“Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.”

-Jane Austen 

_{Content Warnings: Occasional mention of sexual assault; specific incidents of SA in the 20th century and risk working women’s potential risk for SA in 19th-century England.}

Welcome to the first of my series: Overthinking! I love to think a little too much about the things I and those around me love. In this series, I’ll present reactions, responses, questions, research, and opinions other than my own, and of course my own opinions. I’ll always try to be honest, accurate, and fair. I’m sure I’ll get things wrong, but I’m always willing to learn. Some of the topics may interest you, others may not. The assignment I give myself may change, but for now, it’s to think about fun things in a critical and smart way. First up is a comparison of several adaptations of Jane Austen’s Emma!  

If you have no familiarity with the plot of Emma, I highly recommend reading the summary on Wikipedia. Or go watch one of these adaptations first. Or, better yet, read it! this audible version with Emma Thompson narrating is a master class.  

Why overthink adapting Emma? 

Published in 1815, Jane Austen’s Emma presents–in my opinion–one of her most unlikable heroines. The “handsome, clever, and rich” Emma Woodhouse is a spoiled, vain, know-it-all who actually knows precious little. She has little life experience outside of her charmed small village of Highbury, and sees herself as an arbiter of taste and possessor of great wisdom, in spite of having virtually no intellectual curiosity or dedication to any pursuit of knowledge. She meddles and inserts herself into the lives of those around her, often to disastrous effect. She is convinced of her own self-importance and worth simply because she is a member of Highbury’s gentry. 

Depicting such a heroine on the screen, along with a large and diverse cast of characters, makes adapting Emma a challenge. The village of Highbury and its residents present a complex comedy of manners; social machinations; romantic hopes, disappointments, and expectations; humor; satire; wit; and joy. Adapting anything from one medium into another is a challenge, but with historical works, this challenge becomes layered: how do you make 19th-century issues relevant or understandable to a 20th or 21st century audience? 

With Emma, we have a story deeply enmeshed in regency social mores and cultural constraints utterly foreign to modern readers, with a cast of dozens of characters entangled in complex social relationships. We have an unlikeable, obnoxious protagonist who eventually wins readers over the course of the novel, and we have a writer who gives us gorgeous and often cutting, humorous prose, something that usually gets overlooked and forgotten in many page-to-screen adaptations.

This raises the question: How the heck can you adapt Emma for modern audiences? Do you keep it period or change it up?  Do you play with genre? Do you gender-swap? What elements can remain unchanged and which ones need updating to contemporary audiences to fully understand and grasp the stakes of the story? What do you lose when you cut Austen’s pitch-perfect prose and how do you build in her particular brand of humor without overplaying it? 

When we watch an adaptation of Emma, we want to see something that is “handsome, clever, and rich.” But how do you deliver on such a tall order? 

Historical Context and  Characterization

Now, as this series is titled Overthinking, I need to give some background before we jump into talking about the adaptations under study. 

Setting: Regency England

We’re about to get real nerdy here, but stay with me: King George III of England (r. 1760-1820) suffered periods of mania that eventually led the British parliament to pass legislation allowing for George, the Prince of Wales (later George IV), to serve as regent when the king was not well. While officially the Prince of Wales only reigned as regent from 1811 until the King’s death in 1820, the term ‘Regency period’ is often applied from the last decades of the 18th century until the reign of Queen Victoria in 1837. 

In Britain, the period was characterized by industrialization, the Napoleonic Wars, and abolition. The Regency period has had an indelible impact on contemporary 20th- and 21st-century popular culture, thanks in part to the literary movement of the period to which Jane Austen, Lord Byron, John Keats, the Shelleys, William Blake belonged. Literature of this era focused on the individual, the importance of an individual’s emotions, and evocative and highly Romantic notions of the past (particularly the medieval period). The modern novel was born in the Regency era, setting the literary course we’re still on today. 

There’s no genre that’s more impacted by the Regency era than the historical romance.¹ The subgenre of regency-period romance was launched by Georgette Heyer in the 1930s, inspired by Jane Austen. Heyer’s works created a fictionalized Regency-world, but one where her characters had more modern sensibilities–a trait that has continued as the genre has developed over the past 90 years.² The Regency era, set amongst the British upper crust or the haute ton, provided a glittering escapist background for romantic escapades. 

Any adaptation of Jane Austen’s novels on the screen should be understood within this context. Though Austen’s works were consistently popular throughout the 20th century, 1995 began a moment of a renewed interest in Jane Austen in popular culture, where she now reigns supreme. This moment roughly began with Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility, Colin Firth’s Pride and Prejudice (yes, it’s his), and, yes, Amy Heckerling’s Clueless. (Footnote about other adaptations before). In 2020, the Regency era had yet again another reinvigoration with the release of Netflix’s Bridgerton, based on one of the best regency series of the genre by Julia Quinn. Thus, the fictionalized setting of the Regency era–to the 20th and 21st century viewer/reader–looms large! 

Cast of Characters 

Character development is one of the best things about Jane Austen novels. Frequently dismissed as women’s romantic fluff by the jaded, her novels are some of the first examples of free indirect discourse. This narration style is third-person in delivery, but reveals the inner, first-person thoughts, feelings, attitudes of a/the character(s), e.g. “She was glad about the visit. It had been so long since anyone had paid a call. It renewed her spirit.”³ A pioneer and ultimate master in this now very well-known form of narration, Austen allowed this style of prose to reveal personality traits of each character–Emma in particular. You feel Emma’s passion, her humor, her frustration, and her regret. Being in the third person, Austen is able to shift the character descriptions and prose as needed. For instance, the passages about Miss Bates are ridiculously long and chatty, truly allowing the reader to feel not be told what it’s like to interact with “poor Miss Bates.”

This style of narration allowed Austen to give three-dimensions to both the heroine and the large ensemble. Besides Emma, there’s her hypochondriac and curmudgeonly father, the widower Mr Woodhouse, who cannot abide the idea of his daughters being more than 2 miles away from him. Emma’s mother died in Emma’s infancy.⁴ 

There’s Mr George Knightley, the Woodhouses’ neighbor and family connection. His younger brother, John Knightley is married to Emma’s sister, Isabella. Thus, Mr Knightley, who is very many years Emma’s senior, often takes on the patient, brotherly role and is one of the few people that calls Emma out on her bullshit, rather than indulge her–though that love eventually becomes romantic. 

There’s Harriet Smith, a parlor boarder at Mrs. Godwin’s school–she is the natural (illegitimate) daughter of an unknown person of some wealth who pays for her keep. There’s the poor–literally cash poor Miss Bates and her widower mother Mrs. Bates; they are invited to everything, mostly out of charity and to whom the adjective “poor” is always attached. The overly chatty Miss Bates, though often indulged by the town’s residents, fails to notice their occasional yet obvious condescension. 

