Twilight to the rescue ~ BrontëBlog

Thursday, December 03, 2009

Twilight to the rescue

Thursday, December 03, 2009 11:49 am by Cristina in Books, Brontë Society, Brontëana, Jane Eyre, Movies-DVD-TV, Weirdo, Wuthering Heights No comments

The Guardian recaps all the Brontë things about to happen that may or may not be due to the Twilight frenzy. (This blog's archives prove the fact that there were modern Brontë goings-on even before Twilight, though. Just saying.)

The Brontës are back in fashion – with a bit of help from Bella Swan. New films of Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre will shoot next spring, and a script about the teenage fantasies of the four Brontë siblings is in the works.
The film-makers are piggybacking off the success of the Twilight saga, which has sparked a renewed enthusiasm among financiers for gothic romance; the Brontës in particular. Wuthering Heights is one of Twilight heroine Bella Swan's favourite books, frequently referenced in the third episode Eclipse, whose storyline is inspired by Emily Brontë's only novel.
The producers of the latest Brontë projects are targeting the Twilight audience with younger casts than previous versions and scripts that emphasise the sensational gothic elements alongside a contemporary psychological realism.
Wuthering Heights, directed by Peter Webber, will star 22-year-old Ed Westwick, a British actor best known from the American teen TV series Gossip Girl, as an unusually youthful Heathcliff. Gemma Arterton, 23, will play Cathy.
Jane Eyre, meanwhile, will be directed by Cary Fukunaga who, in the pursuit of authenticity on his last film Sin Nombre, got arrested for riding illegally on the roof of a cargo train. Jane Eyre stars the 20-year-old Mia Wasikowska, soon to be seen in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland, opposite Michael Fassbender as Mr Rochester (who was at one point lined up for Heathcliff in the other film).
Dominic Murphy, the British director who made his debut this year's with the harrowing White Lightnin', is writing an untitled project about the imaginative worlds invented by the Brontës as adolescents, isolated in their Haworth parsonage.
"There is a whole younger audience out there that is ripe to enjoy these darker versions of what is generally served up, and the response from funders has been very upbeat, especially in the light of the recent success of Twilight," says Murphy's producer Mike Downey.
"The Twilight factor is extremely helpful to Wuthering Heights," agrees producer Robert Bernstein. "It's clearly in the zeitgeist. Why is anybody's guess, but people are absolutely obsessed with this doomed, romantic love that can only be achieved beyond death, or in the case of Twilight, by becoming a vampire."
In Eclipse, Bella quotes Cathy on Heathcliff to describe her feelings for her vampire lover Edward: "If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger." It is this forbidden, obsessive romance between Heathcliff and Cathy that Webber's film will focus on.
Sales of Wuthering Heights shot up in France when it was marketed alongside Eclipse in bookshops. In the UK, Harper Collins republished it with a cover imitating the Twilight design, including an endorsement from "Bella & Edward". Head of sales Kate Manning says the gimmick has given teenage girls "a renewed interest in Brontë".
Jane Eyre doesn't enjoy the same direct Twilight connection, but Moira Buffini's script brings out the book's gothic thrills. "This isn't going to be Zeffirelli lite," says producer Paul Trijbits, referring to the insipid 1996 version of Charlotte Brontë's novel. "It's fear in a gothic environment set against the backdrop of a love story. Is there something in the attic, or isn't there? It's a bit like The Others."
Wuthering Heights will shoot next May in Scotland and Ireland – leaving the Yorkshire moors to take advantage of finance. Jane Eyre is scheduled for March, either in Yorkshire or Scotland. Murphy's untitled Brontë project is intended to shoot in 2011. (Adam Dawtrey)

We first heard about the untitled Brontë project (to be shoot in 2011) here. And of course this all supposedly being made in order to cater to Twilight fans no producer will have thought of a Brontë story that is not connected to the Twilight saga. At least the untitled project does seems to explore a bit of a new direction, though the 'teenage Brontës' isn't a coincidence, as Mike Downey says.

Incidentally, if any producers are still casting, they will find Hollyoaks' Zoe Lister willing and ready, as she says in an interview for HeatWorld.

What do you have planned next?
Plans? Plans? Ha! Hopefully some theatre, quality dramas and so on. As long as I’m working. I’d love to do a period drama. A Brontë would be good, but they’ve all been on recently.

Funny she should say that 'they've all been on recently'.

The Smith College Sophian looks at the whole 'the Brontës are fashionable because of Twilight' thing from a different, much more negative, point of view.

Did I just see a copy of Pride and Prejudice atop the pile of Twilight paraphernalia? Sadly, I did. And it was no ordinary copy either. Twilight has earned the rights to reprint literary classics to appeal to the vampire-loving preteen population. My soul wept.
It was not only Pride and Prejudice that got hurt, either. Romeo and Juliet and Wuthering Heights were also snatched up into the whirlpool of destruction Stephenie Meyer is leaking unto the world. Dark covers reminiscent of the Twilight books equipped with creepy flowers now bind these three literary masterpieces.
Each work has a catchy slogan on it as well - "The love that started it all" for Pride and Prejudice, "The original forbidden love" for Romeo and Juliet and "Love never dies" for Wuthering Heights. The Wuthering Heights cover caused me to cringe the most, though: In the top corner, a bubble informed potential readers that it is "Bella and Edwards's favorite book."
I wish I could say the madness stopped there, but alas the marketing world decided to further stab me in the heart. In the back of the copy of Wuthering Heights there is a quiz to help readers find out if the love between them and their partner is as "tumultuous" - I was shocked by their "big word" choice - as the love between Catherine and Heathcliff. Really now, really?
I'm sure that somewhere Ms. Bronte is rolling over in her grave, though I would prefer she come back as a poltergeist who haunts Meyer for the rest of her life and keeps her from ever writing down another word beyond the occasional grocery list. (Ava Jacobstein)

Christmas ideas are creeping into news outlets. The Times, for instance, compiles a list of good biographies. Tormented Hope: Nine hypochondriac Lives by Brian Dillon is one of them.

Tormented Hope Nine Hypochondriac Lives by Brian DillonHypochondriacs, Dillon reminds us, are always other people, and in these elegant portraits he tells the stories of nine bodies imprisoned by delusional illness. A fine stylist (James Boswell saw himself as “a kind of Holland: a fragile land, temporarily reclaimed”), Dillon also has an empathic bedside manner, and never strays from the aches and pains of the body in question, be it that of Charles Darwin, Charlotte Brontë, Andy Warhol or Glenn Gould. His diagnosis of hypochondria both as the illness and the cure is beautifully argued (Penguin Ireland £18.99). (Frances Wilson)

Also on the list is Martin Stannard's biography of Muriel Spark, who has been mentioned here before.

White Apricot suggests a cape (pictured here) which is described as

Very “Heathcliff on the moors". . . (Bonny Osterhage)

But if you are looking for a very special Christmas present and very special recipient and have a large fortune you might consider bidding at one of the forthcoming Brontë auctions (at Christie's and at Sotheby's) and presenting your 'prize' to the Brontë Society, as The Telegraph and Argus reminds us today.

Finally, the Heathcliff metaphor of the day comes from Metropulse: