People who were alive in November 1963 like to reminisce about the moment they learned that JFK had been shot. American Janeites who were alive in January 1996 can look back on a far more joyful, although slightly less momentous, milestone: their first viewing of the BBC’s landmark adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, which began airing on the A&E network exactly twenty years ago tonight.
That adaptation, which features the famous not-in-Austen shot of Colin Firth, aka Mr. Darcy, in a clingy, translucent wet shirt, is often credited (by me, among other people) with kicking off the pop-culture Austenmania that we still live with today, albeit in the attenuated form of Bustle listicles and zombie mashups.
So where was I when I first saw the famous P&P? Well, I didn’t subscribe to cable back then, so I had to content myself with a VHS recording mailed to me by my parents some time (a week? A month? Can’t remember now) after the original broadcast.
My husband and I invited a Janeite friend over for a two-night viewing party in our tiny apartment. The second night, she and I insisted on starting out by rewatching our favorite scene. No, not that one! In those pre-Internet days, I don’t know if we’d heard about the wet-shirt frenzy spawned by the show’s initial broadcast a few months earlier in England.
Anyway, that scene is in the second half.
We wanted to see Darcy and Elizabeth, played by the great Jennifer Ehle, crossing swords after his insulting proposal -- the six-minute exchange in which she tells him he’s “the last man in the world” she would ever agree to marry. It’s one of Jane Austen’s greatest scenes, and Andrew Davies’ screenplay realizes it beautifully, skillfully turning paraphrase into speech and interweaving the result with a condensed version of Austen’s dialogue. Firth paces, Ehle seethes, and the intensity of feeling between them gives even a P&P virgin a clue that Elizabeth is going to end up eating those words, with a cherry on top.
OK, I just went and watched that scene again. It’s still fabulous. Happy twentieth anniversary, everyone.
2 comments
Jan 15 2016 12:26AM by A. Marie
I had the distinct thrill of being in London the previous September, the night the first episode aired on the BBC. I still remember being in a newsstand a couple of days beforehand, seeing the Radio Times with Ehle and Firth on the cover, and letting out a whoop so loud it startled the cashier! But, alas, we must also mourn the passing of Alan Rickman today. Best Obadiah Slope, Sheriff of Nottingham, and Col. Brandon ever--not to mention Severus Snape. RIP.
Jan 15 2016 02:06AM by Deborah Yaffe
Oh, I know -- Alan Rickman's death is a blow. What a great actor. And certainly the best Brandon
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