Emma’s antagonist, Jane Fairfax, is Miss Bates’ orphaned niece who was placed in her aunt and grandmother’s care after the death of her parents. Practically perfect in every way, blessed in all things except station, Jane eventually is taken under the wing of a well-to-do friend and her family, the Campbells. Because the Bates’ have so few resources, Miss Fairfax essentially lives with the Campbells until her friend’s marriage–placing her in an uncomfortable position of having to find employment, a difficult and dangerous thing for a young, beautiful woman with few connections. 

There’s the pompous vicar, Mr. Elton, who chases after Emma, mostly due to the benefit that a match with Emma would bring his station and pocketbook. When rejected, he marries the first heiress he can find, the uppity and snobbish Augusta, who constantly tries to supplant Emma as the reigning lady of quality of Highbury. 

There is Mrs. Weston née Taylor, Emma’s governess, then companion, who marries a neighboring landowner, Mr. Weston. A charming and affable man, Mr. Weston was a widower whose only child was sent to live with his wife’s family, to be raised by his aunt. His aunt, instead of encouraging to maintain his connection with his father, makes him her heir, changes his last name and never lets the boy leave and when he does, calls him home abruptly. Thus, Frank Weston Churchill–the long-lost often-discussed, but rarely seen son of Mr. Weston–is a quasi-mythic figure to the townspeople of Highbury. He is a puckish figure, who engages with an open and obvious public flirtation with Emma, for it only to be revealed that he had long been engaged to Miss Jane Fairfax, whom he had met while she resided with the Campbells. It’s a lot to depict on screen satisfactorily. 

As you can see, there are a LOT of characters. The sheer variety and depth of the characters Austen presents is impressive! This wealth of characters and their characterizations makes it one of the most difficult of Austen’s popular novels to adapt without shortchanging any of the major plotlines or important characters.

The Consequences of Emma’s Matchmaking in a Regency Context

Emma compels Harriet to refuse Mr. Robert Martin’s proposal, because if Harriet married Mr. Martin, her social status would be so far below Emma’s that Emma could (read would) no longer invite Harriet into “polite society.” Mr. Robert Martin, one of Mr. Knightley’s tenant farmers, was termed a gentleman farmer by Mr. Knightly (gentleman indicating that he was of an appropriate social class). However, Emma chooses to see the Martins as too low to socially interact with and not low enough to be of interest because they’d need her charity or for her to condescend to visit them–a sure sign of her snobbishness.

When adapting Emma, the screenwriter and director have to communicate in some way the consequences of Emma’s matchmaking, and to demonstrate her ‘wrongness.’ Often, this results in concentrating on the emotional impact of her meddling, rather than more tangible, real world concerns. Let’s get into it. 

The most obvious instance of Emma’s folly is in her relationships with two young women of different social status and situations, but of a similar age. She fails to recognize the limitations that Jane Fairfax and Harriet Smith have that she does not, judges them based not on their situations but her own, and does not recognize she may not know the right thing to do. She’s snobbish and elitist in some of the worst kinds of ways. 

So why is this a big deal that Emma talked Harriet out of accepting Mr. Robert Martin?  

Harriet is illegitimate, which placed her under certain social constraints. Women such as Harriet–illegitimate, without the backing of a family name, a dowry, or a profession–faced an uphill battle. Her choices were basically to get married or become a governess or a lady’s companion–the only socially acceptable employment a woman could take. Harriet would need to find a potential spouse that is okay with her illegitimacy and willing to accept her dowry or lack thereof

Jane, similarly, would need to find someone able to marry her without the need of a dowry. Frank Churchill–as his heir to his aunt’s fortune– had the ability to marry Jane without a dowry. Her secret engagement to Frank Churchill also put her in a precarious social situation. Her engagement all hinged on whether or not Frank Churchill would be allowed to marry her, as his fortune was entirely dependent on his controlling aunt’s wishes. His aunt would likely reject a marriage to Jane Fairfax because she was neither well-to-do in pocketbook or pedigree. However, she could not be a burden to her aunt and grandmother for too long as they had too few resources already; the longer she was unable to reveal her engagement, the harder it became to explain why she did not seek employment. 

Thus, on the other side of the spectrum of reality entirely, sits Emma who states with regularity that she will not marry–to her it’s fully a choice. She does not understand the real pressure felt by those in Harriet and Jane’s circumstances. The only reason she has a choice is because she was independently wealthy, possessing a fortune of £30,000 (~£3.5 million today). The contemporary 19th-century reader would have inherently known the context in which Emma’s behavior must be viewed. 

What’s easy for 21st-century readers/viewers/consumers to miss is the potential stakes of Emma’s behavior in this situation (a little bit of a TW in the next paragraph). Harriet and Jane shared an incredibly uncertain future which entirely hinged upon their matrimonial prospects. Emma viewed Harriet’s potential marriage to a farmer as removing Harriet from acceptable society, and thus rendering Harriet an unsuitable friend. That’s ridiculously snobbish, but an all too common attitude amongst well-to-do landowners. 

19th-century women who worked–whatever the nature of that work–were vulnerable, especially in an era before labor reforms. The socially-acceptable positions of lady’s companion or a governess required women to live-in the home of their employer and to be virtually on-call 24/7/365; the family/individual one worked for also dramatically impacted their well-being.⁵ Women of any social class depended on marrying well for their livelihood. So when Emma selfishly dissuades Harriet from accepting Robert Martin’s proposal, she snobbishly fails to realize that for Harriet marrying Mr. Martin was ideal. 

Thus, there are two elements to Emma’s wrongness: 

(a) the emotional damage potentially done to Harriet by convincing her to refuse Mr. Martin, someone for whom Harriet has a great affection and 

(b) potentially putting Harriet’s livelihood at risk by encouraging her to consider matches with individuals who would not seriously consider her, getting too big for her britches so to speak.⁶ 

In most of Austen’s novels, there is often a “gentleman” waiting in the wings to take advantage of women in some way, particularly those without the privilege of class, influence, or wealth. 

There’s John Willoughby who impregnates Col. Brandon’s ward, Beth in Sense and Sensibility; there’s cash-poor Wickham who tries to trick Georgiana Darcy, a very young heiress, into eloping so that he can profit from her dowry and who does succeed in eloping with Miss Lydia Bennet; there’s the younger Mr. Elliot who courts both Anne Elliot (his cousin) and the elder Sir Walter Elliot’s potential spouse, so that however the cookie crumbles, he becomes the heir to Mr. Eliot’s barony. 

Danger was at every turn. Austen drew close attention to the fact that in the incredibly patriarchal society of 19th-century Britain, a woman’s safety and security was entirely dependent upon the character of the men in her orbit. Thus, through her matchmaking proclivities, Emma is a proverbial bull in the china shop of the town of Highbury. Her actions could have had significantly terrible real-world consequences.

Yet, somehow, Austen makes Emma charming. Her selfishness ends up being balanced by her naïvety, good intentions, self-reflection, and humor. Readers end up rooting for Emma because she grows over the course of the novel. She realizes that maybe she shouldn’t play matchmaker for her friends and community only for her own entertainment, but rather she should support them in making their own decisions–ones that impact their lives. She makes amends and apologies to those she’s wronged, or at least she tries to do so. She changes. 

