Hung up on Heathcliff's skin colour

There are obviously hundreds of news outlets reporting the cast of Wuthering Heights, some just the bare facts and others hung up on Heathcliff's skin colour. On this topic, we think Emily was intentionally or unintentionally vague. Heathcliff's origins are in Liverpool, which also leaves the door open to many possibilities. It's been a subject of study for decades and, even though as always the X pundits seem to know it all (spoiler alert: they don't), the fact remains that it's open to interpretation. And, apart from that, weren't we all so into colour-blind casting and all that? Wasn't the actor's fine interpretation enough to transcend skin colour? 

Anyway, on to some of the articles now. The Telegraph has Michael Stewart and Dr Claire O'Callaghan discuss it:

It comes after a 2011 adaptation of the Emily Brontë novel cast a black man in the role for the first time, after the use of actors such as Laurence Olivier and Ralph Fiennes in earlier productions.

There is a growing belief among literary experts that Heathcliff, described in the novel as a “dark-skinned gypsy”, is either black or mixed-race.

Michael Stewart, the director of the Brontë Writing Centre, said: “I feel quite strongly that Emily’s intention was that he was either black or mixed-race and there are lots of clues in the text to suggest that.”

The Brontë expert, who has written a novel interpreting the “missing years of Heathcliff” titled ‘Ill Will’, added that it had been “an interesting decision, because we live in a very different time now” compared with previous adaptations.

In Brontë’s 1847 novel, Heathcliff is found abandoned as a baby at the slave port of Liverpool by Mr Earnshaw, who adopts him, so his ethnicity is “ambiguous”.

Mr Stewart said: “With Wuthering Heights, you’ve had many years of white actors playing the more ambiguous ethnic character… But things are different now, the way we represent certain people in art and culture comes with a responsibility now that wasn’t there 20 years ago.”

Brontë fans commenting on Mr Elordi’s casting announcement agreed, with one post on X, formerly Twitter, garnering more than 119,000 likes and more than four million views stating: “Heathcliff is described as a dark-skinned brown man in the book and a major plot point is that he was subjected to racist abuse by his adopted family. But yeah sure Jacob Elordi is perfect!”

Dr Claire O’Callaghan, another Brontë family expert and the editor-in-chief of the official journal of the Brontë Society, suggested that Mr Fennell’s casting “overlooks” the readings of the original text.

She told The Telegraph: “I guess the danger of this – of casting a white actor – particularly in the cultural climate, is that it overlooks the ambiguity that’s there, and therefore kind of overlooks the readings that Emily Brontë is pointing to that are as rich as anything else.

“So I think it’s interesting that Hollywood has made that choice. I’m assuming that’s because they’re trying to distinguish it from the Andrea Arnold production that went on a few years ago.”

Dr O’Callaghan, the author of Emily Brontë Reappraised, said it had been a “brave decision” for the film to be made in the current cultural climate.

“It’s a really interesting time, I think, particularly post-Me Too… And certainly with the ongoing righteous battles around cultural race context that are happening all over the world, to kind of make this film, it’s a brave decision,” she said.

Speaking about the frustrated fan’s viral comment about Mr Elordi being unsuited to the role given the character being subject to racist abuse, she explained: “If you’re reading the comments around blackness as related to skin colour and his ethnic origins, then certainly it reads as racist abuse.

“And that’s part of the horror of that first part of the book is that Emily Brontë shows the kind of abuse of the outsider, and it’s for that reason that he has been written about, both in fictional terms, as black… and, of course, in Andrea Arnold’s adaptation.”

The casting was branded as “bizarre” by Brontë fans online, with one writing on X: “Why not Sydney Sweeney as Jane Eyre.”

Another added: “It’s extremely disappointing that in 2024 nothing has changed in Hollywood. But what’s even worse is that it’s such an important aspect of the book.”

Dr O’Callaghan is hopeful that the novel will not be portrayed on-screen as a love story, which she insists is “one of the biggest mistakes” the film and television industry keeps making with Wuthering Heights adaptations.

She said: “The book is far much more than that, it’s really dark… I hope that Hollywood does justice to it.

