Has the BBC made a new series called Jane Austen being retold and so that's why there are all these new TV movies coming out? Why are they premiering in the UK and not the US? I haven't seen one yet and I really want to. So is it like with Shakespeare Retold and they're adapting the Jane Austen books to modern day?
shareNo, not modern day. They will be airing in the US in November on PBS--just like most British productions, it will simply take a while to work it's way over to the States.
John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.
No, not modern day. They will be airing in the US in November on PBS--just like most British productions, it will simply take a while to work it's way over to the States.
Not as long as it used to be. We used to get programs a year or more after they were shown in the UK if we get them at all. Now we wait a matter of months. Have we just lost our patience skills? I think so. The popularity of torrent sites and you tube illustrate our lack of patience these days. I keep myself on dial up so's not to fall into the rush rush impatient attitudes of today. We tend to lose our people skills when we lose our patience.
The new adaptations of Northanger Abbey, Persuasion and Mansfield Park are nothing to do with the BBC, although the BBC are currently working on a new version of Sense and Sensibility. They premiered in the UK, because they were commissioned for a British TV channel called ITV.
The new adaptations are apparently going to be shown in the USA in February 2008. They were on YouTube a while back, so if you are desperate to see them, you could always try there.
You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hopeshare
If you want to see them go on to you tube there all on it.
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I like the people they cast, but I think the films need to be longer. I also think they (film makers in general who do Austen adaptations) have become lazy, and have fallen back on a certain lightweight, almost spoofing style. I think these photoplays have fallen into a rut. There are certain Austen fan girls (and boys, I suppose), who make up the "Auntie Jane" cult and think of Austen as nothing but a silly spinster romance novelist. I think this style is what they expect and want. There should be a halt and restart, sort of like what was done with the James Bond movies, to try a different approach (and not by simply making everyone's clothes dirty and having pigs in the drawing room). The balance of humor and realism in the Ehle/Firth "Pride and Prejudice" was a good representation of Austen's effects in the novel, but I think they have lost their way in the intervening twelve years and are just presenting a lot of cardboard pining, bowing, and curtseying.
shareI think it is impossible to compare a 5 hour miniseries with these latest adaptations. And to short change the Pride and Prejudice film by oversimplification (and not by simply making everyone's clothes dirty and having pigs in the drawing room) does little to promote your point of view. We have the same writer for the screenplay of NA as we did for the P&P mini. So who has lost their way?
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