Methodology

In this post, we will look at four adaptations of Emma. There are obviously many other adaptations not under consideration here. I debated which I’d select and which I’d leave out. Would I watch new content that I hadn’t seen before?  How would it hold up against the stuff I have seen many times? Would that be a fair comparison? Should I consider adaptations in all media? What are the limits and constraints? 

Let’s get into what I decided. 

Selecting Adaptations for Study

For this post, I will only be examining my favorites in film/TV, that I’ve seen more than once. This, perhaps, may not be academically rigorous, but there are a few reasons for this approach. 

1. There must be limits! This could rapidly spiral out of control and become unfun for me. And you. Everyone. I already wrote one dissertation. 
2. I want to be familiar with the content! There is value in having immersed myself in the adaptations selected. I know them well, so it’s not just a slapped together gut reaction. 
3. Context matters!  The conversation would become less satisfying if I couldn’t do full justice to the context to which the adapted content belongs. For instance, if I brought 2010’s Aisha, a Hindi language adaptation of Clueless into the discussion, what kind of insight could I bring to it? Not much. Not because I don’t think it’s worth talking about, but my knowledge is insufficient. While I want to watch it and I am willing to learn, I don’t think my opinion about it is worthy of circulating as I have only seen a handful of Bollywood films and I don’t speak Hindi. I can judge it only on its adaptation of the source material, not on how it speaks to the social context of its targeted audience. Thus I decided for this post, I will only discuss anglophone tv/film adaptations of Emma as that is the only area I have experience in. Is that cherry-picking? Maybe. But I think it’s only fair, and this isn’t a peer-reviewed paper. So neener neener! 
4. Movies and TV series will be considered! This list is mostly movies and one BBC TV series. I considered if it was fair to compare a 4-episode series to feature films that are half as long. It is. They’re similar enough formats, and, I’m the boss–I do what I want! However, I will pay attention to this when levying any criticism. 

On Adaptations

I love thinking about adaptations. So many stories that we love are adaptations. They’re everywhere, even when we don’t realize it. 

So what do I mean by adaptation? Basically an adaptation is the transferring of a story from one medium to another or from an earlier version of the same medium (a remake). From book to film. From film to stage musical. From book to stage. And sometimes back again.

Adaptations run the gamut of being incredibly faithful to the source material or departing drastically in tone, plot, characterization. In some cases, the film/TV adaptations become just as, if not more, beloved than their source material: The Wizard of Oz, The Shining, Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, Matilda, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Les Misérables, Netflix’s Bridgerton, all the Nicholas Sparks movies, literally every single Disney movie ever made, the list goes on.⁷ 

On Broadway, a new run of a well-known show also falls into the category of adaptation and demonstrates how varied adaptations can be. The recent and dark (and oh-so weird) new version of Oklahoma! It was an entirely different show even though not a line of dialogue–book or lyrics–was changed. Same goes for recent runs of Stephen Sondheim’s Company, where the lead character was gender-flipped, Robert becoming Bobbie, changing the entire tenor of the show for a new generation of viewers. In a similar vein, but with less of an impact to how the story was told, was the recent run of 1776 where the almost entirely male cast was played by women, and, mostly women of color. 

For a successful adaptation my criteria are few. The story should be told well in the new medium. This, particularly with book-to-film adaptations, often means that stuff will get left out. Of course it will. But the selection of what is left out and what is changed must be done smartly, so the stakes feel legitimate to the viewer. I find more often than not that TV shows/films that slavishly follow the source material are not my favorite and neither are those that go totally off script for no reason. Some adaptations make the list of both good and awful adaptations: Game of Thrones, for instance, started awesome and ended like a hot pile of poo…but that’s honestly probably because they ran out of material to actually adapt. 

In essence, the best adaptations, imho, do something with the source material to make it exciting to contemporary viewers/readers/consumers. For a lot of fantasy/sci-fi adaptations, this can be done through cinematography–giving imaginative life to worlds beyond our experience. For historical period pieces, part of it is a similar kind of scene setting–none of us lived in 19th-century England– so the filmmakers must present an imagined reality. But any adaptation is going to have to find out what works now within the original story, and make it relevant and engaging to a broad audience. Changing times allow for incorporating new technologies, new societal norms, etc. to tell stories with different emphases, resulting in something new yet familiar. 

Now there are many adaptations that I would consider “good” adaptations that I dislike. There are Oscar-winning adaptations of musicals that I loathe with every fiber of my being because it doesn’t adapt the musical as well as it does the setting. (Those who know me will immediately know what musical this is. 😂) 

To sum up, for me, a good adaptation should: 

1. Adjust the plot/setting/characters/etc. for its new medium. For instance, is the circumscribed plot understandable to those who haven’t read the book? (or whatever the original medium is?)
2. Have its own point of view. Especially in cases of stories that have been redone often, it has to add something to the mix. 
3. Have some kind of dialogue with the source material. At first I phrased this as “respect” the source material, but then I thought about it and decided that was the wrong word. For instance, I think the reinvisioned 1776 would have hit a lot better if it had done more with the source material. It was too respectful, maybe? Instead of a scene-for-scene transfer of a story from one medium to another, are there layers of nuance that the adaptation is able to bring to the table that the previous medium could not? 
4. In the case of the often adapted, the newest version has to do something unique. Jane Austen’s works have been adapted in various media endlessly. Each new adaptation must position itself amongst the previous adaptations smartly and bring something new to the table, or else, what’s the point? 

Methods of Analysis

To dive into how the films up for study handle the art of adapting, I will discuss the following: 

Background: Give a little bit of an intro to each film/series, its cultural context and impact.  

Changes & Takes: Discuss what was changed and if there were any unique takes? What kind of changes were made to the plot, setting, characters, etc., and what was the impact of those changes? Did they have original takes on the characters, setting, etc.? 

Casting & Characters: Explore the impact of casting: How the actors selected impact the characterization? Were there any miscastings? 

Sensory Experience: Consider how the movies and show looked and felt. I am not a cinematographer, nor am I particularly versed in the art of cinematography. I won’t be making assessments of camera angles, aspect ratio and the like. Rather, I will be talking about the movies’ impact on my senses. How did I feel while watching/listening while experiencing this movie/series?

That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi What was my overall impression? How does it hit in 2024? Will I watch it again in the future? 

At the end, I’ll synthesize, think about what really spoke to me. Which is the best adaptation and what does best mean? 

Obviously, this is all highly scientific. 🙃

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Let the analysis begin!

I debated the order in which to present these films. The art historian in me wants to go chronologically, but instead I am going to controversially go in order of my least to most favorite (controversial because favorites have no place in academic discussion). For this, I define “favorite” as the one I watch the most often, the one to which I turn when I want an Emma fix. However, I am aware that my favorite adaptation may not be the best adaptation. 

Without any further ado, let’s begin!

