Wednesday, February 25, 2015

All About Austen

With my frequent references to Netherfield and Hartfield for my own residences, there is hardly any need to reveal that one of my secret passions is the novels of Jane Austen. Till now I've always lived by the oft-repeated mantra of the Regency matchmaker extraordinaire Mrs Bennet - It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife

Adaptations of her famous novels are numerous from acclaimed movies based on them to the more unusual parodies adding zombies and vampires into the mix of stodgy British rural gentry. So rather than spend my past week dining on yee sang and new year cookies, I have been rabidly catching up on a web series ostensibly based on Pride and Prejudice, arguably Austen's most well-known tour de force. A tad late to the party - albeit fashionably so - but there is no better time to watch the Lizzie Bennet Diaries





Watch it! Certainly deserves winning the Primetime Emmy Award in 2013 for Outstanding Creative AChievement in Interactive Media-Original Interactive Program. Yes, quite the mouthful! Rather than a reluctant debutante, Lizzie is now an enterprising grad student out to complete her thesis by filming a vlog with her best friend Charlotte Lu. 

And get this - Bingley has turned into Bing Lee, as in Asian-American - and that's not even the most radical departure from the novel! Another character from the novel, Colonel Fitzwilliam has been turned into a fabulous gay black man!


Of course they couldn't change the main protagonists that much. Admittedly the coldly aristocratic Mr Darcy might not be to everyone's tastes - certainly wasn't to mine either - despite the fact that Charming Calvin once likened me to him! In real life, I think we would probably have intensely disliked each other at first sight! Fortunately the web series turned that haughty arrogance into something a tad more approachable, though as always our Darcy's quite the socially awkward fellow. 


A touch of Asperger's perhaps? 



Although as always, Darcy is melt-your-panties hot. 


Bowtie. What is there not to love?

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