What Would Lizzie Bennet Do?

I’m always struck silent and dumb when I attempt to shove Thanksgiving into 20^th Century Brit Lit context. Probably because Brits don’t celebrate our version of Thanksgiving. This year we included another family in our Thanksgiving dinner celebration. Kim, the mother, is a former Londoner, with a charming accent undiminished and unmellowed by her years living on the West Coast, married to a native Californian.

Hoping to impress her with my international savoir faire, I asked the man at the local European deli what a Brit would have for Thanksgiving dinner (He had an accent – I figured he would know) Blandly, he replied, “Since Thanksgiving is when you Yanks decided you’d rather starve on foreign shores than live in England a moment longer, I’m not sure there’s an answer to that question.”

I settled for starting with Stilton, crackers and smoked salmon. Fine.

But as the resulting marvelously relaxed dinner revealed, there is no national boundary on Thanks or Giving. Nor is there any minimum weight or yardstick. No wooden cutout indicating Must Be As Tall As This Line to Be Worthy Of Thanks.

So at the risk of sounding theatrically sentimental, I offer unrepentant thanks for The Big Things — Good health, a happy marriage, books, music, American citizenship – but also for The Small Things, the stuff of life, the things that render this life more livable, more colorful, more filled with light and imagery, more five-sense-ual. Again, here, I am struck dumb and silent by the enormity of The Small Things. Despite my love of words I am rendered wordless when Giving Thanks. So I am thankful to God that He can interpret the contents of my brimming, bursting heart.

The term “mentor” used to give me fits. In my ignorance I confused it with the insipid term “role model,” and my hackles would rise and I would protest that I would never be so derivative as to need or want to model myself at all, much less model myself after someone else.

When I was unemployed, I was firmly in Austen territory: A woman left to feeling that her worth is measured by everything but her ability to labor. Elinor Dashwood and Fanny Price.

Now that I am working again, I am planted firmly in Dickens territory. Nicholas Nickelby, David Copperfield, Pip. I’m surrounded by characters coworkers who tickle my imagination and make me laugh (in the most affectionate way possible) quietly behind my office door.

(I had a mentor once. I had a boss who made me understand that mentor meant so much more than “guide” or “teacher.” Mentor, in the case of Fred, meant motivator, believer, and companion. My very first business trip with him, we argued over the plot of the movie Sorcerer (William Friedkin fans!) and we each ordered two tall beers from the stewardess because we knew it would be forever before she came around to us again. A beer-drinking mentor – the very best kind.)

In the last few weeks I have been struggling to characterize the man who is my boss. The one man in an office of capable, driven, affable and endlessly kind women. Busy women. Accomplishing so much.

In trying to describe Ted to myself, I kept peregrinating around Charles Dickens. I would meander through the books and stories, briefly landing on Wilkins Micawber from David Copperfield, but rejecting that parallel; Micawber was kind and avuncular, but had failed in so many basic ways. Not Ted. No.

Mentally thumbing through all of Dickens, I failed to find the character I was looking for. But I knew he was there. I knew it . There. Just beyond my mental reach.  My boss is Dickensian in the very best possible way. Dignified but truly hilarious in a dry, self-effacing way. Paternal as the day is long. He cooks an elaborate and meticulous lunch for his staff each Tuesday, calling us all together to enjoy a leisurely meal, inviting us each to declare something for which we are thankful, each in our turn. Never too busy to spend more than a few minutes with each staffer, encouraging, inquiring, listening, sharing the details of his own agenda. I’m touched and overwhelmed by his kindness. The simplicity of his kindness.

But kindness alone does not a mentor make. Ted has invested some serious trust and faith in my abilities. As someone who has worked alone for many years, I am aware that this interaction and investment is a currency beyond, well, currency. Suddenly, I’m Nicholas Nickelby. This is awesome.

I come home from work. I start dinner. Still convivial and calm from my day at my new happy office, I sip a glass of Australian wine as I chop and sauté. I’m smiling. I think about my day. I’m happy. My children are infected by my mood as well. I think about Ted and my new coworkers. Ted takes simple gestures and makes then grand. It’s a feeling he has planted among his staff. It’s …It’s ..