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1996: Emma 

Director & Screenplay: Douglas McGrath
Music: Rachel Portman
Runtime: 120 minutes
Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeremy Northam, Alan Cumming, Toni Collette, Ewan McGregor
Rotten Tomatoes: 84% 

Background

I remember the first time I saw this movie. I had braces and just had a tooth pulled because it wasn’t going to fit in my tiny, tiny mouth. My mom let me rent a few movies to watch while I laid on the couch and “recovered” from the entirely painless procedure. This was definitely in high school so for me it would have been many years after Emma was released. I don’t remember what my original thoughts were about the movie, but it was, for a time, “the” Emma in my standard rotation–it was eventually supplanted by 2009’s miniseries as my favorite version of Emma. I hadn’t had the urge to watch it in years and dusting it off for this blog was an experience. 

Changes & Takes 

All in all, this is a fairly traditional adaptation of Emma. It takes place in Regency England and follows the basic structure of Austen’s novel, with few if any derivations on plot points. The most visible changes were mostly made to give more depth to Emma and Mr Knightley’s relationship. You get a sense of their attraction earlier on with heated arguments and more tension building from the get go. Most of the broad strokes of the plot are there, though at times abbreviated necessarily to fit the format not to really take any “liberties” with the plot. 

The thing that suffered the most in the retelling is the Frank Churchill/Jane Fairfax element. It felt like so much of an afterthought in this telling–Jane Fairfax barely has three lines on screen. You don’t get any real sense of the tension between Frank and Jane, nor how badly Frank leads Emma on in a very public quasi-courtship. You don’t get a sense of the tension and awkwardness between Emma and Jane. This storyline seems to have fallen victim to the time constraints, and I’m guessing that the director chose to focus more on Emma and Harriet’s relationship rather than the complex Emma/Frank/Jane triangle. I’m not sure that paid off. 

Casting & Characters

Whew. I personally think the casting in this movie is wild. Few of the actors feel correct for or natural in their roles. It feels like an excessively weird blend of people. But from a 2024-vantage point, it most feels like a weird group but that’s probably not a fair critique. 

Emma: First off, I do not like Gwyneth Paltrow as Emma, and I always felt this way to some degree. Her acting is fine, and her crusty-dusty British accent is solid (apparently her accentwork is half of why she was cast in the role). In 1996, the director of the film said this of Paltrow’s Emma: 

“One of the many great things about Gwyneth is she plays all sides of it. She doesn’t soften the unpleasant things in Emma’s character, nor does she inflate her good qualities. She has everything a young woman that age has, all the petulance, the vanity, the self-confidence that can only come from youth and ignorance. The tenderness, the repentance, the honest desire to help someone even though in her case it always seems to turn into harm. Because she doesn’t always try to make herself look good, that makes her all the more endearing.”

I….just fundamentally disagree. I don’t find her Emma endearing at all. Is that because I have 25+ years of knowledge of Gwyneth Paltrow, including that she sold a $75 candle that smelled like her vagina? Maybe. I’m not a perfect person and I will judge you if you sell an overpriced candle meant to smell like your vagina. However, Paltrow’s Emma doesn’t give you the sense that she grew in this adaptation. She’s as snobbish and overbearing as she was at the beginning. The lack of a clear character arc makes Paltrow’s performance fall short for me.

Truly Baffling Casting Choices: I could go on about how weird some of these choices felt but will try to keep it brief: 

• Ewan McGregor as Frank Churchill. His Churchill wears truly one of the most god awful wigs to ever grace the silver screen, and his depiction of Frank Churchill just feels weirdly cartoonish. McGregor himself didn’t think he did a good job in that role, saying it was the worst work he’s ever done. I’d have to agree–though I don’t know if he was given enough screen time to make it work. 
• Polly Walker as Jane Fairfax. Now known for her roles in HBO’s Rome as the conniving Atia and Netflix’s Bridgerton as likewise conniving Mrs. Featherington, a young Polly Walker is just far too sensual to play Jane Fairfax. Even just visually speaking, undeniably gorgeous, with those eyebrows and eyes, she is just so much better suited to playing a villain or someone who is dangerous. And that does not work on Jane Fairfax. They paired her up with Ewan McGregor, which just does not work. Zero Chemistry (plus there were zero on-screen opportunities given to these characters to develop chemistry.) 
• Toni Colette as Harriet Smith. I love Toni Colette as an actress, but she just…doesn’t feel like a period actress. Having two of the main female leads in an Austen production be American (Paltrow) and Australian (Colette) is also…odd. I don’t know that it is a dealbreaker, but I am just not sure they worked well together. I am also not sure why but Toni Colette just felt far too old to play the young Miss Smith, even though she was around 23 when making the film. She also apparently gained weight to play the role of Harriet to appear “Rubenesque”…and like….why. (I think this annoys me, because it seems like such a 1990s thing to make THE character who is not socially acceptable a TINY,  and do I mean only a TINY,  bit round…she is not Rubenesque. She’s barely a size 8.) 
• Alan Cumming as Mr. Elton. Look, I love Alan Cumming. He’s a mega talented stage actor and musical star. He always commits to a role. But as Mr Elton, he just didn’t work. Perhaps it’s because I know he’s gay, and often plays queer roles and that his characters are usually energetic and vivacious. But I was never able to suspend my level of disbelief and accept him as such a timid character that he seemed to portray in Emma. His performance felt cartoonish and fake, like he was wearing a “demure” costume. I kept expecting him to break out in song at any moment and give me jazz hands. (Which would have been an improvement, tbh.)

Truly Great Casting Choices:

• Jeremy Northam as Mr. Knightley. This man was meant to wear Regency attire. And his hair. He works reasonably well as Mr. Knightley if there’s not really a whole lot of depth to his affection for Emma. It seems a little more like love/hate. 
• Real life mother-daughter duo Phyllida Law and Sophie Thompson (Emma Thompson’s sister and mom) as Mrs Bates and Miss Bates. Apparently they were cast together unknowingly by the casting director as their names were on separate lists. They were barely on screen, which is a shame since they were such a delight. I really wanted more. 

Sensory Experience: How did the movie look and feel? 

Upon rewatching this movie, I was struck by how strange the lighting was throughout the entire film. Most of the indoor scenes are lit with a golden light from above that gives those scenes this weird dated quality that I don’t fully understand. Is it meant to be akin to stage lighting? To give the figures an idyllic quality? I am sure it was to attempt to convey candlelight, but….incredibly inexpertly. It does not give off the effect of candlelight to me but just seems super weird 1990s BBC stylistic strange. Like it’s clear you’re on a set and it pulls me out of it. 

Like it’s fucking weird, right? A choice.  

The music was also, to my mind, not very special, but exactly what you’d expect from a mid-1990s Jane Austen adaptation–jaunty and light instrumental music, nothing special. The only notable entry was a duet (which lasted FAR too long) between Gwyneth Paltrow and Ewan McGregor at a dinner party. 

Overall, aesthetically the movie just feels quasi-cartoonish, which originally I thought may be unfair looking at it in 2024. But no, there are so many movies that I adore that hold up so much better in this regard. 

That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi 

In 2024, I just don’t think this movie holds up as either a great adaptation OR a good movie. It had long fallen out of my standard rewatch routine. I am not sure I would willingly decide to watch it again as there are other options out that do a better job of doing Emma and are more enjoyable to watch. 

