TeenHollywood: You must like a challenge because after playing an iconic figure like Alice you are playing Jane Eyre?And while on the subject of forthcoming movies, The Age gives an update on the status of Andrea Arnold's Wuthering Heights in an article about her previous film, Fish Tank:
Mia: That’s right. I have kind of started preparing. I have re-read the book and want to be knowledgeable about all things connected to Jane Eyre. (Note: the film is now in post-production). (Lynn Barker)
It's a Friday night in London and Andrea Arnold is sitting in her garden, still revelling in the first warm day of the nascent northern summer. ''It's like honey after the cold winter,'' says the 49-year-old filmmaker, who has spent the entire week at her computer trying to finish a draft due on Monday morning of her adaptation of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights.Previous adaptations of the novel are mentioned elsewhere too. Comic Book Movie actually comments on the number of adaptations:
''It's a crazy, silly thing to do,'' Arnold says of her next project, a sigh turning into a burst of laughter as she ponders her predicament. A few hours earlier, when she'd begun to feel besieged by pressure, Arnold put on a mix-tape she'd made for an old friend living in Spain - Dizzee Rascal, Pulp, Jamaican ska, Rolling Stones, Happy Mondays - and danced around her kitchen. [...]
Both Red Road and Fish Tank sprang from Arnold's people watching. A passer-by will catch her eye and from that image she'll begin creating a story in her head for them - if it takes root it becomes a script. Wuthering Heights, a 19th-century gothic romance, is of a different stock but Arnold isn't certain that it will invoke change in her private, nurturing methods.
''The reasons I'm attracted to having a go at it is that it doesn't start in the same place as my previous films,'' she admits. ''But when it comes down to it I do have one image in my mind that keeps me going on Wuthering Heights when things get tough. It's kind of the same thing with everything I do - I latch on to something I can't let go of. Even when I'm miserable and cursing that thing that started me, I can't let go of it.'' (Craig Mathieson)
One particular movie that has been refilmed more than twice is Wuthering Heights. I can't remember how many versions of the story I have seen. But why? I don't know. (Scorpioxfactor)And the Spenborough Guardian mentions the 2009 adaptation in an article about Oakwell Hall and the forthcoming The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister (May 31, 9 pm on BBC2):
OAKWELL Hall Country Park will once again be the star of the small screen this bank holiday weekend.But of course there's more to Wuthering Heights adaptations than just the screen. The Herald (Scotland) talks to ballet dancer Hannah Bateman.
It's been less than a year since the Birstall manor house adorned our screens as it was one of the many locations used to film Wuthering Heights.The two-part drama, starring Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley, was broadcast over the August bank holiday last year.
“She [Dangerous Liaisons' Marquise de Merteuil, in a choreography by David Nixon for Northern Ballet Theatre] [i]s definitely very different from the other female roles I’ve danced,” laughs Bateman, who – as the smitten Isabella Linton – has recently been on the receiving end of some bruising, abusive treatment from Heathcliff in NBT’s Wuthering Heights. (Mary Brennan)Opera, too. The Baltimore Sun covers the vocal competition at the Annapolis Opera.
Third prize, the $1,500 Hughes Award, went to bass Adam Fry, who sang a delightfully comic "La calunnia" from Rossini's "Barber of Seville" and a pleasing "Man that is born of a woman" from Herrmann's "Wuthering Heights." (Mary Johnson)And don't forget that that opera will be on stage at the Minnesota Opera next year.
Transmuting a youthful seminal experience into his cycle of zombie movies probably sounded like a good idea, and it inspired his film’s singularly poetic image: the sight of a beautiful zombie woman (Kathleen Munroe) riding on horseback like something out of a Wild West version of “Wuthering Heights.” (James Verniere)The Winnipeg Free Press has a couple of articles on the film Black Field, which we mentioned several times last year. First article:
Shot near Tyndall, Man., Black Field is largely set on a ramshackle homestead in the late 19th century where two sisters subsist, two years after the deaths of their father and brothers.Second article:
Maggie McGregor (Sara Canning of The Vampire Diaries) is the elder, distressed by the hard life in which she finds herself, but stoic in her resolve to maintain the family farm while caring for her 14-year-old sister Rose (played by the ethereally lovely young Winnipeg actress Ferron Guerreiro). [...]
In making this movie, Esterhazy attempted to transplant the gothic genre of the Brontë sisters to a desolate Canadian prairie setting, and she succeeds most spectacularly in the look of the film. In collaboration with gifted cinematographer Paul Suderman and production designer Ricardo Alms, Esterhazy saturates the frame with striking images -- diffused, lantern-lit interiors and the gorgeous, bare-treed desolation of an early prairie spring. (Randall King)
"As soon as we wrapped on Black Field, she had to fly to Atlanta and start shooting a TV series," says Winnipeg director Danishka Esterhazy, 40. "We got her at the perfect time. We were so lucky."And Uptown reviews the film as well.
The feeling was mutual for the Gander, Nfld.-born Canning, 22, although the combination of the dark romance of Vampire combined with the Brontë-esque trappings of Black Field put Canning at risk of being pigeonholed as a gothic girl. (Randall King)
Inspired by the dark romance of the Brontë sisters — whose novels she calls “early feminist literature” — Esterhazy started writing the screenplay for Black Field in early 2008. (Kenton Smith)Does the 'whose novels she calls “early feminist literature”' bit sound sceptical to anyone else?
