McGovern's tv work, and then have the audacity to roll their eyes at the best dramatisation to come along in a long time (Cranford); one that has been praised all over the board. In short: they're never happy.
ReplyDeleteAnd why do they seem to think that we're all female and wear bonnets?
Sense and Sensibility "for the umpteenth time"? The last BBC adaptation was way back in 1981.
The only complaint I have - and it's a minor one - is that the BBC tend to play safe; it took them ages to air Cranford.
I think the BBC could do a lot more to adapt modern and recent classics; I would've loved a BBC adaptation of Ian McEwan's masterwork, Atonement; or Henry James' What Maisie Knew.
Anyway, it's about time we got Villette, Shirley, and Agnes Grey on our screens!
I'm as uncomplaining as you both are.
ReplyDeleteMy only wish is the same as Tattycoram's - that they would take more risks sometimes. Sense and Sensibility or Jane Eyre have been adapted many, many times on different formats while novels just as worthy like Villette - never. It's a vicious circle after all. These novels tend to be even more popular because of their adaptations (apart from their own values, of course) while the others seem less popular precisely because of the scarce adaptations. (Granted, Mrs Gaskell now has three hugely popular adaptations to her name and yet she's lagging behind. So the logic might not be so simple after all).