It’s Fezziwig. It’s Mr. Fezziwig from A Christmas Carol.

As his apprentice Ebenezer Scrooge remarks, “He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. The happiness he gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune.”

That’s Ted. I am certain that in our association, Ted will teach me many things professionally. It’s inevitable. But I am also more than certain that Ted, by his benevolent example, has already begun to teach me the power of the simple, caring gesture. The power of faith invested.

Wait. Does this make me Ebenezer Scrooge?

I wondered about the term Victorian. I wonder why it is casually thrown around to mean “uptight” and “repressed.”  How true can this really be? Could Victoria, who was nicknamed The Grandmother of Europe have been such a constrict on the minds, hearts and behavior of her people? If so, why would they put up with it for so long?

To find my answers I turned not to a text book or a reliable biographer (too predictable) but to a BBC miniseries called Victoria and Albert. I know! How esoteric a title is that?

I don’t know what I expected. I think I expected to be bored.

Victoria’s young life was tightly controlled by a domineering mother and by her tentative role in the royal hierarchy.

OK, so far, I’m a little bored. But this is England’s Victorian Era. I hardly expected intrigues and affairs a la randy Charles II.

But then Victoria meets her cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Basically, he’s German. She thinks he’s dull. And yeah, he does have that overly flouncy look that all men seemed to have in the 19^th Century. But he sort of grew on me. He’s polite, but has a low-level pissed-off-ed-ness that’s intriguing. He must have grown on Victoria too, because she married him. Actually, she proposed. I think because she outranked him.  Bummer. I’m not sure I could rise to that challenge. How Victorian of me. See? It doesn’t make sense. She’s 16 and she works up the nerve to propose to her foxy royal cousin. That’s not exactly uptight.

So they get married and get right down to business. Right away he realizes that he’s outranked in the household, in the family and in the kingdom. And this is a man who is no shrinking violet, no slouch in the brains department and has been raised in a seriously paternal culture. The whole second-in-command thing did not sit well with this guy.

He stalks down halls. He glowers. He lets off steam on symbolically virile black stallions. He raises his voice. He slams doors. He runs his hands through his hair distractedly.

I’m not bored anymore. No. Not at all.

He fires the domineering housekeeper (poor Diana Rigg). He installs himself as Mr. I-Run-The-Household-Man. With stereotypical German efficiency he gets that huge castle running like a VW. A restored one. Custom paint job. Like….mebee…1963 Bug. Forest Green.  (Sigh) Just like that.

He is not officially allowed to help Victoria run the country. Not yet, anyway. But she gets to the point where his influence holds swoon, er  sway. He’s a man of the people. Uncomfortably aware that the Royal Family’s reputation had disintegrated in the previous generations, he is determined to raise his family’s profile as an example to the common man.  He does all this in perfectly tailored royal outfits. Cutaway coats. Just…yeah.

I like this guy. This Albert is a simmering pot of righteous, royal He-Man. And he loves Christmas! He brought the first Christmas tree to Great Britain! Swoon! I’m not bored!

The Great Exhibition – that was Albert’s brainchild. Overhaul of the royal finances (those spendthrift royals!) – Albert again.  Modernization of university curricula – Albert! Did I mention Christmas trees? Albert. Albert. Albert.

When he dies at the age of 42, his wife goes into mourning for years. Get that: The Queen of England does not appear in public for years. She wears black for the rest of her life. For Albert. In honor of Albert.

This Queen? This marriage is the root of the throwaway term that has come to mean “repressed and uptight?” Please. We need to re-think this. Albert had it going on. He’s like a royal superhero but without the embarrassing outfit. More (and more accurate) research is needed to get to the root of this word and its misapplication. At the very least we need to add a term that acknowledges Albert’s hotness. Albertian. I like it. As in, My Albertian husband insists I not cook tonight and is instead taking me out for dinner a deux. Swoon indeed.

Wentworth: Cheers, old man.

Brandon: Ah. Yes. Bottoms up, old chap. Tell me again…why are we sitting in a tavern tipping back these…what did you call them?

Wentworth: Martinis. Italian, apparently.

Brandon: Remarkable. They’re really very good, you know. I think I’d like it better if it was made with gin, but on the whole, they are …

Wentworth: …remarkable. Yes. I think we’re sitting here, just basically getting polluted because we’re both veterans of Britannia’s armed forces and we’re drinking to our shared commitment to England’s… Oh, just…sod it all.

Brandon: We’re here because of women.

Wentworth: Women. How to handle a woman?

Brandon: Hold up there, that’s Richard Burton’s line from Camelot. We’re from Austen. Jane Austen. I hate that bitch.

Wentworth: She’s really written us into fits, hasn’t she? Done us a nasty turn. Look at you – a Colonel with His Majesty’s Finest – trailing behind some child of 17, hoping for crumbs from her table.

Brandon: Beautiful. My Marianne is a vision. Have you seen her, man? She’s perfection. Have you heard her sing? Play the pianoforte? Seraphic.

Wentworth: I’m sure. And here I sit. Worked my way through His Majesty’s Navy. In command of my own ship. Wealthier than I ever thought possible. Ladies – lovely ones – crawling all over me. I could have my pick! But no. I can’t seem to exorcise the spinsterish Anne Elliot, of all people, from my brain. She threw me over years ago. How big a mooncalf am I?

Brandon: What’s a mooncalf?

Wentworth: A simpleton! A tomfool! A dunderhead!

Brandon: Wow. We English certainly employ odd phraseology. Can we blame Jane Austen for that, as well?

Wentworth: I think we can! I insist we do! Let’s examine this rationally for a moment: You and I are – let’s face it man – two of the most admired male literary figures in the English language. We’re stalwart lads! Men of our word! Upright and All right! We wore uniforms and served nobly. We don’t dally with shady ladies…

Brandon: Are we counting all the time I spent in the Indies?

Wentworth: Ah, no. I don’t think we need to count that, nor my first two years at sea. What say you, eh?

Brandon: Agreed. But all that aside, we are top of the male-literary-hero heap. But this Austen woman has us reduced to piles of rubble, stammering and swooning over a couple of dames. That’s it. I demand a do-over.

Wentworth: O they already did that.

Brandon: Did what?

Wentworth: A do over. They did us both over. Haven’t you seen it? PBS remade Austen’s Sense & Sensibility as well as Persuasion. You really need to keep up with pop culture, Brandon.

Brandon: They did me over? How did it go? How did I fare? Do I still get the girl? MY girl? They did not change that, right? Say they didn’t. Please.

Wentworth: Get a hold of yourself, man. Yes. You still get the girl. But you’re different. She’s different. Willoughby’s still total dick, but he’s shorter and more effeminate.

Brandon: Good. He’s an ass. But Marianne is still…she’s still…

Wentworth: Put it this way, she’s no Kate Winslet, that’s for sure. But then you’re no Alan Rickman. You’re that flaccid officer fellow from that children’s movie about the Loch Ness Monster? Remember?

Brandon: NO! I need to be Alan Rickman. I insist I am Alan Rickman. I have the bittersweet chocolate voice, the sensitive yet masculine expression. The quiet strength. The even temper. The…damnit! I want my Alan Rickman quiet strength! I want my deep, bedroomy, sexy voice!

Wentworth: Yes, they kind of messed with your whole shtick. I fared a bit better, but not really. We all know I need to be Ciaran Hinds. I need that stentorian tone. The Mr. Bolt Upright posture. The smoldering looks. Right? Am I right?

Brandon: …I …I can’t believe this….

Wentworth: Buck up man. As I was saying…they took away all my tall-dark-and-Ciaran-Hinds stuff and replaced it with a vaguely pretty face and a wistful expression. Then they took all the really lusty chemistry I had with Amanda Root and replaced it with puppyish longing tinged with repressed sexual frustration. It’s painful. I’m considering pressing charges. Defamation of character.  Repressed. As if.

Brandon: What about all the fangirls? They’ve moved on, haven’t they?

Wentworth: No! You really do need to start reading all those romancy-swoony Austen web sites. It’s gotten political. There are vociferous fans defending us. It’s like a duel, but among cat ladies and lit nerds.

Brandon: Cat ladies and lit nerds? I really do need another one of these Italian drinks.

Wentworth: Martinis.

Brandon: Or go back into the army…

Wentworth: Hang in there, the second Napoleonic War is about to begin. Shall we have another and drink to His Majesty?

When I started all this, I had firmly lodged in my head the idea that 19^th Century Brit Lit and its BBC-type movie interpretations could cure any problem of modern life. Well, MY limited version of modern life. Which means I went into this convinced that Austen, Hardy, Trollope, and company could solve everything but gang violence, Columbian drug cartels, and futile searches for WMDs.

It’s been awhile since I was wrong. But I was wrong. While the Brit Lit Cure is nearly miraculous in its ability to bring perspective, humor, empathy and common-sense wisdom to most ailments, it fails almost comically when applied to a select few others.

• A hangover

There are some drinkers in Austen. Mr. Hurst comes immediately to mind. Dickens, Eliot, Hardy, Trollope — Lots of drinkers. But these characters are archetypal wastrels. They are career ne’r-do-wells. Lifelong party hounds and Lost-Weekenders. And while there is a lot of drinking of wine and ale at all hours of the day and by all characters for any old excuse (Remember Darcy offering Elizabeth a glass of wine the morning that she received anxious news from home?), no one ever seems worse for the wear. No vertical naps following a drinky luncheon. No sleeping in because the dinner party the night before went off the hook. And no one ever has to worry about police checkpoints for drunk drivers. These people had carriages. And drivers. And Highway Patrol wasn’t invented yet. Neither was Aleve. I just plain can’t relate at all.

• My socially awkward son’s dearth of friends in school.

My son is smart, cool, funny, kind, well read, a fast runner, great swimmer, budding surfer, fair rock climber and seasoned backpacker. He’s also frighteningly handsome.  But he has no real friends in school. Girls give him the fits. I can’t wait till all these twerpy little snots figure out what a great kid he is and start calling the house asking to talk to him. Then they’ll find out that karma’s a bitch and so am I. 19^th Century British Literature is remarkably devoid of socially awkward kids with potentially bitchy, bitter moms. Except Lady Catherine de Bourgh. I’d like to forget I just drew that parallel. I hate me.

• A crippling heatwave

They’re all wearing 90 percent too much clothing in these books. London in the middle of summer cannot be any more pleasant than the 10-day Southern California heatwave I just lived through. No one in these books complains about the heat. No one has a pool. When they go to the beach (the seaside), they wear 120 percent too much clothing. It’s like they have no sense of self preservation.

• Men who wear too much cologne

This is a real problem for me, and I can find no help at all in these books. Maybe the problem back then was a lack of running water and an egregious lack of regular bathing. Maybe they were all inured to the reek of their fellow man. But why are men in this current day so devoted to smelling like the first floor of Nordstrom? It’s really effeminate (not that there’s anything wrong with that), which, judging from the marketing campaigns, is definitely not the goal. Maybe it’s me. I can’t be the only one who holds her breath in an elevator when a man gets in (most of the time). Can I?

Last year’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall has nothing to do with 19^th Century Brit Lit or any BBC-esque adaptation of the aforementioned. Except, by a stretch, in that maybe that film’s Russell Brand is my titular casting choice if ever the BBC produces a biography of Oscar Wilde. Directed by Terry Gilliam.

With that tenuous link established, the groundwork has now been laid for a foray into Forgetting Sarah Marshall’s pathetic protagonist Peter, and how this silly little movie has become my most recent talisman in my quest to solve my life.

I’m Peter. I wake up and the first thing that pops into my head is Peter’s pathetic autobiographical song: “Peter you suck. Peter you suck. Peter your music is fucking terrible. Peter you suck, Peter you suck. You don’t do anything of value. Peter you suck. Go write some music. But instead you sit and write these bullshit songs. It’s so self-loathing. Go see a psychiatrist. I hate the psychiatrist. Go see one anyway.”

Being unemployed sucks one’s ego dry. Ego vampire. My anemic little ego is a husk of its formerly vibrant, overblown self. It is not that I loved my job or even my line of work so very much. In fact, I frequently felt that my line of work was vapid, manipulative and self-absorbed. But it was lucrative and I was good at it. Am good at it. Am I still good at it? How would I know?

My husband sits me down and hits me with The Talk. The Talk that essentially is the stake in the heart of my ego. You have so much talent. Why are you not living up to your potential? Has he been reincarnated as my high school counselor? My husband is the reanimated corpse of Mr. Wolcott.

I want to ask him what I wanted to ask Mr. Wolcott. How the hell would you even know? How would you know what my potential is? Why do I have to live up to my potential when so many other people do not? How would you even know if I have any talent at all.? Maybe I am a talentless, egomaniacal hack. Maybe I suck. Maybe I suck. Maybe my writing is fucking terrible. Maybe I suck. Maybe I suck. Maybe I don’t write anything of value.

Poor Peter. Poor me. I’m a cliché. I’m a self-loathing, doubt-riddled cliché. I thought I had escaped Mr. Wolcott and all his expectations when I left high school. Apparently I married him.

Peter’s friends keep urging him to do something creative, to work on his Dracula Musical. I love that: His Dracula Musical. Peter’s Dracula Musical becomes the vessel for all his energy, his creativity, his newly emerged life force. It becomes his raison d’etre.

Bram Stoker was the business manager for the Lyceum Theater when he wrote Dracula, so he had a paying gig while he penned his particular Dracula Musical. Shouldn’t I have that paying gig while I work on mine? Was he riddled with doubt and saddled with a mummified ego, as I am?

Screw Bram Stoker. I need to work on my Dracula Musical. I don’t exactly know quite what it is or what shape it will take. I don’t even know if I suck or if my writing is fucking terrible or if I can write anything of value.

I watched the end of Forgetting Sarah Marshall 5 times (thanks, Youtube). Just the ending. The Dracula Musical. That contagious, ebullient mood of victory and of  inner demons vanquished.  The muppets. The potential realized. I want that Dracula Musical ending.

I’ve been putting this off. Just as I did with the “new” version of Persuasion. I had a hard time getting around to reviewing it. The motivation was lacking. The production was un-compelling. The original was so exemplary. But then I did. Ugh.

And now I am faced with the same dour task — reviewing (read: picking apart) the newer version of Sense & Sensibility.

I don’t want to. I can’t make me. I know I should. My husband and I sat around tearing this thing to shreds like a couple of bitter cat ladies.  That was way more fun than the actual watching. It was a slog. It wasn’t that it was all bad — It wasn’t. It had many problems, not the least of which was that Ang Lee’s version had so much — so very deliciously much — going for it. But even without the comparison, this version was palid and even tedious.

The main thing…. The very most central problem was the portrayal of Marianne Dashwood. If your Marianne is bad, your production is kind of doomed, don’t you think? Marianne is young. The young can be quite delightful, but they can also be self-absorbed and convinced of their own rightness rather too often. The trick with Marianne is that she is an almost-total delight. But she is also an energy-sapping pain in the neck some of the time. She carefully navigates this delicately treacherous path adeptly, so that we end up championing her causes and mourning her losses right along with her. In the end we worry for her. We’re relieved, but we are afraid her spirit will have been tamed a little too thoroughly. Ang Lee’s Marianne does all this. We feel Elinor’s affectionate exasperation; Mrs. Dashwood’s inability to stop from spoiling her Marianne a bit;  Edward’s brotherly concern; Brandon’s warm attentions.

This new Marianne is (sorry) kind of a bitch.  She sneers. She brushes Elinor aside completely. She simpers…Austen’s (and Lee’s) Marianne would rather die than simper.  Her very first encounter with Brandon is all wrong. She almost deliberately misconstrues his discerning opinion of her piano performance.  Later, she hissingly discredits him completely to Elinor.  Not only is this a fabrication, but it is out of character for Marianne, and sets her up as an insufferable bitch with few redeeming characteristics.