... she entered a competition for a work experience placement at Vogue. She'd always liked clothes. "You had to write the story of your life in 700 words," she explains over coffee, sitting opposite me, neat and handsome in a cool green dress. "My first try was straight – lots of homework, lots of helping my mother – and boring as hell. So I made the whole thing up. I had us living in Yorkshire" (Simpson grew up in Willesden, north London) "and my father was a market gardener who used to leave every day at 2am to take narcissi down to Covent Garden. I had four brothers who were paratroopers. It owed a bit to Wuthering Heights. Lots of savagery and drama." When Vogue kept her on, she spent a year or so blushing through awkward encounters with people who stopped to ask how everything was at home. (Sarah Crown)The PCC Courier reveals how author Jamaica Kincaid got to read Jane Eyre:
Brought up in the island of Antigua, Kincaid spoke about her gradual interest in writing, which sprouted from her rebelliousness in school. It is through the school's punishments that Kincaid would be exposed to literature works such as Paradise Lost and Jane Eyre. (Neil Protacio)Novelist Jay McInerney writes in The Telegraph about his love for Jane Austen's heroines and of course can't help but mention what Charlotte Brontë thought about Jane Austen's work:
“Critics have remarked that there is no real delineation of true love in Jane Austen and that is true enough,” David Dachies claims in an influential and otherwise sensible essay entitled “Jane Austen, Karl Marx and the Aristocratic Dance”. “Austen knew only too well that in that kind of society genteel young ladies cannot afford true love. The only object must be marriage, and marriage with someone eligible. In Jane Austen, only the poor can afford passion.” It’s hard to believe a reader of sense could be so preposterously obtuse and misguided, although Charlotte Brontë made a similar argument a hundred years earlier (“The passions are perfectly unknown to her”). For all of their differences, a belief in true love, with passion as its signal component, is precisely what distinguishes Austen heroines from most of their contemporaries.The Telegraph also suggests 'fun things to do with kids' in Yorkshire and the North East. The Brontë Parsonage Museum is a recommended stop:
Brontë Parsonage MuseumVoxy informs about another sort of literary travel in Australia and New Zealand:
Misunderstood teens and romantic souls reading the Brontës get a fascinating insight into one of the world’s most literary families who lived here in Haworth amidst the brooding moors. Don’t take small ones, though – Charlie played havoc running into roped off areas. We took solace in Branwell Brontë’s local pub The Black Bull, where we pretended to Phoebe that we hadn’t heard the barman mention the pub was haunted.
Church Street, Haworth, Keighley, West Yorks (01535 642323)
Adults 6.50, five-16s £3.50 (Ben Hatch and Dinah Hatch)
Escape from the cold and cosy up by the fire with a free gift of Penguin classics at Peppers Resorts and Retreats this winter.Tim Holland comments on an article from the latest issue of the Brontë Society Gazette on ToTheCenter. A Writer's House and Kabaret Kulturel (in French) post about Jane Eyre. Spring Dawns at Heights writes about J. L. Niemann's Rochester. YouTube user TheKodakman and Flickr user Bazzadarambler have both been to Haworth/Brontë Country.
From Rotorua to Tekapo, Peppers is offering the ultimate winter indulgence for book lovers. Guests staying at any of the four premium resorts will be treated to a set of six popular classics including some of the most talked about titles of all time, from Wuthering Heights to The Great Gatsby, for both him and her.
The Winter Classics package includes two nights luxury accommodation, full breakfast each morning, a delicious afternoon tea, a set of six Popular Penguin classics and a steamy hot chocolate or glass of red to relax and unwind by the fire.
Indulge your inner bookworm this winter at select Peppers Retreats and Resorts along with superb food and wine and impeccable service while enjoying total mind and soul relaxation in sumptuous surrounds.
CNN Shanghai interviews singer, composer and director Eheart Chen whose latest album is "简, 爱" ("Jane, Love"). The Jane of the title has some relation to our Jane Eyre: The album’s addictive hit song is "Jane Love," which pays tribute to Shanghai’s popular dubbing actor Qiu Yuefeng, who passed away 30 years ago. The half-Russian’s legendary voice was the most recognizable one in the media for most Chinese people from the 1950s to 1970s.Click here to watch the "Jane Love" music video (Youku).
“Qiu was the voice behind Chinese dubbing classics like 'Jane Eyre.' Dubbed movies were culture symbols in Shanghai for several decades. It was the entertainment I grew up with,” explains Chen.
Chen made the song's music video by himself, using rare movie footage and photos he got from Shanghai Film Dubbing Studio and Qiu’s son. Chen also invited his friend Moz Wang, an editor at Shanghai's Chinese Timeout, to collaborate on the lyrics.
“I’m also a fan of Eheart’s music,” Wang says. “[He] might not be the best musician in Shanghai, but he’s definitely the most Shanghainese one. He uses music to relive the city’s past and to tell stories.” (Tracy You)
[Sara] Canning is talking from the Atlanta, Ga., set of the CW TV show The Vampire Diaries, which seems more than a few worlds away from the Emily Brontë-like mix of manners, corsets and doomed romance found in Black Field. (Eric Volmers)John Farr reviews several Joan Fontaine/Olivia de Havilland films for The Huffington Post. No review of Devotion (in which Olivia de Havilland was an improbable Charlotte Brontë) but there's one of Jane Eyre 1944:
Sent to a girls' reformatory by a hateful aunt (Agnes Moorehead), young orphan Jane Eyre (Fontaine) endures ten years of harsh discipline and abuse at the hands of a sadistic headmaster. Ten years later, Jane finds work as a governess at the gloomy estate of gruff, imperious Edward Rochester (Orson Welles), where she cares for his coquettish, French-born daughter, Adele (Margaret O'Brien). Though Rochester is clearly fighting some inner demons, he's also increasingly fond of Jane, who becomes his most trusted confidante. Welles put his distinctive stamp on this haunting adaptation of Charlotte Brontë's canonical novel playing the brooding, ill-starred baron who falls for his humble governess, movingly played by the fresh-faced Fontaine. Director Robert Stevenson worked closely with author Aldous Huxley on the script, but apart from the excellent cast and writing, what makes this version so memorable is its oppressive, darkly romantic Gothic atmosphere: in particular, Jane and Rochester's first terrifying meeting on the fog-shrouded moors will surely etch into your mind. Look, too, for Liz Taylor early on as Jane's consumptive childhood friend.The Hindu insists on Emily Brontë's influence on Sarita Mandanna's Tiger Walls:
When Sarita Mandanna sat down to write her first novel, she knew it would have to be in the mould of her favourite novels from childhood — the grand, sweeping sagas of Emily Brontë or Jane Austen. (Divya Kumar)Masala interviews actress Sonam Kapoor:
Tell us about your favourite real-life love story and your fave movie love story.Azar Nafisi remembers Neda Agha-Soltan (and mentions her Brontë interests) in The Huffington Post; Stitching Words, One Thread at a Time hates Jane Eyre as much as she loves Wuthering Heights; Gypsyscarlett's weblog posts about Wuthering Heights translated into German; Avant-garde reviews Jane Eyre. Several blogs review Wide Sargasso Sea: Seeing and Being Seen, The Long Distance Book Club and Soy Chai Bookshelf. Somehow it gets to be tomorrow posts icons of Jane Eyre 1944 and The Other Ayn icons of Jane Eyre 2006. Tädi-Blogi reviews the performances of Wuthering Heights in Vanemuine (in Estonian). Also in Estonian orkaani südames on vaikus posts about Jane Eyre. Finally PrimaveraLuna reviews Wuthering Heights in Lithuanian.
