Netflix dropped the full trailer today for its six-part Pride and Prejudice series, with Emma Corrin as Elizabeth Bennet, Jack Lowden as Darcy, Olivia Colman as Mrs. Bennet and Rufus Sewell as Mr. Bennet. Written by Dolly Alderton, directed by Euros Lyn, it premieres December 3. Deadline
Jane Austen is the only renewable resource in Hollywood, and Netflix just fired the generator back up. The clip opens with Elizabeth and Jane lying on a rooftop — a rooftop, in what is presumably 1813 — where one of them says, "One day, Jane, I'll either be a governess and a spinster, or a wife and mother," which is the most honest career pitch ever put on television.
Then there is the lake scene where Darcy skips stones, echoing George MacKay in the new Sense and Sensibility film that opened in theaters this month. Fiona Shaw is in both pictures. At this point the Regency era is less a time period and more a shared universe. And the trailer ends with a gem: Olivia Colman demanding to know why Mr. Bennet makes everything so dramatic, because Rufus Sewell does not say a single word in the entire trailer. Not one. That is not a character choice, that is a bit.
The safety net on this one is that Dolly Alderton is writing it, Euros Lyn is directing it, and Emma Corrin is executive producing it, so the slow burn is being supervised by the woman playing it. Six episodes for a book most people read in an afternoon.
YOUR TURN: Six episodes for a book you can read in an afternoon. Who is paying for the other five?
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