“A critic once said that it’s not an adaptable text, and that’s why I think Hollywood has really struggled over the years to make something that really reflects the entirety, the fullness, of the original.” (India McTaggart)

Our understanding of Heathcliff's abuse by his adoptive family and by the Lintons has always been that it's about class not race. That's the whole point of making him come back as a rich man, able to buy his way into society, and still be an outcast. It is possible that his skin color may have been a contributing factor, but if the novel has to be read from a social point of view Emily would seem to be more interested in class issues adding the vague racial descriptions as one more layer rather than the whole point. But, again, part of the allure of Wuthering Heights has always been that it's so open to each reader's interpretation. To try and tie it to any one way of reading it is to limit it.

Newsweek also looks at some of the reactions, including a comment from a spokesperson at the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

Collider's Maggie Boccella wrote on the platform to her 1,000 fans: "Gonna just go ahead and keep my English major mouth shut on this one." But then posted: "Said I was gonna shut up, but it is *painfully* obvious that Fennell doesn't actually care about WH's themes. She just wants to make a tortured lovers drama with a name that'll put butts in seats."

As though her last two movies didn't make that shallowness obvious already," she said of the filmmaker, who was at the helm of last year's Saltburn and 2020's Promising Young Woman.

TV and film critic Gavia Baker-Whitelaw added: "White Heathcliff and 34-year-old Cathy, and they both look like they belong on Instagram.... I'm obsessed. Emerald Fennell does it again [derogatory]," to her 13,000 followers.

"Shame," one fan remarked on X. "Much more suitable actors out there."

Another person—an academic and writer specializing in the field of nineteenth-century Gothic—penned: "Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights: Heathcliff was 'as dark almost as if it came from the devil'; 'a dark skinned gipsy; as a child, he wishes he'd had 'light hair and a fair skin', aware of his radicalisation.

"The film industry: *let us cast yet another white actor*." [...]

Brontë expert Nick Holland told Newsweek: "One difficulty in the casting of Heathcliff is the conundrum Emily left us about his race—we know that he was plucked from the docks at Liverpool, and he is described as dark skinned, whilst other characters, using the parlance of the time, refer to him as a 'gipsy' and as a 'Lascar,' a native of Southeast Asia. It is also noted that he could be American or Spanish.

"What they are definitely saying is that Heathcliff stood out in some way because of his looks and skin color. The 2011 adaptation cast Black actors James Howson and Solomon Glave as Heathcliff, and I think it was a very successful move."

Holland went on: "Emerald Fennell, with Elordi, has given us another white Heathcliff—but given the ambiguity of Emily's description this shouldn't necessarily rule him out. I do think, however, that it would be preferable to have a BAME actor portraying Heathcliff in new adaptations, if only to show that the England of this time was more ethnically diverse than some people realize."

A representative for the Brontë Parsonage Museum told Newsweek: "Everyone at the Brontë Parsonage Museum is very excited about Emerald Fennell's adaptation of Wuthering Heights.

"Emily Brontë's Heathcliff is shrouded in intrigue and his ancestral background is ambiguous, but every screen or theatre adaptation brings something fresh for contemporary audiences to think about. We are thrilled that Emily's work continues to inspire creatives today and look forward to learning more about Emerald Fennell's ideas." (Julia Hunt)

The Independent questions the casting choice as well.

However, in the book, the character is described as having dark hair, dark eyes, and dark skin and is believed to be from a Roma or Gypsy background. [...]

In response, The Independent’s film critic Clarisse Loughrey asked: “Did anyone actually read the book before deciding this?” (Greg Evans)

Dazed addresses our colour-blind casting comment. Apparently,

colour-blind casting is only progressive if it is helping create opportunities for actors of colour. It’s no secret that Black, Asian and mixed-race actors are seldom offered lead roles or afforded the chance to play rounded, three-dimensional characters (especially in period dramas). Speaking to the Telegraph in 2018, Mod expressed her frustration with the stereotypical, “meek, supporting roles” usually offered to Asian actresses like herself: “Doctors, lawyers and policewomen [...] There’s still a long way to go.” With this in mind, it’s maddening that Elordi has been cast as Heathcliff – a complex, well-rounded lead character explicitly referred to as “dark-skinned” in Brontë’s original text.

It’s especially frustrating given that Heathcliff’s race is also integral to his characterisation: as a boy he is repeatedly subject to racist abuse, with various characters describing him as a “dog”, “dirty” and a “slave boy”; these formative experiences of racism shape Heathcliff into the cruel, aggressive, traumatised man he becomes. When he flees the moors partway through the novel, he’s hell-bent on amassing wealth in order to woo Cathy – but his insecurity about being perceived as racially ‘impure’ also fuels his dogged pursuit of status. Ultimately, Heathcliff’s saturnine temperament and Cathy’s reluctance to marry him just don’t hit home as powerfully if he isn’t portrayed as a racialised character.