Real-life would have to be my mum and dad (Anil and Sunita Kapoor). From the movies, ‘Gone With The Wind’, ‘Wuthering Heights’, and ‘Mughal-E-Azam’. Wait a minute, none of them end very romantically, do they? (Nazia Khan)
[Danishka] Esterhazy attempts to transplant the gothic genre of the Brontë sisters to a desolate Canadian Prairie setting, and she succeeds most spectacularly in the look of the film. In collaboration with gifted cinematographer Paul Suderman and production designer Ricardo Alms, Esterhazy saturates the frame with striking images -- diffused, lantern-lit interiors and the gorgeous desolation of an early Prairie spring. (Randall King in EJ)
Inspired by the “dark romance” of the Brontë sisters — whose novels she calls “early feminist literature” — Esterhazy started writing the screenplay for Black Field in early 2008. So striking was her basic scenario that she found a producer with the first draft: Winnipeg thespian and acting teacher Jeff Skinner. (Kenton Smith in SM)The Yorkshire Post interviews actor Brian Blessed who remembers the following anecdote:
"My mother never had any doubts acting was the right thing to do," he says. "But I think my father was a little worried. However, when he saw me appear as Bramwell (sic) Brontë, that changed everything. Afterwards, he turned to me and said he had found the death scene absolutely terrifying. He had never seen an audience sit in stunned silence before. He lived until he was 98 and his opinion was always important to me." (Sarah Freeman)Wonder Wall interviews Charlaine Harris, writer and probable Brontëite.
Some of her favorite writers that may have influenced her: Edgar Allen Poe, Charlotte Bronte, Jane Austen, Nigel Marsh, Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Robert Heinlein. (Zap2it)Another Brontëite is singer and actress Kelly Clarkson who knows perfectly well what she would bring to a desert island
Thanks to Wonkette, we have discovered that in Laura Bush's memoirs, Spoken from the Heart, the Brontës are actually mentioned:“I would take Hugh Jackman,” Kelly replied when asked what three things she would take with her to a desert island during an interview with British television show The Hot Desk. “I am sorry to his wife by the way – I guess I would also take a good book, one of my favourite books because you would be pretty bored right? Maybe I would take Jane Eyre. (MusicRooms)
You enjoyed living by yourself and with roommates in Houston and in Austin, where you occasionally poked around in the University of Texas library, “a treasure trove of rare manuscripts from Shakespeare’s First Folio to manuscripts by the Brontë sisters and John Keats and the page proofs from James Joyce’s Ulysses” (p. 91).
Makes sense to Ms. Spafford, whose love of fiction began with The Cat in the Hat and graduated to an obsession with the Brontë sisters and, most recently, novels by African-American authors. (Hayley Mick)More Jane Eyre podcasts are posted on Classic Literature Podcast; the Brontë Parsonage Blog publishes another opinion on the Scarborough car park in Anne Brontë's graveyard issue; Life, Love & Why has mixed feelings after reading Wuthering Heights; Provo City Library Staff Reviews posts about Romancing Miss Brontë.
Two rooms in the oldest part of Temple Newsam House [in Leeds] have been restored to their original state and are open to the to the public for the first time. [...]So if you are nearby, you might enjoy seeing the doll's house there.
On display in this room [Mr Cutts room] for the first time is Temple Newsam's latest acquisition a 1740s Doll's house or Baby house reputed to have been decorated by Charlotte Bronte whilst working as a governess in Yorkshire.
The inspiration for the Izzy Lane Spring/Summer 2010 Collection starts with the soft fine Shetland wool spun from rescued sheep, undyed in its multitude of natural colors, from the rust moorit, and blue-grey katmoget. The garments are as fine as cashmere and woven into a light summer cloth in Victorian mills, with patchworks and furrows of different patterns inspired by the Wuthering Heights landscapes of the Yorkshire Dales. Cropped 40’s silhouette skirts matched with edgy Wensleydale knits in candy colors paired with kneelength boots made from faux snake and faux croc, all approved by the Vegetarian Society.The Heart of Haworth posts a media release from the Brontë Parsonage Museum which includes one event taking place this very evening:
There will be two special open evenings at the Brontë Parsonage Museum on Tuesday 15 and Wednesday 23 September when local people are invited to come along and enjoy privileged access to the museum. Wine and canapés will be served, followed by a guided tour of the museum and a special visit to the museum’s Library, not usually accessible to the public, to see some of the treasures of the museum’s collection at close quarters and discus with staff displays for 2010 focusing on Haworth in the Brontës’ time.On the blogosphere: Sink me! The lady's a poet! has posted a poem entitled 'How to enjoy Jane Eyre' and Sonoma Country Life writes about The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë by Syrie James.
The evening events are taking place as part of a Heritage Lottery funded project. The project will focus on renewing the presentation of the historic rooms of the Parsonage with new interpretation for visitors, young and old, and new object cases and displays. These events are an opportunity for local people to see the museum, find out more about its collections and help museum staff with new displays for 2010.
Places are available for 15 or 23 September, 7.30pm. Places will be limited for these special evenings and so booking is required (with early booking recommended). For further details and bookings, contact the museum on 01535 640192/ sonia.boocock@bronte.org.uk
These open evenings are a great opportunity for local people to literally see behind the scenes at the museum and to gain an insight into the remarkably rich collection we have, of which only around 10% is displayed. This project aims to make more of the collection accessible, particularly that relating to Haworth’s social history, and to involve local people in the work we’re doing to improve the museum and the way it reflects the history of Haworth as well as the Brontë story.
