Notorious Woman

I remember this series, even after all these years, as being an excellent version of the life of George Sand. I remember one line Rosemary Harris said about Chopin's music being like pearls dropping. Very finely done. I wish it were out on video.

I saw this mini-series on PBS many years ago, and it is still one of my all-time favorites. Rosemary Harris gives a brilliant and touching performance as Aurore Dupin ("George Sand"), and the supporting cast is excellent. Harris won an Emmy for her performance, quite deservedly.

The series follows George Sand's life as she struggles against the many obstacles that are placed in her path because she is a woman. She takes to dressing like a man and adopting the pen-name "George Sand" for her writings. The series depicts her friendships/relationships with famous men of her time, including Chopin and Liszt.

A thoroughly memorable and moving series. If it is not available on video, I hope it soon will be.

I,too, remember being riveted to the TV when each episode was broadcast. Rosemary Harris as Sand sprawled under Chopin's piano is an image I can still see today...and Chakiris playing the delicate, coughing & sickly Polish pianist, always trying to make music amid the often chaotic dramas around him.

This was terrific pairing. Rosemary Harris played the often abrasive, overpowering man to Chakiris's sensitive and increasingly frail Chopin. As I recall, I first doubted Chakiris could play this role, but he was perfect. Jeremy Irons has never failed to execute. (See if you can find a wonderful movie he made called "Moonlighting," in which he plays the head of a Polish group of contractors smuggled into London to secretly work on the houses of rich elite. Of course, like most illegal immigrants they are paid nothing for their work.)

I don't understand why Notorious Woman is not available. My goodness, if you can rent Duchess of Duke Street and Upstairs, Downstairs why not this treasure?

A fascinating historical personality makes for a stellar miniseries. Yes, it was definitely in color. Rosemary Harris is indeed a wonder, and for masculine eye candy there is George Chakiris ("West Side Story") and Jeremy Irons. Oddly enough, though I currently am a huge fan of Irons I didn't realize he was in this production until I read his biog here on IMDb. George was a feminist of sorts, a woman author assuming a male first name and boldly wearing pants, though she dealt with the usual problems of women since time began (relationship woes, unruly offspring). One of my all-time favorites in the show's tenure, along with "I, Claudius" and "Lily" (Francesca Annis as Lily Langtry, the most celebrated babe of her era).

The radiant Rosemary Harris lent class and substance to her characterization of George Sand. I only saw this production once, long ago and far away when it was originally televised and yet, as in a dream, there are images that linger, just beyond my grasping. I remember George Chakiris as Chopin, on Majorca, a grand piano and flowing curtains, and thinking at the time that his performance was unexpectedly good, given the work he had done previously. I remember the superficial friendship between Aurore and Marie and of making it a point to commit the proper pronunciation of Sinéad Cusack's name to memory. (Fortuitous, that.) But mostly I remember Rosemary Harris's performance as Sand, making of this woman of questionable literary credentials a credible and compelling writer to be attended to. This mini-series was a credit to everyone artistically connected with it, from script through final edit, and I find it perplexing that it has not yet been made available, preferably on DVD, but any format, at this point, would be welcome.