Granted, Fennell is not the first person to cast a white actor as Heathcliff – Andrea Arnold remains the only director to have ever cast a Black actor, James Howson, in the role. But do we really need another white Heathcliff in 2024, when the likes of Dev Patel, Regé-Jean Page, and Riz Ahmed are available? I’m not convinced. (Serena Smith)

Again, it's also about class, not just race. Otherwise what would be the point of his coming back rich? Heathcliff is trying to buy his way into society. If his issues were only about his skin colour, there would be no point in him doing that.

E!News on the (pointless) online controversy:

However, some on social media couldn’t help but question the casting choices for star-crossed lovers Heathcliff and Catherine.

“No hate to Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi but neither of them have enough Psychologically Tortured vibes to play Cathy and Heathcliff,” one user wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “Like a Wuthering Heights adaptation simply needs actors who are weirder.”

Another X user suggested Elle Fanning for the role of Catherine and Dev Patel as Heathcliff, calling them “the casting I would die for.”

“No hate to Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi of course,” the user noted, “but for Wuthering Heights ??? No. Their faces are too modern.”

One observer further claimed Robbie and Elordi were ill-suited for the roles for having “iPhone Face,” a phenomenon described as being too modern-looking to play a character in a period piece—although they noted it wouldn’t deter them from seeing the film.

“While I feel that both Jacob Elordi and Margot Robbie have severe cases of iPhone face I will be seated for Wuthering Heights regardless,” they wrote, “Because to me being hot is the most important thing an actor can be.” (Will Reid)

Also on Buzzfeed.

The Spinoff asks Emerald Fennell: 'please don’t Saltburnify Wuthering Heights'.

Welcome, friends, to the inaugural meeting of the Support Group for Concerned Citizens Against the Saltburning of Wuthering Heights. 

It has been brought to our attention that one Emerald Fennell, the writer and director of that embarrassingly over-hyped movie about the wee Irish actor from The Banshees of Inisherin fucking a freshly dug and populated grave, has set her sights on a film adaptation of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. What’s more, actors Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi have been announced as the lead characters of Catherine and Heathcliff. 

First, some reactions on this casting news gathered from within the group: 

“Hard pass from me”

“Did she [Fennell] read the book?”

“This is a mistake of gargantuan proportions”

“Elordi is not Heathcliff. So, no”

“No.”

“Hell no.”

A scan of our initial concerns can be summarised as: the boy Elordi – handsome as he may have been in Saltburn – is no Heathcliff. And as much as Margot Robbie appears to be able to turn her talents to any character, without a decent Heathcliff there is no Cathy. Wuthering Heights is about the pain and brutality of loving what you fear and fearing what you love, all conveyed in Emily Brontë’s startling, poetic prose. Elordi and Robbie simply do not read as brutish, muddy, and crazed purveyors of the best and worst of human nature. Too polished, too Hollywood, too Saltburn. 

But though we may be twitchy about the casting, this dispatch is really to convey the far greater fear that Fennell is going to Saltburnify one of the greatest, most gloriously batshit, gothic masterpieces to ever haunt the Yorkshire moors. Wuthering Heights deserves the very best and we’re afraid Fennell has not proven that she is such (an example of the very best being of course the Emma Thompson (screenplay) and Ang Lee (Director) collaboration that produced the 1995 film adaptation of Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, which is perfect). It has been reported that Fennell is down to write, produce and direct Wuthering Heights and this group considers this trifecta to be a huge mistake.

Should Fennell be let anywhere near any Brontë is the question. [...]

But Elordi? The only interesting thing about him in Saltburn was his eyebrow piercing. He’s going to need to unveil a hell of a lot more charisma if he wants to do justice to one of the great chaotic, love demons in all of art. Heathcliff is weather. Unsettling and mesmerising and magnetic. He is the wicked, wild slip that was eroded out of Catherine thanks to class and gender expectations. Also, Heathcliff says shit like this: “You teach me now how cruel you’ve been – cruel and false. Why did you despise me? Why did you betray your own heart, Cathy? I have not one word of comfort. You deserve this. You have killed yourself. Yes, you may kiss me, and cry; and wring out my kisses and tears: they’ll blight you – they’ll damn you. […] Do I want to live? What kind of living will it be when you – oh, God! would you like to live with your soul in the grave?’