Andrew McCarthy
Director
"Inspired by the Gothic novels of the Brontës, Black Field is a suspenseful drama unfolding on a bleak Canadian prairie landscape in the 19th century. Two sisters’ lives are forever changed when a mysterious and charming man arrives at their isolated farm."Categories: Alert, Brontë Parsonage Museum, Brontëana, Movies-DVD-TV, References, Weirdo, Wuthering Heights
Charlotte visited the Yorkshire Coast on several occasions before her death in 1855, with her first 'holiday' in Bridlington, or Burlington as it was then called.Margaret Drabble chooses her favourite literary landscapes for The Guardian:
Sadly, just a decade later, in May 1849, her younger sister Anne died in Scarborough, and was buried in St Mary's churchyard. However, Charlotte's initial experience of the coast presented her with happier memories.
In September 1839, as the harvests were being gathered in the fields around her, Charlotte was in need of a holiday.
Her great friend, Ellen Nussey, whom she met in January 1831 at Roe Head School, Mirfield, recognised the need for a change of scene in her companion. During the first eight months of the year, Charlotte had experienced several life-changing events. In February she had her first proposal of marriage, from Ellen's brother, Henry. She turned him down, and put the experience into words in the shape of St John Rivers in Jane Eyre.
In April, Anne left home to become governess to the children of Joshua Ingham, of Blake Hall, Mirfield. A trying time for Anne, and for her sisters as well, she lasted with her employer until December 1839.
Also from April, Charlotte was employed as a governess with the Sidgwick family at Stonegappe, near Lothersdale, between Skipton and Colne. Charlotte did not have any 'natural' sympathies with the role of governess and she returned to Haworth in July. The following month, William Hodgson, her father Patrick's first curate, and then vicar of Colne, visited the parsonage for the day, accompanied by his own curate, David Pryce. Attracted to Charlotte, David soon wrote to her proposing marriage: Charlotte turned him down. Mr Pryce died the following year.
Not surprisingly, after all the emotional turmoil in Charlotte's life, a break from the routine was welcome. In September, after an earlier suggestion by their mutual friend Mary Taylor, Ellen arranged a trip to Bridlington. Charlotte's father Patrick and Aunt Branwell (who cared for the Bronte siblings after the death of their mother, Maria, in September 1821) were not keen on the two ladies travelling unaccompanied.
Therefore, accommodation arrangements were made by Ellen's brother Henry, who had been curate at Burton Agnes, near Bridlington. He still had connections in the area, and made plans for Charlotte and Ellen to stay at a farmhouse outside Bridlington, away from the quayside. This 'unacceptable' area was where they would have preferred to stay, but it was an area deemed unsuitable for respectable ladies to take lodgings.
Charlotte and Ellen set off for Leeds, by horse-drawn carriage, and from Leeds they took their first train ride to Selby.
As railway tracks had not been laid further than Selby, the companions travelled by coach to York and then on to the Wolds town of Driffield. (Tim Beagles)
HaworthIncidentally, Michelle Styles posts about her visit to Haworth on her blog.
I tend to prefer outdoor landscapes to writers' houses, but make an exception for the Brontë Parsonage at Haworth, a house in which life was experienced with extraordinary intensity. This place and its churchyard and its surrounding moorland are numinous.
4. “The play-hour in the evening I thought the pleasantest fraction of the day at Lowood: the bit of bread, the draught of ______ swallowed at five o’clock had revived vitality, if it had not satisfied hunger: the long restraint of the day was slackened; the schoolroom felt warmer than in the morning—its fires being allowed to burn a little more brightly, to supply, in some measure, the place of candles, not yet introduced: the ruddy gloaming, the licensed uproar, the confusion of many voices gave one a welcome sense of liberty.” The young Jane Eyre finds a moment of peace in her early days at her new school. But what is the reviving liquor concerned?If you can't think of an answer, we can tell you.
Possible answers: 1. Brandy 2. Milk 3. Tea 4. Coffee
New to the festival audience this year are director Danishka Esterhazy with the Brontë-esque prairie romance Black Field, director Dilip Mehta with Cooking With Stella, a culture-clash comedy starring Lisa Ray and Don McKellar, and Quebec’s Xavier Dolan, whose I Killed My Mother was a Cannes hit this year. (Glen Schaefer)Designer Christopher Keane's relationship with his sister is explained in a Brontë way in The Times:
Although his sister never wanted her name on the label, “it is,” he says, “like a joint product. I’ll come up with the drawings and we work on the toiles. We sort of design together until we get a little shudder”. It’s all a bit Cathy and Heathcliff, but this is not news to him. “It can be excluding and in the past some of our partners couldn’t cope. I’d have to explain, of course that ‘I love her more than I love you, she’s my sister’. It is a bit addictive, but we just really enjoy each other’s company.” (Lisa Armstrong)Also in The Times, Erica Wagner has an explanation for the popularity of historical novels:
As to why historical novels are so popular with authors, the answer is surely the same, though I could venture another, only somewhat facetious, possibility. It is much, much easier to construct a plot if your characters are unable to call each other on their mobile phones. If Cathy had been able to ring Heathcliff and tell him that she never meant to sound that mean would we have had Wuthering Heights? I rest my case.Maureen Corrigan (well-known Brontëite) reviews Lorrie Moore's A Gate at the Stairs for NPR:
If you're one of those paranoid readers who believes that every detail means something — and in a Lorrie Moore story you can never be too paranoid — you might catch on to the fact before I did that the A Gate at the Stairs surrealistically layers the essential Jane Eyre elements of a hyper-observant nanny (a "governess," if you will), a key character of mixed race, a dread secret and a remote cad of an employer named "Edward."The Independent Florida Alligator doesn't at all like Stephenie Meyer's Twilight saga:
It's alone worth reading this novel just to see how Moore, on her last page, raucously upends the famous closing lines of Jane Eyre, "Reader, I married him." But the overarching reason to read Moore is to surrender yourself to how perceptively she reads the world. Sometimes her language makes you laugh, because you're taken by surprise by how "on target" it is, like when Tassie describes her middle-aged mother's thickening face as being framed in "a cameo of meat."
Granted, entertainment doesn't always have to have a moral. But let's stop treating "Twilight" like it's the next "Harry Potter" or, even worse, "Wuthering Heights." (Hilary Lehman)Some local Haworth news. The Telegraph & Argus announces the Haworth Arts Festival programme (September 10-13) and there's also an article on anti-social behaviour in Haworth and Oakworth. Literair Nederland reminds us of the upcoming performances (next October) of Woeste hoogten (Wuthering Heights) in the Netherlands. Cartas de la Historia (in Spanish) mentions the famous exchange of letters between Charlotte Brontë and Robert Southey and Amy Reviews... talks about Wide Sargasso Sea.
Le Sorelle BrontëCategories: Brontëana, Haworth, Jane Eyre, References, Theatre, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wuthering Heights
Libretto Bernard de Zogheb - maestro concertatore Andrea Chenna
Drammaturgia Stefano Valanzuolo – regia Davide Livermore
ore 20,30 Palazzo Reale di Portici - Esedra
Ingresso 5 euro
A new American film of Wuthering Heights has cast as Heathcliff not brooding George Clooney nor rough-hewn Russell Crowe, nor any Laurence Olivier lookalike, but James Howson, an actor who is either fully black or mixed race. Emily Brontë aficionados are apoplectic. Blasphemous, they say, unthinkable, just the way many used to when a real black man played Othello instead of a white actor blacked up. England's traditions are apparently being violated. Stuff and nonsense. If they even skim-read the book, they would know Heathcliff was a strange boy, not white but of mysterious background, perhaps gypsy, or the mixed-race son of a foreign sailor and an Englishwoman. The way he is portrayed in part reflects his rejection.The Australian, taking a look at the Venice Film Festival, doesn't seem too thrilled about the film:
Brontë also attributes his viciousness to his "otherness", and some critics have analysed racist expectations underpinning the character. So the choice is the most authentic yet of any screen version of the novel. Furthermore, there have been men of colour in this country since the 16th century – and some had white lovers, like Cathy. In the 18th century, this liaison would hardly have been surprising. The only shocking thing is that so many Englanders know nothing of their history and that it falls to outsiders to remind them. (Yasmin Alibhai-Brown)
Less successful was Andrea Arnold's take on Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights, mainly because the director, presumably in an attempt to go for realism rather than romanticism, has cast largely unknown and untried actors with mixed success. (David Stratton)The Sydney Morning Herald is also sceptical about using 'non-actors':
Performances of this calibre illustrate the potential weakness of using non-actors, as Andrea Arnold did in her otherwise convincingly grubby adaptation of Wuthering Heights, winner of the cinematography prize for Robbie Ryan. Her previous film, the much-awarded Fish Tank, paired Michael Fassbender as a knowing older man with the bus-stop discovery Katie Jarvis as an awkward teenager, which worked brilliantly. In her new film, Arnold evokes Emily Brontë's moors and the story's tragic trajectory persuasively, even movingly, but the performers simply don't have the skills to convey the consuming connection between Catherine and Heathcliff. (Stephanie Bunbury)On the other hand, a few sites highlight Robbie Ryan's cinematography and his award for it at the Venice Film Festival. The Financial Times:
In a strong year for Britain, Robbie Ryan won and deserved the Best Cinematography prize for Wuthering Heights. His work here is stupendous: a weather-battered impasto, sluiced by lyricism, molten with changing colours, textured like a series of Turner canvases gone north. He should hang these images in a gallery and call them “Mud, rain, wind, passion”. (Nigel Andrews)And so does The Seattle Times's Popcorn and Prejudice:
. . . it's still without a buyer as far as I know; as is "Wuthering Heights" (which won a well-deserved cinematography award at the Venice Film Festival, announced yesterday). (Moira Macdonald)The Irish Times is proud of Robbie Ryan as well:
Robbie Ryan, one of Ireland’s most admired young directors of photography, received the best cinematography prize for his work on Andrea Arnold’s Wuthering Heights . The film breaks new ground by casting a black actor, James Howson, as Heathcliff. (Donald Clarke)Meredith Brody from IndieWire's Thompson on Hollywood writes from Toronto:
I turn towards the Lightbox, but he laughs and turns me back towards Alexander Payne and George Clooney. But a few steps later I run into my friend David Pendleton, who thinks the reason, the only reason possible, that I’m headed away from the Lightbox is that Wuthering Heights is full, so I bow to the inevitable and turn towards Andrea Arnold and the moors.Metromix is also writing from Toronto:
I like Wuthering Heights – its old-fashioned Academy aperture frames those moors beautifully, the shots of nature (often red in tooth and claw) are rhythmic and poetic, the lives and dwelling places of both the poor and the rich are carefully delineated. But even while I understand what Arnold is trying to do, my Masterpiece Science Theater 3000 evil voice in my head comments on the action rather cynically.As soon as Arnold cast a black man as Heathcliff, she turned Wuthering Heights in the direction of Mandingo, especially after Heathcliff returns all grown up and receives hot-eyed glances from both Cathy and her sister-in-law Isabella. The constant shots of insects, animals, earth, mud, wind and rain – Heathcliff and Cathy all elemental, contrasted with Edgar, overdressed, indoors—reminded me, once again, that I am at two with nature. I decided that the 18th century’s television equivalent was looking into carefully-lit windows, framing bits of essential action. And that a popular pastime was hanging dogs on fenceposts by their collars. (It seemed that absolutely every animal seen in the film was harmed in some way, as attested to by the Inhuman Society.) And so on and so forth.
British director Andrea Arnold's "Wuthering Heights" never settles for anything easy, though the typical audience for costume dramas may wish otherwise. A stripped-down, earthy, visually-driven adaptation of Emily Brontë's classic novel boasts beautiful cinematography only to bury its passion under layers of tedium.Hala Movie has also seen the film at the Toronto Film Festival:
We spend an awfully long time with Heathcliff (Solomon Glave) and Catherine (Shannon Beer) as children bonding in the harsh elements. They barely speak, but they sure do horse around in nature a lot, and the film quickly becomes repetitive and indulgent.
Arnold gives the material an additional twist by casting Heathcliff—an orphaned gypsy in Brontë's book—as a black man, adding overt racial tensions to the character's rivalry with Catherine's spiteful brother Hindley (Lee Shaw). But, at least initially, that basically means Hindley beats Heathcliff up a lot.
The plodding first half—made all the less compelling by the young actors' obvious inexperience—gives way to a comparably brisk and action-packed second half with older teens James Howson and the especially welcome Kaya Scodelario taking over as Heath and Cathy.
It's still slow going, but Arnold's vision finally begins to pay off in these later sections, mostly because there's finally some dialogue, active conflict and emotional directness to support the visual style. This reimagined "Heights" has similar intentions to this year's "grittier" "Jane Eyre," but "Eyre" provided a conventional narrative and acclaimed actors along with its handheld camerawork, gothic touches and period detail. "Heights" is bolder, and far surpasses "Eyre" in creating a tactile sense of time and place, but also serves to prove that in romantic classics, sometimes conventions serve a purpose. (Geoff Berkshire)
Wuthering Heights is a grim, cruel novel, heralded for its daring technique and epic romance – love so suffocatingly intense that little could ever hope to compare. Healthcliff and Catherine's connection is the backbone to the darkness, but it has also been its downfall. Inspired by grandoise emotion, cinematic and episodic offerings have dulled the cruelty, smoothed the edges, and added a regal air to the proceedings, thrusting Emily Brontë's painful story into corsetted period garb that can't begin to adequately explore the source material. Andrea Arnold, on the other hand, removes the shine, revealing the novel's darkest aspects to tell a story of us versus them – unleashing the novel's pain, while also becoming too enamored with it. [...]The Movie Hub very shows its dislike for the film while the Italian blog Il Cinema Bendato gives it a 6/10.
It's hard to adequately gauge Wuthering Heights. On the one hand, it's a wonderful diversion from the usual period pieces. Where others were enamored with the romance, Arnold is enamored with the pain and reality. This isn't a piece where the families live in truly grand houses with typical period garb, gorgeously pristine landscapes, and manipulative scores. She rips out every bit of the novel's dark reality and pushes it to the screen.
Most directly, she ends the habit of casting white actors as Heathcliff and instead casts two black unknowns (first Solomon Glave, then James Howson). Though it might be argued that he wasn't distinctly African, the casting is much more in line with the novel's description of a dark-skinned, black-eyed, black-haired gypsy than previous Heathcliffs like Tom Hardy or Ralph Fiennes. Heathcliff is the other in every shape of the word – he looks, speaks, and acts differently. As much as he might have been brought in because of Christian kindness, his otherness isn't something he can avoid.
Arnold also makes the Wuthering Heights farm modest, like the homes Emily Bronte is said to have been inspired by. The floors are dirty, the walls are crumbling, and it's the perfect, dingy backdrop to complement the downfall of Hindley. The floors creak and the wind continually howls while handheld cameras linger in the shadows. Arnold thrusts us into this world as much as she can while we sit in comfortable seats in a darkened theater. We feel every bit of the dreariness that encompasses the landscape and the Earnshaw family, and we can almost feel, smell, and taste the cold rain and fog as they descend. Images pop in and out of focus, the depth of field continually changes as is these are our eyes as we're led further into the world. As an audience, we aren't allowed to rest in our removed, sugared-over environment. We see this dankness and cold, we watch the players kill and prepare their meals, live in dirty clothes, and wrestle their boots from the mud. We're not allowed to ignore the dark corners of an already dark novel; we must watch the cruelty inflicted on the dogs, and experience the domination and violence. (Read more)
Robbie Ryan was awarded the prize for best photography for "Wuthering Heights" by Britain's Andrea Arnold, a dark adaptation of the tragic love story between Cathy and Heathcliff in Emily Brontë's well-loved novel.The Independent (Ireland) quotes the producers:
With no musical score, the film is a visual feast for the senses as it portrays the characters' turmoil through the lashing wind and rain, darkness and harshness of elements up on the Yorkshire moors in northern England. (Tiziana Fabi)
Film4, which backed both 'Shame' and 'Wuthering Heights', said the films were of "outstanding quality". (Neil Lancefield)Categories: Movies-DVD-TV, Wuthering Heights
Charlotte Brontë's 209th birthday will be commemorated at an event being organised by the local Banagher Brontë Group on Saturday, April 26.Proceedings will start at Charlotte's Way, The Hill, Banagher at 1.30pm where the group will gather to carpool for a field trip to Shannon Harbour, Shannonbridge, Meelick Weir Walkway, Victoria Lock and Eyrecourt.The purpose of the trip is to visit places outside Banagher which Arthur Bell Nicholls would have been proud to show his new wife, the eminent novelist Charlotte Brontë, when they honeymooned in Banagher in July 1854.Upon returning to Banagher at around 5pm, the group will gather in the new snug in Hough’s pub for readings by, on, or about the Brontës of Haworth and the Bells of Banagher.This will be an 'open mic' format, so now is your chance to 'have your spake'!The readings will conclude at about 6.30pm. Some folks will t
hen repair to Flynn's restaurant for food. Please make your own booking to guarantee a place at a table at 057 9151312.Proceedings will conclude with a recital by the Banagher Brontë Ensemble in Corrigan’s Corner Pub at 9pm.The ensemble is now an integral part of the group, and we have been awarded a grant of €800 to reward the gifted players for creating an extensive and growing repertoire of appropriate music.The group will perform twice more this year, once in Heritage Week in Tullamore, as part of four days of celebration of the Brontë associations with County Offaly, particularly Banagher, from Friday, August 15 to Monday, August 18. Full details coming soon.The group's final events for 2025 will be held at the end of November, when it will Arthur Bell Nicholls' 119th anniversary.
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Dressed in a long black coat, gold-buttoned waistcoat and with longer hair and sideburns, the actor also revealed a hooped earring for the highly-anticipated £62million production.When he smiled, he flashed a gold tooth.Robbie, 36, who plays Catherine Earnshaw, or Cathy, was dressed in a voluminous black gown with black veil during filming on Tuesday for what appeared to be a funeral scene. She clutched a hot water bottle in between takes on the moorland set. (Molly Clayton)
Erase Erase follows Tess, a heartbroken young dyke, who forms an unexpected and all-consuming bond with an older woman, Nora, after being invited to her mansion in upstate NY. Erase Erase is a spiky, queer, darkly comedic spin on the gothic novel—think Gen-Z Jane Eyre or Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca by way of contemporary sugar mommies. Erase Erase runs from April 10th-12th at Grace Exhibition Space.
When I wrote The Creation of Half-Broken People I definitely wanted the Gothic to matter. My first introduction to the genre was when I read Jane Eyre in high school in my A-Level English class. Having been primed by most of the literature that I had consumed till that point to sympathize with the often-white protagonist of the story, my encounter with Bertha Mason turned out to be a revelation. My superb teacher, Mrs. Joan Madonko, made me realize that Bertha Mason in all her wretchedness was not something to fear as Jane did and Mr. Rochester encouraged, but was instead someone that I, a black girl living in a former British colony, should understand and feel an affinity towards. (...)The story had many false starts… until I decided to deliberately write it as a Gothic novel—as a story that is in conversation with Jane Eyre.
De pronto, muchos factores aparecidos en las páginas precedentes toman un vuelo distinto, y la relectura de Cumbres borrascosas que se insinúa en la novela gana profundidad, y lo mismo ocurre con los ecos bíblicos que la puntúan. (Nadal Suau) (Translation)
Amores vampíricos y voluptuosidad lésbica: Aixa de la Cruz se viste de Emily Brontë en su nueva novela. (...)En la última novela de Aixa de la Cruz (Bilbao, 1988), todo empieza con Emily Brontë. Su protagonista, Violeta, crece fascinada bajo el signo de Cumbres borrascosas, es decir, obsesionada con ser una heroína de amor, deseosa de vivir una historia romántica y apasionada que no se convierta nunca en tragedia ni abandono. Y así es como Violeta, Cathy contemporánea, encuentra a Paul, su Heathcliff particular.Como en la novela de Brontë, el vínculo que construyen se encuentra por encima de la sangre y la amistad, del sexo y el erotismo; si en el siglo XIX había matrimonios de conveniencia, corazones rotos y venganza, en el XXI hay búsqueda de otros modos de establecer relaciones que no pudran el amor. (...)Aixa de la Cruz lo sabe y por eso nos regala su versión contemporánea de unas cumbres borrascosas coronadas de pactos de amor que sangran nuevas formas de quererse en un mundo insoportable. (Begoña Méndez) (Translation)
A.D.L.C.: Esta novela nació como una especie de diálogo con Cumbres borrascosas, mi novela preferida en la infancia y adolescencia, a la que vuelvo siempre para entender la fascinación que genera un tipo de romanticismo violento que atrae como un precipicio.Nuria Azancot: ¿Qué le debe este libro, y usted como autora, a la novela gótica y a Jane Austen?A.D.L.C.: (...) Las heroínas se acaban enamorando de lo que, casualmente, les conviene en términos económicos, y ostentan un autocontrol que, si nos movemos al periodo romántico con Cumbres borrascosas, queda arrasado. De Austen me gusta esta asociación de la novela romántica con la novela de tensión de clase, como en El amante de Lady Chatterley o en Gente normal de Sally Rooney, que es una autora en la que pensé bastante también mientras escribía este libro.N.A.: ¿Y qué peso tienen los vampiros? Porque la sangre atraviesa todo el libro...A.D.L.C.: Claro, es que la metáfora de los vampiros es perfecta para hablar de ese amor fusional rollo Cumbres borrascosas ("¡Yo soy Heathcliff!, gritaba Catherine"), que no respeta ni desea la individualidad del otro. (Translation)
March 10 – Screening of Jane Eyre at the Alamo Drafthouse, South Lamar. Time TBD. The film is a passionate adaptation of the timeless novel by influential English author Charlotte Brontë. It is directed by two-time AFF Alum Cary Fukunaga and stars Mia Wasikowska, Judi Dench, Michael Fassbender, Jamie Bell and Sally Hawkins.The screening will be part of the joint events organised by the Austin Film Festival and Texas Book Festival.
There are some classic novels that work well when well-meaning authors decide to yank the characters out of their corsets and into the 21st century. Charlotte Brontë's famous Victorian Gothic romance "Jane Eyre" just isn't one of them. (Jessica Kokesh)About the character of Nico Rathburn she says,
What is with Young Adult authors romanticizing jerks recently? (Jessica Kokesh)We would just like to point out that the original Mr Rochester is no saint either.
Paranormal romance is the single most important literary movement of our time. To judge by the shelves of Borders, novels about sexy vampires and beefcake mummies are the only things people read or write anymore. In fact, I've begun to outline my own paranormal Gothic-romance masterpiece. Not to give too much away, but it's going to be the Wuthering Heights of hot yetis. And I'd better act fast. (David Thorpe)Northern Stars reports Danishka Esterhazy's film Black Field 'has been chosen to open the 6th annual Vancouver Women in Film Festival on March 4th' and the Brontë influences of the movie are once again mentioned:
Inspired by the Gothic novels of the Brontë sisters, this suspenseful drama unfolds on a bleak Canadian prairie landscape set in the 19th century.The Scotsman discusses the new season of Skins and recalls the Charlotte Brontë tattoo moment.
She can look like "Joan Crawford on acid" (her words), a vamp, a drag queen, a serious artist swathed in black, or a Brontë sister. (Chitra Ramaswamy)Given that her new album - Let England Shake - is coming out in a couple of weeks, we are pretty certain that this won't be the last time we read something along those lines.
