The mask scene

Movie Maker has Frances O'Connor tell what's fact and what's fiction in Emily.

“Once we get to the mask scene in the film, if the audience still feels that they’re watching a biopic, I think we’re in trouble,” O’Connor laughs in an interview with MovieMaker, referring to an early scene in which the Brontës, plus Weightman, gather around and take turns trying on an old theatrical mask.

“I did all the research, and then I read Wuthering Heights, and I really wanted to create a film that really celebrated her voice,” O’Connor adds. [...]

The result is a fictional story inspired by real-life people.

“I wanted to tell a story that’s about a young woman existing within the patriarchy, trying to find her voice,” O’Connor says.

Did Emily Brontë really have an affair with William Weightman?

The short answer is that there’s no evidence to support that Emily Brontë had an affair with her father’s curate, William Weightman, O’Connor tells us. But he was a real person who did interact with the family, and Emily and her sisters did refer to him as “Celia Amelia.”

“William Weightman was a real character that existed who worked alongside the Brontës. He was called Celia Amelia by the Brontë sisters. He was a flirt. He did die when the sisters were in Brussels,” O’Connor tells us. “There was a period of time where it was Branwell, Weightman and Emily kicking around the parsonage for about two years while the sisters were away. And I don’t think she had an affair, but we don’t know.”

O’Connor thinks that Emily’s brother, Branwell Brontë, and Weightman might have inspired two of the characters in Wuthering Heights.

“She might have been looking at these guys in terms of Bramwell being like Heathcliff and Weightman being like Edgar in a way,” O’Connor says.

And from what is known of Emily in real life, she was indeed shy.

“She’s definitely an introvert. She was definitely socially anxious,” she says.

O’Connor also doesn’t believe the rumors that it was really Anne Brontë who had an affair with Weightman.

“That’s actually not proven, and in fact, Juliet Barker says in her book, The Brontës, that actually Charlotte was the one who was the most in love with him,” O’Connor says. “And he clearly was not interested in her. And so he I felt like she kind of invented this — Juliet Barker talks about a bit that there’s really very little evidence that there was any connection to any of them [having an affair with Weightman]. But it’s kind of become that, from like one little reference that Charlotte writes in a letter. But it’s kind of disputed by a couple of historians.” [...]

Did Emily and Branwell really get tattoos?

Although O’Connor assures us that it would have been possible for them to get tattoos in the 1800s, that scene where Branwell and Emily write “Freedom in thought” on their arms is again a bit of artistic license on O’Connor’s part — “my imagination,” she says.

She clarifies that in the movie, she intended for the words to have just been written in pen ink on their arms, not real tattoos.

“Emily was a free thinker. She really was someone who had original thought and her own ideas. And for me, that’s really important at a time where there’s so much kind of group thinking and group consciousness around everything,” O’Connor said of her inspiration for the scene. (Margeaux Sippell)

Roger Ebert interviews both Frances O'Connor and Emma Mackey.

Just as in Emily’s book, Wuthering Heights, the setting is tremendously important. We first see Emily literally caressing the moor grass. What was important to you in portraying the environment the Brontës lived in?

Frances O'Connor: When I was 20-something, I was doing a film in London, [Mansfield Park], and I had a couple of weeks off because the director got sick. I already was a bit of a Brontë geek, so I went up to Haworth, where the Brontës are from, for the first time, and there was something about visiting that landscape that for me was incredibly evocative, and you could see where that world of the book came from. Landscape is associated with emotion a lot of the time, and I really wanted to put that into the film. And so, the environment had to be a place that felt very evocative and also elemental with the wind and the rain and the birdsong so that you really felt immersed in the world. One of the things I felt was very important was that the sound also helped us feel immersed in the world, whether it's the actor's breath or the moving movement of the costume. We foleyed a lot of that so that you really felt you were inside it. 

Because that's how I felt when I read Wuthering Heights.[...]

I also loved the lighting in the film, which felt very authentic to the period, just candlelight and sunlight. How does that affect your performance?

Emma Mackey: It was very freeing. I didn't feel like I was ever placed. I don't remember ever being on a mark. The cinematographer, Nanu Segal, fashioned this L-shaped arm that she attached to the camera with candles, so in the evening scenes and when the characters were in bed, it was incredible. And it didn't even clock at the time. I didn’t think, “What's she doing? What is that contraption?” But it was great. I think specifically when Charlotte and Emily are in bed, and they're telling the stories, and Charlotte's telling her to keep her stories to herself, and it's embarrassing, that first kind of sister-off that we have, that was all candlelit. That's what gives it that hue. I don't ever remember being told it was my close-up, so when I saw the film, I was like, “Oh, bloody hell, it's quite a lot of my face.” That's quite a good sign, I think. I wasn't self-aware. The lighting and the way that the camera moved were so key to that being the case.

One of the most memorable moments of the movie is the mask scene. 