So basically the lynchpin of the story is a bitch. Sorry. I can’t feel any of the requisite sympathy for this bitchy middle sister.

One more thing — her voice is unbearably shrill. Especially when contrasted with Elinor’s deep, mosulated, genuinely delightful, mellow-as-brandy voice. Marianne is a shrill bitch. And that’s just the beginning….

How would you like to be the month called August? It must be difficult and frustrating, trying to live up to the word that means “marked by dignity and grandeur; venerable.”  October, November and December, by contrast, have it much easier. They need to live up to…what?  titles conferred based on their respective (and outdated) numerical place among the months.  April’s got it easy. March — well, time marches on and never more so truly than in the month when the days tramp in like  sodden, angry lion and then prance out like a lamb on a Caribbean cruise. May. Yeah, there’s a tough assignment. Permissiveness abounds in the lusty month of May. The month of Yes You May.

August has a tough time of it. Dignity and grandeur in 90-plus-degree heat is a jeopardous undertaking (and doomed to failure).  Dignity and a sweat-soaked armpits? Grandeur and a wilted hairstyle? Have you ever heard of a venerable heat wave? These intimidating adjectives have no place in a beach parking lot packed with SUVs. They gain no purchase when the thermometer is bright red and someone asks “What’s for dinner?” and suddenly all you can think of is retreating to a dark closet when you can bang your head against a wall until the world cools down to at least the 80-degree mark.  A straitjacket hardly conjures images of dignity.

Sometimes, when watching some BBC miniseries, some Dickens adaptation, some Austen story brought to the screen, I think of the modern conveniences such as anti-perspirant, ceiling fans, daily bathing and cold beer in frosty bottles — and I wonder why no one thought to question the wisdom of corsets, chemises, farthingales, petticoats, cravats, waistcoats, bonnets, gloves and starched collars. At least during the month of August. Dignity can take a hike. But not in petticoats and a corset.

How To Get The Girl and Still Keep Your Shirt On

FD: Knightley, you dog, how great to see you. We never see you, buried as you are out in the country. What do you find to occupy your time there?

GK: Darcy! An unexpected pleasure! I have been very much occupied…um… at Donwell, and um…a visit to my brother John, and then…

FD: To hear John tell it, you’ve gone and gotten yourself mixed up with a woman….but he would say no more.

GK: John mentioned that, did he? Well, mixed up is not exactly the word. I am considering settling down, is all. Just not exactly sure this is the right time or perhaps I should wait. The lady in question might be a bit young for marriage…or for me…our families might…Yes, well, there is much to be considered…

FD: Local girl?

GK: Ah. Yes indeed. Local. Young. I’ve known her family for years. Just..she might need more time to get used to the idea of marriage. I’m not sure she’d have me. Not sure she thinks of me…you know…quite that way…

FD: She’s driving you out of your mind, isn’t she.

GK: Ghhhhaaaaa. Yeeesss. So relieved that you get it. You know what I’m talking about. Mad! She’s making me mad. Crazy. She’s all I think about. I…there’s…I can’t get anything done. I’ve missed meetings. Forgetting things. Social engagements.

FD: Don’t worry about that. It just makes you more of an enigma. And I know from enigma. Look, man. Get hold of yourself. You have this image to live up to. This literary image.

GK: Well, that’s not exactly my problem, is it? I mean isn’t that Jane Whatsit’s problem? She’s the one who wrote me into this damned buttoned-up character..

FD: Yes! Exactly! Which is why you need to find a way to take care of this particular yen for this local girl without blowing your image. You’re considered this…um…this…

GK: “Thinking Woman’s Sex Symbol?” Ugh. Please. Damned embarrassing. Lame. I’ve heard that. Yes. On those Austen discussion boards. You should talk, Darcy. You’re practically at the top of these ridiculous lists.

FD: Which is why you need to listen to me. Find some way of staying in character while you take care of this distraction. It’s what…1801 or something? You can’t exactly take her to your place and seduce her…

GK: More’s the pity..

FD: That’s not in character, pal.

GK: That’s more Churchill’s line of work.