This passage may offer a clue, I suppose, to why Fennell is compelled to make the 23rd film adaptation of Wuthering Heights. She does seem to enjoy a character that loves to the grave and beyond. And look, who among us doesn’t understand the compulsion? Wuthering Heights is a cult book for freaks and normies alike. Who among us hasn’t wanted to flail about the moors all hopeless about the division between our hearts and our minds? 

And yet we, The Anti-Saltburning Society, have grave doubts. Wuthering Heights has spawned a vast array of artistic spinoffs, most of them shadows of the founding story. Kate Bush’s perfect song and subsequent fan-made mass dance mobs are an exception. Which leads us directly to the elephant in the room: the panic-inducing suspicion that Fennell might use Kate’s song in the film? I fear this is inevitable. We know Fennell loves pop music. And we know she’s not super fussed about historical accuracy. We also know that Cruel Intentions, one of the inspirations for Saltburn, is a retelling of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’ 1782 novel Les Liaisons dangereuses. And while we’re here, what if Fennell leans so far into her late 90s x early 2000s influences that she produces a Frankenstein’s monster of Wuthering Heights meets She’s All That meets Britney Spears’ music video for the 2003 hit, Toxic? 

And yet. If Fennell does want to do Wuthering Heights then perhaps we should hope that it is precisely that kind of translation that she makes – an ahistoric retelling over an attempt at a faithful, historically and textually accurate adaptation. Perhaps we ought to hope that Fennell tugs this gothic classic so far out of context that we can only see the vaguest of Brontë pencil marks underneath. It worked for 10 Things I Hate About You, and it worked for Clueless. It definitely worked for Cruel Intentions. 

The question remains, however: does this adaptation even need to happen at all? I’ve counted over 20 film adaptations of Wuthering Heights made between 1948 and 2015. And that’s not including 2022’s Emily Brontë biopic, Emily, starring Sex Education’s Emma Mackey (which was OK: Mackey was compelling, and the story managed to weave a lot of Brontë theories, but it made a ludicrous mistake with a silly out-of-character secret sex romp with a tutor which would have been better left as simmering but unrequited desire). 

Ultimately I put forward a motion that we beg Fennell to leave off. We’ve had Tom Hardy as Heathcliff, we’ve had Juliette Binoche as Cathy. Can we please just leave it there?

All those in favour say, “Haunt me, then!” (Claire Mabey)

Tatler also comments on the Saltburn approach.

But much like Saltburn, there’s more depraved yearning than actual sex; expect visually dense scenes, laden with symbolism and psychologically charged suspense. This adaptation of Wuthering Heights is likely to push viewers to think about reaching the extremes of the psyche… and what happens when a collection of characters (who, frankly, are all a bit too closely related) fail to restrain their turbulent emotions – and what grave consequences unfold.

I say grave, because if you managed to witness that fateful tomb scene in Saltburn, brace yourself once more. Emerald Fennel hinted she might interpret a similarly climatic moment in Wuthering Heights. She previously teased the film with an illustrated poster, featuring two suggestively encircled skeletons that reference a similarly erotically charged graveyard scene. [...]

It’s macabre, it’s erotic, it’s esoteric – it’s not even the end of it. Because there’s another object that could contend with Saltburn’s bathwater. It’s locks of hair. Earlier in the novel, though Catherine is still buried, Heathcliff tries to replace Edgar’s lock of hair out of her locket, for his own. Later, however, Nelly the housekeeper, secretly retrieves Edgar’s lock and twines the two in the locket.

Comely corpses, and such reliquary objects of devotion are some of the hallmark features of Gothic literature, specifically the Gothic Revival, where Victorians became re-enchanted by the Medieval age. Wuthering Heights (the fictional house the book is named after) features ‘crumbling griffins’ and ‘grotesque carvings’, where characters are often locked inside a quagmire of garrats and attics, often looking forlornly out of windows under the house’s psychological grip. So think of Gothic Revival manors like Tyntesfield where they could film. [...]

Unlike the ‘golden hour’ inflected Saltburn, with it’s yellowed Oxford stones, and flower-wilting September summer. Fennell, typically an ‘indoor’ director, will have to contend with the Yorkshire moors. Dark, boggy, unruly, and perilous (with looming threat of how you can drown there in the novel). This new landscape will give a whole new mood, colour palette and lighting effect.

