Mansfield Park

Oh dear! The BBC is not about to be knocked off its pedestal for absorbing period dramas by this one. I agree this novel of Jane Austens is the difficult to portray particularly to a modern audience, the heroine is hardly a Elizabeth Bennet, even Edmund is not calculated to cause female hearts to skip a beat. However I must say I was hoping for an improvement on the last and was sadly disappointed. The basic story was preserved, but the dialogue was so altered that all that was Jane Austen's tone, manner, feeling, wit, depth, was diluted if not lost. If some past adaptions may be seen as dated the weakness of this one must be that it is too modern ('his life is one long party'?????) The cast was generally adequate, but I think Billie Piper was the wrong choice, it needed someone more restrained, I gained no impression of hidden depths beneath a submissive exterior, she was more like a frolicking child. I see I must wait for the BBC to weave its magic once again.

Was this sponsored by Wash and go? Was the hair stylist on strike? What a mess! Would well-bred young ladies of those days be seen in public with hair like Billie Piper's? Casting Ms Piper was a big, big, big error. She is undeniably attractive to look at, but, after Dr Who, the natural place for her was EastEnders, not in a Jane Austen adaptation. Her looks and demeanour are completely out of place.

The ITV website shows the makers of the film saying (this is the gist) that Fanny Price is a boring character, but that they fixed that by bringing in Billie Piper. If they had so little sympathy or understanding for Jane Austen's original work, why did they bother adapting it? (Were these the same people who gave us 'Marple'? The same blinkered, tied-to-the-zeitgeist mentality was at work there too).

This version is rather boring. It also seems to be a very low-budget one, bound to the one setting. The so-called picnic (a few people standing around on the lawn of the house) is an unbelievably feeble scene.

But it is at least vastly better than the 1999 version.

Well, this latest version of Mansfield Park seemed to try and take the edginess of the 1999 theatrical version (outright copied some of the ideas from it in fact), but tone things down a bit to bring it more in line with the original story. Unfortunately, the result is a rather lackluster, and schizophrenic, production. And, as with all the other versions of Mansfield Park out there, the character of Fanny Price is no where to be found. Instead there is a strangely child-like, bleached-blond woman running around who never really fully develops as a character. At least in the 1999 movie the character they call "Fanny Price" is firmly established as rebellious tomboy who is too clever for her own good. This "Fanny Price" is a complete enigma. Someday, I would really like to see a dramatization of Mansfield Park that actually includes a depiction of the character of Fanny as she was written by Jane Austen. A sweet, kind, compassionate girl with a timid personality and frail constitution. She is reserved in manner and painfully honest, but also strong in her convictions, unfailingly loyal, extremely intelligent, and remarkably astute. A bit of a late bloomer, it is not until her eighteenth year that she finally begins to make the transition from awkward adolescent to self-possessed young woman. And she wants nothing more in life than to be of some real use to those she loves most. It's a wonderfully complex character that I look forward to one day seeing faithfully portrayed.

Why bother, ITV? Admittedly, Mansfield Park is the most difficult of the novels to "get," and Fanny is certainly the hardest to like, but... If one is going to take it on, then have the courage to risk being true to the book and its rather complicated spirit. And for heaven's sake, have the guts to cast Fanny as she was written: A prissy, good-hearted, sweetish, whiner! Mrs. Norris wasn't nearly as awful as she should have been. And what the heck happened to Portsmouth? The contrast between Fanny's rather dubious family and family home and the splendors of Mansfield is key to, well, so many aspects of Fanny's refusal of Henry, her uncle's rejection, Henry's near transformation to a good person, etc., etc. Again, given the complexity and challenges of the novel, why did they bother? It's beyond me...

Fanny Price (Billie Piper) was sent to live with her aunts in Mansfield Park at the age of 10. Her aunt Mrs. Norris gets tired of her. Her other aunt Lady Bertram and her wealthy husband Sir Thomas Bertram have four children, Tom (James D'Arcy), Edmund (Blake Ritson), Maria (Michelle Ryan), and Julia (Catherine Steadman). All of them treat Fanny as inferior except Edmund. She falls in love with his kindness. Sir Thomas has to attend to business in the West Indies. Tom returns as a degenerate gambler. Edmund is left as the head of the family. Maria is engaged and plans to marry after her father's return. The family is turned upside down with the arrival of their neighbors siblings Mary (Hayley Atwell) and Henry Crawford (Joseph Beattie).

Billie Piper is a very modern personality and doesn't fit the Fanny character. She's itching to break out of her restrained role. The production is strictly TV level. This is a problematic presentation of a classic. These are solid actors but they are wasted. It's been done much better and there is no need for this.