FD: Churchill. Frank Churchill?

GK: Total prick.

FD: What a tool.

GK: Right. So what your saying is I need to find a way to get what I want ..

FD: …but still stay in character. Right. The reader trusts you, Knightley. You have to keep your honorable, chivalrous nature.

GK: God I hate that woman, Jane Austen. Does she even realize how difficult this all is? Leave it to a woman to tie her male characters in knots.

FD: Don’t let her get the best of you, man. Play along! Beat her at her own game! Find a way of declaring yourself that stays in character AND gets you the girl. If you play your cards right you could even work in some quotable line, like…

GK: “In vain I have struggled. It will not do. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

FD: Ooooh. That’s good. Unfortunately, it’s been used.

GK: How about, “Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment…”

FD: Hackneyed. Clichéd…

GK: Maybe I should just tell her that I cannot make speeches. That if I loved her less I might be able to talk about it more…

FD: Good! That’s good man! Go with that!

GK: You think?

FD: The lady won’t know what hit her. And neither will that Austen witch.

GK: Excellent.

FD: Just don’t do anything rash like jumping in a pond with your shirt on. Or undoing your cravat. Ask John Thornton about that one. Entire message bords, swooning over that one.

GK: Got it. No wet shirts. No undone cravats. What if I just get two different fellows to play me in two different film versions?

FD: You’re catching on.

“For months I have had all this on my mind without being at liberty to speak of it to a single creature.” -- Elinor Dashwood

Twice I have watched the new Persuasion. Twice. It debuted in January and I have held my tongue. I have kept my council. In vain I have struggled. It will not do. I need to spill about this new, upstart version of my favorite Jane Austen book.

Ugh.

It’s just a frustrating attempt any way I look at it. It seems damned, doesn’t it? It tries to remake an excellent film adaptation of the (arguably…but since this is my blog, let’s just accept it) best book by (possibly…see earlier parenthetical caveat) the best author in the English language. And it flails. And fails. Watching it twice was tedious. I am not sure if I wanted to like it or I wanted it to fail because I wanted to remain (ridiculously) loyal to the loved version with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds. In the end I wanted to like it just so I would have another interpretation to love. Like having two Emmas. Like having two pints of Hagen Daaz in the freezer.

So I watched it. And watched it again and picked it apart with my husband and made polite mouth noises when asked about it by casual acquaintances because God forbid I am branded a snob. Which I am. I hate me for being a snob, but it’s all I’ve got.

Persuasion

Avoiding comparisons between the 1995 motion picture release version (let’s call it P1 for short) and this upstart version (let’s call it P.U.) for short are inevitable and unfortunate and telling. On it’s own, PU might be an acceptable story. If one had never read the book, with it’s mature, melancholy prose and the quietly hopeful tone that seeps slowly into the plot, PU might be a diverting and pleasant tale. In fact the one advantage PU does have over P1 is that it takes much of Anne Elliott’s internal dialogs and turns them into diary entries, thereby injecting it with more of Jane Austen’s own words.

PU has only two things wrong with it: The cast and the plot. The direction, too. Oh, and the characterizations. That’s four things. Wait. The script, too. OK, that’s five.

Wentworth. Let’s start with Wentworth. PU’s Wentworth is nice looking (when he smiles) but has no charisma, no Hey!-Whoa factor. No thang that sets him apart. P1’s Wentworth is played by an average looking actor. But as Wentworth, he becomes so charismatic, so charming. Lots of Hey!-Whoa. PU’s Wentworth is not up to the task of making a woman like Anne pine for years. P1’s Wentworth shows his gallantry as well as his resentment. He also does a great job showing us how he still pines for Anne…and is doing his best to fight his growing feelings.

Mary Musgrove. She comes off like a character in a community theater production of some Beatrix Potter story. She’s a comedic rodent. Like a little badger or hedgehog with the whiny snurffly voice, dim ways and inexplicably poor posture. To hear her saying nearly the same lines as the amazing Sophie Thompson is a travesty.

Charles Musgrove: Like a high school actor reading his lines in the first run-through. What a dork.