Some of my disinclination to watch this movie may also come from what we now know in 2024, like the fact that this movie was greenlit by then chairman of Miramax, convicted sex offender, Harvey Weinstein. Beyond just mere association with a fucking creep, the film’s star, Gwyneth Paltrow, later said that Weinstein harassed her after she signed on for the film. 

Overall, I wouldn’t say that the film does anything *wrong* I just am not sure that the choices made really make it right either. 

FINAL GRADE: D (Passing grade without being a fail) 

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2009: Emma 

Director: Jim O’Hanlon
Screenplay: Sandy Welch
Music: Samuel Sim
Runtime: Four 60+ minute episodes
Starring: Romola Garai, Jonny Lee Miller, Michael Gambon

Background

In the aughts a series of Jane Austen miniseries/movies were released on BBC, among them of my favorite version of Persuasion,  an okay version of Sense and Sensibility, and 2009’s Emma (plus Northanger Abbey starring Felicity Jones and Mansfield Park starring Billie Piper–smartly, there was no attempt to do Pride and Prejudice as a feature film was released in 2005).⁸ 

The first time I watched this version of Emma, I knew this would supplant the 1996 version for me. When I sat down to write this comparison, I expected this to be my ultimate favorite version, but I was surprised to find that, while I do love it and always will, I see it more of a copy and paste of Emma from book to screen–to a point. Previously, I’d have said it wasn’t really doing too much in adapting, just trying to be the most faithful version. I’d have said that Romola Garai is one of the best Emma’s because of how charming she is able to make Emma a character who can be frankly obnoxious, charming and delightful. 

However, after immersing myself in this story for this post, and thinking about how to adapt the story to the screen, I realized during this watch-through that it didn’t stand out in the ways I expected. Did it do anything wrong? Not especially. But it didn’t do anything special either. 

Changes & Takes

As a four-episode mini-series, where each episode is an hour long, this adaptation has much more time to spend luxuriating in the characters and the plot, leaving no stone unturned. I can’t think of anything controversial or notable in their adaptation. As I rewatched it, I felt like it didn’t have a particular goal. 

Casting & Characters

In general, this mini-series is very well cast. Even though I do love Romola Garai’s Emma, she is too sweet and likable from the get-go for the character. She needs to start out in a more unlikeable place for her growth arc. But she does make Emma’s mischief more charming. You can see how so much of her misbehavior is youthful folly, not like a truly rotten figure. But ultimately, she is toooooo nice. 

Jonny Lee Miller is not who I would cast as Mr. Knightley, but he does a decent job. When the series was first released, critics had issues with Jonny Lee Miller being Mr. Knightley–finding him too much of an obvious bad boy for the role. When I first watched this series, I didn’t have any idea of Jonny Lee Miller being a bad boy, so that’s not something I got from his portrayal. 

Michael Gambon is a perfectly curmudgeonly hypochondriac. Most of the other actors I haven’t seen in anything else before or since. The exception to this is Tamsin Greig as Miss Bates who gives the most realistic and heartbreaking version of Miss Bates. No one really stands out as particularly good or miscast.

Sensory Experience

This movie is visibly happy. It’s a warm spring day, a cozy day spent reading by the fire. There’s not a scene that’s not beautiful, there’s not a note that’s not sprightly. It embodies all you want from a Jane Austen retelling. But after such strong showings of this traditional period adaptation in Sense and Sensibility (1995, feature), Pride and Prejudice (1995, series), and Pride and Prejudice (2005, feature), what did this version offer to the genre? 

Not much unfortunately. 

Is it great when you want such a depiction of Emma? 

Yes absolutely. And that’s about it.

That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi

Where this series succeeds is taking advantage of the long format. It gives depth to the relationships that feature films cannot. The opening, for instance, does such a good job of pointing out how well Emma, Frank Churchill, and Jane Fairfax’s situations are parallelled. All three either orphaned (Jane) or lost a mother (Frank and Emma). The disparity in situation–and Emma’s privilege compared to the other two–is made entirely plain to viewers. 

The movie also gives the most real and human version of Miss Bates. She’s not a caricature of the maiden aunt that other adaptations sometimes present; you see her deep love for Jane and for those around her. There’s also some great humanizing of Mr Woodhouse and the loss of his wife; it directly explains his excessive caution for his daughters. It does a great job of showing, not telling, which is a privilege of the time a series has to develop its characters. 

All of that said, I was truly surprised at how poorly this one did in my estimation during this exercise! Will I watch it again? Most definitely, but as an adaptation of Emma, I think it tries too hard to *be* Emma. To–as literally as possible–bring Austen’s word’s to life. I don’t know that that’s a bad goal, but to me, it just made it less interesting on this re-watch. 

FINAL GRADE: SOLID B or B-

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2020: Emma. 

Director: Autumn De Wilde
Screenplay: Eleanor Catton
Music: Isobel Waller-Bridge and David Schweitzer
Runtime: 121 minutes
Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Johnny Flynn, Miranda Hart, and Bill Nighy
Rotten Tomatoes: 86%

Background

When I first heard of 2020’s Emma. I was, at first, mildly surprised that this story was being told yet again for the big screen. Once I learned more about it though, I  knew it would be different. Where 1996’s Emma was fairly straightforward and star-studded, this movie looked like visual candy. When I learned that Johnny Flynn, a folk singer, fiddler, and actor was announced as Mr Knightley, I knew this film would be different. Given the fact that the official title is Emma. with a period since it’s a “period” piece, I was correct. This adaptation is as much an adaptation of the ‘Regency period’ as it is an adaptation of the book. 

This film, the directorial debut of photographer Autumn de Wilde, is an attack on the senses. And I mean that in the best way possible. Given de Wilde’s experience as a photographer of portraits as well as a director of music videos, it makes sense that she capitalized upon that background to make this film. Of the adaptations on discussion here, this movie far and away does the best job of leaving a visual and aural impression on the viewer. 

Changes & Takes 

Released 25 years after Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility, Emma. seems aware of how it fits within the chronology. It knows the history of the genre and revels in its absurdity, but with a fierce level of appreciation. The result is the full realization of the Regency Era as a character all of its own. All in all, I wouldn’t say that this is a change, but it definitely is a take. 

Unconcerned with trying to be Emma, this film lets the characters respond in ways that earlier versions would not have. While the phrasing and word choice is all Austen, the manners Regency, the effect is decidedly 21st century. Servants exist in this version. The absurdity of all versions of Emma and adaptations of Austen you’ve seen without servants becomes immediately apparent. The valet assisted a perfectly capable Johnny Flynn with putting on his trousers (butt shot! 😂), the maid who assists Anya Taylor-Joy with her stockings, reveals the falsity of all of the versions that have gone before. How much of a fiction those versions were. Yet at the same time, it highlights how we as 21st-century audiences envision, and at times, revere, a time period where people were treated as furniture and the main characters don’t even dress themselves.⁹

The other adaptations up for discussion all use voiceover narration of some variety, except this one. Alicia Silverstone does the voiceovers in Clueless. Emma (1996) uses a variety of narrators. Jonny Lee Miller briefly introduces the 2009 mini-series explaining Emma, Frank, and Jane’s loss of their mothers and the consequences of that loss. Given Jane Austen’s use of free-indirect discourse, it’s interesting to me that Emma.’s only form of narration was brief title cards at the intro and at the changes of the season, when the other versions fairly heavily relied upon some vocal narration or voiceover to set the scene.