EM: It was intense. We did it over two or three days, if my memory serves me well, all candlelit. It was a piece that we had been building up to, and it felt quite theatrical. So, naturally, it felt like a theater piece. And we did it in many ways, in many different ways, but always as a oner, so we never broke it up into segments. It was always the entire monologue, so all of the reactions are very raw, and I think that's what makes it so emotionally charged. Tonally, that scene is what shifts the tone of the movie so clearly. And you step into something very, very different and surprising, a supernatural, almost grotesque, very gothic world. And I think that's so key. It is an ode to Emily's writing universe and her legacy. 

FO: We wanted that scene to be a progression that started from someplace where it felt very safe: a family sitting around a table, they've all had a great day, and it feels very inviting, you want to be in that world. And then slowly the light gets less and less and less. And then, eventually, we get into these single isolated images of all the characters. We decided to have one single light source above, like an oil light, an oil lamp, and then for the faces to be quite lit but then quickly recede into the dark. So, you weren't able to really see what was behind you. And then we had the window behind Emily, and you see their image, their reflections behind her, which was also very beautiful. And then, when the windows opened, the light would swing and create this impressionistic sense of hysteria and chaos with the light. (Nell Minow)

GVN reviews the film.

The film’s emotional heft and weight is carried easily by Emma Mackey in the titular role of Emily. She absolutely shines, and the audience feels every emotion pouring out of her expressive eyes. A quote by the author Eva Hope described Emily Brontë’s personality as “a peculiar mixture of timidity and Spartan-like courage.” Mackey completely captures that in every scene, particularly the moments she is acting opposite Oliver Jackson-Cohen, playing William Weightman, and Alexandra Dowling, playing Charlotte Brontë. She effortlessly oscillates from fiery indignation to heartbreaking vulnerability throughout the film. 

Much of what is known of the real Emily Brontë is that she was very introverted and adored nature, her home, animals, and her siblings. Something that practically every introvert can relate to is having your introversion be misinterpreted and classified as something strange and antisocial. It’s easy to become other people’s punching bag or doormat. This specific hardship and the difficulty of relating to others while having a rich inner life is a throughline in Emily. [...]

Frances O’Connor has crafted a beautiful and spellbinding film with Emily that takes into account both the known facets of Emily Brontë’s personality and the unknown ones that were likely present because she was human–something easy to forget with the passage of so much time. O’Connor makes Emily a real person again and allows her to have her moment in the sun when maybe she didn’t otherwise have that opportunity in her own life. Because it is not a traditional biopic, there is a freshness brought to the film that gives it a modern edge that will resonate well with audiences. It is an affectionate and encouraging story that will no doubt empower many, especially introverts and women. Instead of writing something that society deemed “proper” for women, Emily writes her unfiltered feelings and something true to herself. By doing so, she gains confidence and realizes the importance and power of her own voice and desires. (Jessica Gonzales)

ThirdCoastReview gives 3 stars out of 4 to the stage production of Villette at Lookingglass Theatre.

Lucy (winningly played by Mi Kang) is on the surface an adventurous young woman but she later admits she prefers her solitude.  She’s successful as a nanny and teacher of English to the three children of Mme. Beck (Helen Joo Lee), who also  operates a school. Lucy soon is promoted to school teacher and thus begins the career she loves. 

Several other characters become part of Lucy’s life. On board ship, she meets the silly young woman, Ginevra (Mo Shipley), who is vain about her looks and her expectations of marrying well. Ginevra, it turns out, is part of Villette society and the two women meet occasionally but do not become friends, even though Ginevra thinks they are besties. 

Overtaken by illness while out for a stroll, Lucy is rescued by John Bretton (Ronald Román-Meléndez), a young doctor, who takes her to his home so she can recover. There Lucy meets his mother Mrs. Bretton (a sparkling  Renée Lockett), who turns out to be Lucy’s godmother. (How this relationship came to be is never explained in the play.) Mrs. Bretton takes Lucy under her wing, introduces her to local people, arranges invitations and a new gown for her goddaughter. Lucy is usually conservatively dressed in a two-piece gray suit-dress. The fancy new gown is constructed so that Lucy can whip off her jacket and snap on the bright pink gown in a few seconds. (Kudos to Mara Blumenfeld for costume design.)

Professor Paul Emmanuel (Debo Balogun) is a highly respected teacher who takes an interest—and later a romantic interest—in Lucy. Their relationship is rocky at first but they later realize they are in love and plan to marry. 

Walsh’s cast takes on Brontë’s story in an accomplished manner, even the occasional French dialogue (with help from French consultant Christelle Chauvet). In addition to the lack of any backstory for Mrs. Bretton, her son is often referred to as Graham (his middle name in the novel) although he’s not identified that way in the program. The last half of the play moves along rather slowly; the running time of almost 2.5 hours could be accelerated a bit. 

That inventive scenic design, with sliding panels covered in handwriting, is by Yu Shibagaki, with lighting by John Colbert and sound design by Deon Custard and Brandon Reed. Stage manager is Katie Klemme. (Nancy Bishop)

The Bingeful lists Jane Eyre 2011 as a 'movie like Little Women'.