The Crofts: Here is a real loss. P1’s version of Admiral and Mrs Croft conveyed the couple’s absolute devotion to one another in a few beautifully key scenes. The way Fiona Shaw warmly smiles at her husband, and her quiet assertions that as long as she and the admiral were not parted, she was never ill and her life was complete. Admiral Croft’s sweet, natural way with children, his easygoing, sincere affection for Anne as he takes her arm and tells her of Frederick’s letter indicate that these are the kind of people Anne considers good company and makes Sir Walter’s dismissal of them all the more telling. PU’s version are a typical couple of twittery English people. No depth. No humanity. PU’s version of Mrs Croft is not the right age either. That’s Wentworth’s sister? No way.

Sir Walter. This was a killer. Hard to watch this particular misstep. PU’s Sir Walter is a fop, but he is a mean, angry fop and it does not work. He screams at Anne. Sir Walter was more aware of how aristocracy should behave than anyone. Scream at his daughter in front of servants? Raise his voice in front of Smith and Mrs Clay (when he hears his tenant is a Navy man)? No. P1’s whiny, petulant, casually vain Sir Walter with the shallow conversation and the desperate pompousness was too perfect and exactly like Austen characterized him.

Mr Elliott: He is supposed to be a fop. Not Ichabod Craine. P1’s pretty, unctuous Mr. Elliott was shades better.

Mrs. Smith: What? She’s out on the street walking around? Running? Wow! Quite the cure Bath offers the desperately infirm.

Elizabeth: Let’s forget for a moment that instead of 29, this Elizabeth looks older than Lady Russell. She looks about 45. She does not get to screech as much as P1’s Elizabeth. “Perhaps! It might have been! She is a Viscountess! A Viscountess!” I miss my screeching Elizabeth.

Lady Russell: OK. It’s a draw on Lady Russell. P1’s is more formidable and composed. PU’s is a bit more as the book portrays her. I call a tie.

Louisa: She look about 10 and talks like she’s 12. Captain Wentworth asks, “When did Charles want to marry Anne?” Our little Mensa member answers, “I don’t know exactly. But it was before he married Mary.” Even my 9 year old son said, “Well, duh!”

Let me take a side street here to talk about the script. Why would they take Austen’s words and feed them to the wrong character? Why did they feel the need to hit us over the head with the plot points? It’s a patronizing script in many ways, and teeth-grittingly daft in other ways. WHY have that beautiful letter of Frederick’s then only read half of it? Why have Anne speak the lines about women loving longest when all hope is gone and waste them on Benwick AND HAVE FREDERICK NOT OVERHEAR THEM? HE’S SUPPOSED TO OVERHEAR HER! THAT’S HOW HE KNOWS SHE LOVES HIM STILL, IDIOTS. OK, ok, and why have Mrs Smith suddenly able to run a half marathon alongside Anne. Why dear God why have Anne run in circles all over Bath? It’s so bad it’s funny. And why have Louisa make a speedy recovery? She is supposed to linger at Lyme listening to Benwick’s poetry and falling in love with the poor sod. And when did Anne go to med school so she can diagnose and re-set a dislocated collar bone? And Charles and Mary Musgrove never check on their child. Not even to  peek in the room. And why in hell did you have so many close ups of Anne? Why that long, embarassing, excrutiating pause before the kiss in the middle of the street? She looked like a guppy. Why is there a servant with an inkwell in a random doorway at Kellynch? And someone answer me how Frederick Wentworth wrangled Kellynch away from Sir Walter or Mr. Elliott or whomever it belonged to by the end?

I need to let go of all this exhausting bitterness I feel toward the toads who made this.

One last thing. Sally Hawkins as Anne Elliott. You get a gold star for trying, Sally. And putting up with the special-needs director who made you do all these un-Anne-like things and wear that pencil-headed unflattering hairstyle. I liked Sally best in Layer Cake. She plays a coke-addled girlfriend  as well as she played Anne Elliott….that is to say very well. But Amanda Root from P1 is incandescent. And her chemistry with Ciaran Hinds’ Wentworth is exactly as Austen wrote the romance between Anne and Wentworth.