What have you sacrificed for your art?Entertainment Weekly defines with a Brontë metaphore the relationship (or former relationship, we don't really know the present status) between Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart:
I don't think I've sacrificed anything. I've made choices: on one curious day in December 1990, I was offered the chance to take over as artistic director of the Royal Shakespeare Company; then my agent rang and said I'd been asked to make a film of Wuthering Heights with Ralph Fiennes. I chose the RSC, of course, which meant I took a particular path. But I don't regret it. (Laura Barnett)
What I do know is that their relationship has been disseminated through the media not merely to boost ratings or to sell magazines but as a way to burnish the Charlotte-Brontë-meets-James-Dean-meets-the-undead swoony mystique of the Twilight movies. (Owen Gleiberman)Oxford American contextualises the work of the writer Tania James:
All of her stories, she reasons, might be considered responses to the fish-out-of-water stories that inspired her: Jane Eyre, for instance; A House for Mr. Biswas; Emily Dickinson’s poems. (Marion Field)Boston Review posts about the ethical power of poetry:
No matter how loyal and unswerving one’s personal and public commitments—to a love partner, a country, an idea—part of our interior remains capable of change. It is this part of our interior—this region of reversibility that is like a sheet of spun fabric one nanometer thick—that literature addresses. Far from being a threat to our commitments, this interior silk fabric that makes us labile and open enables us actively to re-consent each day to the people and places we are ever more deeply committed to. It also makes us open to new commitments. All genres of literature address this part of us: that is why anti-theatrical tracts are so frightened of the theatre; that is why it is impossible to predict which fictional person any one of us will identify with when reading Antony and Cleopatra or Wuthering Heights. (Elaine Scarry)Vice describes the MTV reality TV series The Hills as
The Hills is Wuthering Heights for the Internet Age, and its characters speak in emoticons. It reminds us that people, even the beautiful ones, are damaged and weird, stuttering and mumbling and not making eye contact or knowing what to do with our hands. (John Saward)Riiighht... is that what Wuthering Heights is supposed to be about?
Think "goth," and images of Anne Rice-era vampires (pre-Twilight) and black leather-clad bands such as Bauhaus, the Sisters of Mercy and Alien Sex Fiend will often come flooding forward. The word became a cliché in the music world long before it became unfashionable, with black mascara and black lace gloves the order of the day.Slate talks about the CW remake of Beauty and the Beast:
But to many, those overplayed images had little to do with the gothic art that is in turn romantic and devastatingly sad. Look at pre-Raphaelite art and, while the skin is pale, the eyes are not smudged with black and nobody looks like a Robert Smith-style death-mime.
The dark, poetic lyrics of Nick Cave and even Morrissey, certainly Kate Bush, capture that feeling beautifully — that Wuthering Heights (book and song) feeling of having love within your grasp and having it torn away before drowning in a sea of grief. (Brett Callwood)
Men may be violent and emotionally abusive because of damage they suffered. But that doesn't mean that their behavior is charming, or excusable, or that Heathcliff or the Beast should be anyone's dream boy. (Alyssa Rosenberg)The Telegraph illustrates an article about the raising costs of restoring listed churches with a picture of
St Michael & all Angels church in Haworth, West Yorkshire, where the Brontës are buried, [and which] is undergoing renovation following lead thefts.Linkiesta (Italy) has an ongoing discussion about the roles of women:
In Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë fa prevalere la protagonista (descritta come dai lineamenti pronunciati) alla bellissima Blanche Ingram sul cuore di Rochester, non per esaltare la moralità dell’eroina, ma per proporre un nuovo modello di donna in cui intelligenza voglia dire consapevolezza di avere il diritto di autodeterminarsi. (...)L'Illustré (Switzerland) describes as follows the work of the comic artist Margaux Kindhauser:
Paradossalmente se Charlotte Brontë auspicava una donna in grado di decidere del proprio destino, in grado di comportarsi alla pari dell’altro sesso (cosa quasi blasfema per un mondo a misura d’UOMO) utilizzando l’espediente della sua non bellezza solo come dettaglio iniziale per catturare l’attenzione del lettore dell’epoca, abituato a sognare eroine belle e di alto lignaggio come sole elette ai migliori matrimoni nobili, per poi introdurlo verso l’idea che la donna possa pretendere di creare se stessa liberamente anche – e, forse, soprattutto – al matrimonio.
Le “donne di Vito Kahlun” potranno forse ispirarsi al modello “Eyre” da istitutrice super velata, ma il loro velarsi sarà esclusivamente finalizzato a entrare nella categoria brave ragazze da sposare..esattamente tutto l’opposto di quello che Charlotte Brontë voleva per le donne nel 1847! (Virginia Odoarde) (Translation)
Pour conjuguer ses envies de raconter elle-même ses histoires et de les mettre en images, Margaux Kindhauser choisit la BD sous le nom de Mara. Autodidacte, elle s’inspire de dessinateurs français (Loisel, Yslaire) et d’ambiances gothiques (Sherlock Holmes, les sœurs Brontë). (Stéphanie Billeter) (Translation)El Mundo (Spain) recommends summer reads:
'El caso de Charles Dexter Ward', de H. P. Lovecraft. [Published by] Alianza. Desde 'Vathek' o 'Cumbres borrascosas' o 'Frankenstein', la Historia de la literatura gótica culmina aquí. (Álvaro Cortina) (Translation).Bengal Reads interviews the author Chelsea M. Cameron:
Will you tell us about your-self and your books?PtitBlog (in French) reviews negatively Jane Eyre 2011, movieshollywoodfinest, In need of a Prince Charming. I don't think so..., Little J Art, Arts & Cie, Le Blog de Marie la Turtue and Les Menus Plaisirs (all three in French) think exactly the opposite; Classics///Hits reviews Agnes Grey; Layers of Though posts about one Jane Eyre audiobook; A Northern Witch lives now in Haworth; Pockeblogg (in Swedish) and Books, Tea & Sweet Apple Pie review Jane Eyre; Dingley Bell (in French) and Książkowe Podróżowanie (in Polish) post about The Tenant of Wildfell Hall; Book 42 reviews Wuthering Heights; Esculpiendo el Tiempo (in Spanish) talks about its 1939 version;
I'm a YA writer from Maine. Lover of things random and ridiculous, Jane Austen/Charlotte and Emily Brontë Fan girl, red velvet cake enthusiast, obsessive tea drinker, vegetarian, former cheerleader and world's worst video gamer
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
Club de lectura: miércoles 25 de septiembre | 19.00 (hora Chile)Biblioteca Facultad de Filosofía y Humanidades de la Universidad de ChileEl Club de Lectura de Bibliotecas UC es un proyecto organizado por la Biblioteca de Humanidades de la Universidad Católica, en el que la escritora y profesora de la Facultad de Letras, María José Navia, dirige un grupo de discusión en línea sobre libros seleccionados por ella junto al equipo de la biblioteca. (Translation)