Casting & Characters

While I don’t know that I would have thought to cast Anya Taylor-Joy as Emma, she does a fantastic job of portraying a handsome, clever, and rich Emma. She is full of contradictions–judgmental, but well meaning, sarcastic, but kind. Self-assured, but also naive. Taylor-Joy brings a real depth to Emma, especially in her interactions with those around her. For instance, she extends such benefit of the doubt to Frank Churchill, but absolutely none to her female counterparts such as Jane Fairfax, with whom Emma is openly competitive. The responses she is able to convey with a single look is truly impressive. The critical scene where Emma insults Miss Bates is immaculate—you can see the exact moment that she realizes her mistake and rudeness; the compliment Mr Weston then provides Emma feels all the more uncomfortable–because it highlights Emma’s social position within the group–folks are still complimenting her even though she is the one who misbehaved. However, you also see Emma feeling true shame for her behavior, not just that she was called out (the impression I got from Paltrow’s Emma). Taylor-Joy’s Emma does the work to make amends, which I fully appreciate. 

Johnny Flynn as a lovesick Mr. Knightley is pretty stellar. Again, I would not have thought to cast him as Mr. Knightley, but it is a casting that I fundamentally love. His version of Knightley is so emotive. You really feel his tension in his relationship with Emma, and the polite, unpossessive jealousy that colors his actions. As in other versions, his Mr Knightley calls Emma’s behavior out, but his Knightley goes even further in stating plainly that Emma is jealous of Jane’s accomplishments. This one leans more into Mr Knightley’s distress that Emma may be falling for Churchill. As I said, he’s a little lovesick (hehehe)–he looks physically ill at the thought of Emma and Frank Churchill pairing up.¹⁰ He also brings such drama to his  confession of love, where it’s almost absurd, but in the best kind of way. Johnny Flynn does the best “if I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more” of all of Knightleys. 

Bill Nighy is an excellent hypochondriac Mr. Woodhouse. Like depicting Emma, it’s hard to balance Mr. Woodhouse’s less pleasant characteristics with his positive ones. Sometimes it’s hard to understand why Emma and everyone else around puts his needs first when he’s so patently ridiculous. Bill Nighy’s Mr. Woodhouse, like Michael Gambon’s, obviously cares deeply for his daughter and his concerns are owing to the loss of his wife. You also see in a few scenes him actually stepping into a paternal role with Emma and offering her comfort, particularly after Emma’s behavior to Miss Bates.

Mia Goth’s Harriet is so silly and so absurd. De Wilde really gives the character a chance to shine by using her as an opportunity to show off the life of a parlor boarder in her school You see Harriet’s fun-loving and simple nature in her interaction with the other boarders. The patent absurdity of Harriet’s response to being mugged by Travellers is so hilarious and uncomfortable (a response shared by the characters who share that scene). I also think of the period pieces, this Harriet stands up to Emma more directly than the others. She calls Emma out for leading her to refuse Mr Martin, and when she reveals that her father is a tradesman who makes galoshes rather than a gentleman as Emma believed, she does so proudly and with backbone, defying Emma to think poorly of her. And, Emma shows her true growth by inviting him to Highbury, moving beyond airs she displayed earlier on. 

The rest of the cast of characters is likewise amazing. Mr Elton is so ridiculous in the best way–creepy and ingratiating, totally giving off an air of a 19th-century incel, with anger simmering under the surface and erupting in bursts. Later, his wife Augusta is also incredibly insufferable. Miranda Hart’s Miss Bates might be the most annoying of all the versions,  and Emma so visibly annoyed by her (as she should be). The way she constantly seeks Emma’s approval (as she would have been with her “social betters” in the 19th century) really brings something to the social dynamic that isn’t easily understood to 21st-century audiences. I also think that this version does an excellent job of hinting that Frank Churchill and Jane Fairfax had an attachment.

Sensory Experience

This whole film can be described as a sensual feast. In visuals, music, and costuming it just blows all of the other adaptations out of the water. The sets and costumes use color so evocatively. Again, I promised that I wouldn’t delve too deeply into cinematography given I know nothing about it, but to my art historical eye, I am deeply unshocked to learn that a photographer who principally shot portraits directed this film. This version, more than any other, uses the scene setting to transmit emotional impact and to reveal the emotional status of the scene. 

Likewise, this film uses its score so effectively, by pulling from the era–not just traditional classical music, but also through the use of standard 18th-century English hymns and folk music recorded by contemporary artists. There is also an original song by Johnny Flynn called Queen Bee, which is told from the perspective of Mr. Knightley’s feelings for Emma. The score, by Isobel Waller-Bridge (sister of Phoebe!), is whimsical and gorgeous. The old standard English hymns against the vaguely operatic chorale, gives some major-chord energy the whole way through.

The costumes are a TOUR DE FORCE. Intricate and gorgeous, leaning into the outlandish styles of the Regency era and into our 20th and 21st century imaginings of Regency Era clothing is just perfection. 

That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi 

Obviously, I adore this movie, but for reasons. It presents an entirely imaginative period piece, more about our 21st-century notions of the 19th century, than the 19th century itself. In doing so, it is a charmingly successful adaptation of Emma. It feels puckish and whimsical in a manner entirely appropriate for how Austen’s works would have felt to the 19th-century reader. Ultimately, I think that’s what makes a really good adaptation. It knows its audience, respects its source material, but doesn’t slavishly try to be the source material. It does its own thing, with a unique stylistic and narrative point of view.¹¹ 

FINAL GRADE: A+, 5-Stars, no notes, practically perfect period adaptation

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1995: Clueless 

Director & Screenplay: Amy Heckerling
Music: David Kitay
Runtime: 97  minutes
Starring: Alicia Silverstone, Paul Rudd, Donald Faison, Brittany Murphy, Breckin Meyer, Stacey Dash
Rotten Tomatoes: 81%

Background

If I had done this list in chronological order, I’d have had to start with Clueless. Starting with the cult-classic Clueless could have been both a boon and a challenge. It could have been a boon because it’s a true adaptation. It is not supposed to *be* Emma, but follows the loose plot of Emma very closely, but creatively positions it in a different universe entirely. If you didn’t know Austen, you wouldn’t have any idea that the story was based on a novel first published in 1815. When I first saw Clueless in either 1995 or 1996 (I know I didn’t see it in the theater, but I know I saw it shortly after it came out), I hadn’t yet read Emma and  found out much later that it was based upon Jane Austen’s novel.  

However, it would have been a huge challenge to do first because it is a cult classic. It’s one of the best teen movies of all time, part of the mid-to-late 1990s teen flick golden era. It launched the careers of Alicia Silverstone, Brittany Murphy, and, in his film debut, gosh-darn perfect human angel (or vampire maybe since he’s not aging?), Paul Rudd. It’s a cultural touchstone, so I feel like I would have had to come out swinging. 