Perhaps there might some sublime-happy Caspar David Friedrich-esque craggs. Expect winds, snow blizzards, frost, and characters that cry hopelessly in the rain in the day and hold lanterns at night, to careen the screens.

Throughout Wuthering Heights, various characters descend and ascend class ranks in ways that mar marriages and incite virulent vengeance, much like Saltburn. Soil seems to be a running protagonist (why stop now?), especially with class and ‘refinement’ in Wuthering Heights. Soil, dirt, mud: on clothes, on people, is a symbolically charged motif on being ‘gentile’ and where you stand in the class rank. So we could expect something on that. [...]

Wuthering Heights is heavy with symbolism, Fennel could take it in any direction, but you may want to pay attention to: birds and bird-watching, keys, windows, scratched names on walls, trespassing walls to pick forbidden fruit, heaven, and blood on bedsheets. We’ll have to see where she takes the story. (Charlotte Rickards)

Den of Geek thinks that 'Wuthering Heights Must Overcome Emerald Fennell and the Novel’s Biggest Weakness'.

When it comes to Wuthering Heights, though, the devil is always in the details. While it is generally considered to be a classic of Western literature, the Gothic novel has long divided critics and readers. Its tale of two lovers caught between the expectations of society and their feuding families may sound like a classic Romeo and Juliet-style narrative, but Wuthering Heights is so much darker and complex than even that often romanticized and misremembered Shakespeare play. 

It’s a novel full of violence perpetuated by often fundamentally unlikable characters. Granted, some of those criticisms are rooted in outdated moral panics (“How dare they question the righteousness of Victorian society?!?!?”), but the book’s complex themes and the often intentionally overly dramatic ways it explores them have long challenged readers who find themselves responding to the text, regardless of the respect they may have for the ideas of the material. That’s why some prefer getting their Wuthering Heights fix by watching one of the many Wuthering Heights film or TV adaptations that often make sharp choices in truncating the story. 

But even then, most of those adaptations have struggled to clear the book’s most infamous hurdle: its multi-generational structure. Wuthering Heights not only addresses some tricky topics through the lens of despicable characters, but does so via a sweeping narrative that spans decades. Even fans of the novel are divided on its second half (or “second volume” in the original publishing), which features a rather sizable time jump, many new characters, and questionable deviations from the first half of the book. It has even been suggested that the second half feels like it was written by a different person (though that is more of a literary criticism than a conspiracy). 

Interpretations aside, the very nature of that second half has long posed a problem for Wuthering Heights’ numerous adaptations. Some of those versions (like the famous 1939 William Wyler film) cut significant chunks out of the later parts of the novel to streamline the continuation of the initial Catherine and Heathcliff story. While that adaptation was widely praised on its own merits (it was nominated for eight Academy Awards, and is still celebrated for Laurence Olivier’s interpretation of Heathcliffe), it has long been criticized by readers for altering so much of the novel and arguably compromising some of the book’s more complex themes in the process. Other adaptations (like the 1992 Wuthering Heights film) that have attempted to adapt the full story have been praised for their faithfulness, but criticized for failing to properly translate that material to another medium in an effective way.

While the “full” version of Wuthering Heights has been called one of those unfilmmable projects, it’s probably more accurate to describe such an adaptation as “complicated.” That’s also what makes Emerald Fennell’s decision to tackle that text so fascinating. 

Based on her previous works, there is little doubt that Fennell is capable of at least attempting to adapt a story filled with revenge, fundamentally unlikable characters, dark themes, and stately manors. Those are all quickly becoming some of the director’s trademarks, which seemingly makes the intimidating Wuthering Heights a strangely perfect fit for her. 

What worries me most is the infamous nature of Wuthering Heights’ final half. I’m a bigger Fennell defender than most, but both Promising Young Woman and Saltuburn suffered from notable final act problems. The former compromised its most intriguing ideas with a shoehorned easy ending, and Saltburn burned down whatever illusions of complexity it could have maintained with a truly awful conventional “twist” spelled out to the audience in agonizing detail. 

Granted, we do not know if Fennell will attempt to adapt Wuthering Heights’ second half as written or if she will reinterpret that portion of the novel as other adaptations have done. However, the smart money is on Fennell taking on the whole thing. It s just hard to imagine that she will back down from that challenge given the nature of her previous works and her general willingness to take some big swings. (Matthew Byrd)

Finally, Jane Eyre's Library shows a Jane Eyre edition from India.