Clearly, I adore this movie and will brook no slander against its perfection. 

Changes & Takes

Setting: Moving Emma from Regency England to a Beverly Hills high school is a sheer move of genius. Amy Heckerling, no stranger to the teen movie or the high school setting, totally got this right. Where else would you find the intense and insular social pressure found in Regency England that is also immediately understood by a late-20th century audience? The ridiculous fashion? (As an adult I totally love this now because it makes me so dang nostalgic.)  Aging down the characters (some) and removing the focus on marriage is also helpful in making it believable. 

There are so many things that just work about this transition. 

• In Emma, Emma paints a portrait (badly) of Harriet. In Clueless, Cher, Tai, and Elton participate in a group photoshoot and Elton hangs the group pic in his locker. (This would work EVEN BETTER in a 2024 insta/TikTok world.) 
• In Emma the focus is on marriage. In Clueless the social status revolves around virginity, who has it and who doesn’t. “You’re a virgin, who can’t drive.” 
• Elton finally making a movie at a high-school party, the gross move he does with the Suck and Blow game, taking Cher home only to try and make out with her, and then fully showing off his dickishness when he abandons Cher in the “middle of nowhere” and she gets mugged. This was a perfect moment of adaptation because it allows Elton–who you pretty much only see in montage shots–to really show off his character, and you can realize really quickly that it’s not great. This allowed Heckerling to massively trim Elton from the plot. It’s totally normal that Tai would have a crush on a guy that she doesn’t really interact with. 

Characters: I love how all of the characters were translated to the 20th century ideal. Cher Horowitz is totally spoiled, but very well meaning, Daddy’s girl. The fact that they made her dad Mel Horowitz (Dan Hedaya), the “nervous” Mr. Woodhouse, a high-profile divorce attorney is just PERFECT. Because of his profession he’s ridiculously overprotective of his only child (there’s no young Knightley or older sister like in the novel), but simultaneously he’s perpetually absent. (Cher’s mother also died from a liposuction procedure gone wrong, some excellent social commentary.) 

Brittany Murphy’s Tai is Heckerling’s take on Harriet Smith–instead of a bastard, Tai is the New Girl in school, whose style is a brand of 1990s grunge that went against Cher’s Valley Girl ideal (same with Breckin Meyer’s skater boi in the role of Mr Robert Martin, the “unsuitable” farmer). One thing that’s just a little ick is that Paul Rudd’s Mr. Knightley is Cher’s ex-step-brother instead of just Mr Horowitz’s intern (even though it’s clear they weren’t step siblings for long). 

One of the most brilliant transformations was Cher’s first matchmaking attempt. Instead of her companion Miss Taylor and neighboring landowner Mr. Weston, Cher matchmakes for her teachers Miss Geist (Twink Caplan) and Mr Hall (Wallace Shawn) in an effort to make them happier so that she’ll get better grades. In a classic, chicken versus egg, it’s fairly clear that the two already had an attraction, Cher just…cleared the path. 

The vicar Mr. Elton becomes Elton and his eventual “wife” is another popular girl, Amber. The characters for whom there is no parallel is Cher’s bestie Dionne (Stacey Dash) and her boyfriend, Murray (Donald Faison). I think this was a smart addition–you needed someone to play straight with Cher in a way that the Mrs. Weston figure (Miss Geist) could not in the context of high school. Dionne and Murphy also provided the classic long-term high-school couple that’s standard for this genre of movie. 

Several characters were dropped for this telling–smartly because it’s hard to transplant the poor maiden aunt–Miss Bates–to a contemporary high school. In some ways, I feel like Miss Geist somewhat falls into that role–the perpetually single teacher in her 40s. Similarly, there’s no Jane Fairfax character, which completely makes sense for the setting–a secret engagement makes no sense in high school. To that end, the Frank Churchill character, another new kid, Christian (Justin Walker) has a fairly poorly kept secret–he’s clearly, obviously gay. 

Takes: One of the things I found the most different is the way you do actually see Tai change under Cher’s tutelage. In Clueless, Cher changes Tai’s style, her hair, her clothes–Tai looks different than she did before. You don’t usually see that in period adaptations of Emma. Harriet usually feels static–the only real thing wrong with her is the circumstance of her birth. In the novel, even if Emma assisted Harriet with her manner, she was still restricted by her social position: an illegitimate child of a merchant, not a landowner. In Clueless, the result is a little different. One could argue that Tai has definitely been improved. She’s less rough around the edges and her clothing is generally more flattering. She is more confident and a little bit less naive than she appeared in her first few days. The reckoning between Tai and Cher at the end feels so much more…substantial because in high school (as opposed to Highbury), there is really no reason that Tai can’t surpass Cher in popularity and influence, and potentially get the ‘guy.’ (To be fair, in some of the films, Emma does legitimately worry that Mr. Knightley has real affection for Harriet. However, the difference of social positions is a fundamental impediment in period versions of Emma that does not exist in Clueless.) 

Casting

I won’t spend a lot of time in this section because the casting is absolute perfection. NO NOTES. Unlike 1996’s Emma, Clueless literally launched the careers of many of the actors, rather than being a weird blip in their early work. 

My biggest thoughts are about how absolutely fucking ageless Paul Rudd is. Like o m g. But so too is Donald Faison, though to a lesser degree, who utterly captured my heart later on as Turk in Scrubs. He also looks practically the same in 2024. 

Sensory Experience

I think it’s hard to judge this movie in this category honestly. In addition to being a great adaptation, it’s one of the most unique teen films of the era, indeed is kind of part of the transitional moment of the John Hughes teen movie to the late-90s teen film that gave us bangers like 10 Things I Hate About You (an adaptation of Taming of the Shrew).  It feels like such a fundamental part of my childhood, watching it fills me with such a nostalgic happy feeling. The soundtrack is the soundtrack of my childhood. No Doubt, Radiohead, the Cranberries, Coolio, Counting Crows, the Beastie Boys. There are some lines in this movie that are part of my daily vernacular. I’ve often quoted the “Rolling with My homies” (and I think of Clueless before Coolio, I’m ashamed to say). 

Overall, the movie is bright and happy, a shot of pure adrenaline. 

That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi 

I admit that I’m totally, completely biased about this movie. In rewatching it, I realized that it’s one of my favorite movies and also just one of those…movies that fundamentally impacted my taste and preferences? It takes the source material and so effectively translates it to a new setting it has new fun and engaging things to say. It manages to portray how charmingly confident, but profoundly naive Cher (Emma) is–aging down the characters was such a smart choice and as I said before, high school is really the perfect 20th-century setting for this story. I can’t think of one better. 

FINAL GRADE: A+ for creativity and nostalgia 

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Final Thoughts

After completing this exercise, I went round and round on the order I would present these adaptations, which was my favorite and which did I think was the best? I think they are all in their own way successful adaptations, each with their own goals. The first two, the 1996 feature film and the 2009 series, appear to me to simply want to tell Jane Austen’s story. The second two, 2020’s Emma. and 1995’s Clueless, each have a more original point of view, AND are successful in transmitting that idea to the viewer. 

There are a number of things that I noted in this exercise: how divergent the Regency fashion was depicted throughout the films, how no version of Mr. Woodhouse was exactly the same, how Miss Bates varied greatly in her ridiculousness, and how uneven the treatment of Frank Churchill and Jane Fairfax’s relationship was. 

However, I think there are three things that can consistently set these movies apart from one another to determine how successful they are as adaptations: how the setting is handled (even in the treatment of the Regency era there is divergence), the role of manners, and how much growth Emma displays over the course of the film. 

I could do a whole other post on the popular imagination in the 20th and 21st centuries and the Regency era, which has taken on a whole new life recently with Netflix runaway successes like Bridgerton. Watching all three of the Regency adaptations plus one that entirely removes the Regency era, really emphasized how important that setting was to the story. The most successful tellings, in my opinion, focused energy into breathing life into the setting. This is, however, a subjective take, and one that’s perhaps unfair to levy on almost 28-year-old films such as 1996’s Emma, which undoubtedly does concentrate on bringing the Regency era to life, but it originally did so to an audience less accustomed to encountering it in film. (That being said, I think 1995’s Sense and Sensibility (feature) and 1995’s Pride and Prejudice (series) do a better job of conveying the Regency era to modern viewers, and they both preceded Emma.) 

I think half the reason that I found 1996’s Emma’s depiction of the Regency era to be uninspiring and foregetable is because the script and the characters do the heavy lifting in that regard. To be sure, yes, the scene setting is emphatically Regency. The comportment of the characters however feels stiff and superficial in the attempt to portray Regency-era manners (which were stiff and superficial, but they were also people). 

You also need to see the Emma character GROW. You don’t get that growth from the 1996 Emma; Paltrow’s Emma seems patently unconcerned with the devastation she almost wrought given all ends well. 2009’s Emma is too sweet and likable to begin with so you don’t really get any sense of growth–she just made a mistake. 

It’s six to one, half dozen the other if 2020’s Emma. or 1995’s Clueless is my favorite OR the best. I’d be happy with either outcome. Alicia Silverstone and Anya Taylor-Joy’s versions of the character contain multitudes. They are sweet, nice, well meaning, but they’re also too smart and sassy for their own good. They manage to embody attitude and revel in the privilege, being paradoxically naive and self-assured all at once. Both Cher and Emma take active steps to make amends for their missteps, rather than everything naturally shaking out for the better as in 1996 and 2009. To tie it all back together, the chronological settings of both of these films also help tell the story. 

Surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly, after watching these versions multiple times, I think I love Emma (both Austen’s novel and the character of Emma) even more than I did before. I was also surprised (somewhat) to find that I found the less “faithful” adaptations the more successful ones. Upon reflection, it makes sense that I like the ones that brought something unique to the table–especially in dealing with Austen’s novels. I do love reimaginings of Austen’s novels in book form but I get really frustrated when people try to mimic Austen, as so few people can do it successfully. Inspiration is part of life and artmaking–just do your own thing instead of trying to be someone else…especially when that someone is Jane Fucking Austen. Try as you might, you are not her. 

Other Adaptations

The four adaptations discussed here obviously are only the tip of the iceberg. There are so many adaptations out there, many from the last twenty years alone. Wikipedia can provide an exhaustive list, but here are some others that I considered for this post. 

• Emma Approved, 2013, YouTube Series 
• Aisha, 2010, an Indian film adaptation of Clueless/Emma, Available to stream on Hulu
• Jane Fairfax, a novel, by Joan Aiken, 1997; told from the point of view of Jane Fairfax
• Audible presents, Emma, This is an abridged, radio show version of Emma that feels like an audiobook. I listened to this driving to Orlando from Nashville in 2022 and it made the hours fly by (my god Georgia and Florida are SO boring). Also Emma Thompson should narrate everything. 

Next time on Overthinking…

Wouldn’t it be great if I could actually promise what was next? 

I’m not there yet, but one day.

Footnotes

1.  Why so many? There are other common periods where historical romances are set: the Viking era, medieval, Victorian, and the American west. These are all English historical romances–I can’t speak to the genre in any other language.
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2. For instance, there have been so many queer historical romances in the past 3 to 5 years. Goodreads has a list of some of them! ↩︎
3. Learn more about Free Indirect Discourse/Speech. ↩︎
4. Most of the characters in Emma’s orbit/age range all share having a mother who died in their infancy or childhood, or is otherwise absent. Frank Churchill’s mother, the first Mrs. Weston, died, and he was sent to live with his mother’s sister. Jane Churchill was an orphan living who was taken in by her female relations, Mrs and Miss Bates. Harriet Smith was being raised by a school–having never met her father or knowing his identity. ↩︎
5. Imagine being a governess for a family where you’d be in forced proximity to abusive and predatory men, controlling mistresses, bratty children, and the like. Or imagine  being a companion to an emotionally and/or physically abusive grande dame who made you wait on them hand and foot. And those types of positions were the best options availableThe less great options run the gamut, from retail to sex work, from being a school teacher to being a factory worker. British society was divided between those who worked and those who owned land. Those who made their wealth through trade were not considered socially acceptable by the upper class, though the more money the tradesman had, more doors were opened to them. For more about modern marriage (including how it impacted the US debutante culture), see Kristen Richardson, The Season: A Social History of the Debutante. ↩︎
6.  I certainly don’t think that the social structure in the early-19th century had it right. Ultimately Harriet had the privilege of money which certainly helped her out more than not. ↩︎
7.  There are also some stories that just get told again and again in the same media: A Star is Born, most recently adapted in 2018 with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper at the helm, was the fourth remake; all titled A Star is Born, the original was released in 1937, first remade in 1954 (with Judy Garland), and then again in 1976 (with Barbra Streisand). 1996’s You’ve Got Mail had earlier iterations in the A Shop Around the Corner (1940) and In the Good Old Summertime (1949)–all were adaptations of a 1937 Hungarian play called Parfumerie. 
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8. The director’s aim was to “make viewers forget” Ang Lee’s 1995 version of Sense and Sensibility, and that is BLASPHEMY OF THE HIGHEST ORDER. It’s a good thing this isn’t a post about Sense and Sensibility adaptations. ↩︎
9.  Not to mention the fact that chattel slavery still existed in this time period! Though Britain had made purchasing slaves illegal in 1807, it did not outlaw owning slaves until the 1830s. Re: dressing themselves, yes I understand that a lot of upper-class regency garments were difficult or impossible to put on without assistance–but that was a choice of the upper class. Conspicuous consumption and all that. 
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10.  Johnny Flynn was the main character of a British TV Show called Scrotal Recall in the UK and Lovesick in the US. It’s hilarious. 
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11.  2022’s Persuasion with Dakota Johson tries to do the same thing, but I think falls a little short. Maybe that’s a post for another day, but I don’t intend this series to be all Jane Austen 😂
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