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Though I’m a sucker for any book or movie that’s somehow based in Jane Austen, I always approach them with trepidation. I worry that they’ll change the story too much—or that the characters will be all wrong. But, despite the sometimes uncomfortable changes in the British mini-series Lost in Austen, I really had nothing to fear.
London bank clerk Amanda Price (Jemima Rooper) loves nothing more than a quiet night at home, curled up with her well-worn copy of Pride and Prejudice. It’s not that she doesn’t have a life; her life just doesn’t compare to the beauty and romance in Austen’s novels. Take, for example, her boyfriend, Michael (Daniel Percival), who recently proposed after a drunken night out with his friends. Mr. Darcy, Amanda decides, would never do that—so she turns him down.
One day, Amanda hears a loud noise in her bathroom—and when she goes to investigate, she finds a young woman who claims to be Elizabeth Bennet (Gemma Arterton) standing in her bathtub. Lizzie seems to have found a portal between her family’s home and Amanda’s bathroom—and when Amanda steps through, she finds herself in Longbourne, the Bennets’ home.
At first, Amanda is delighted to be at Longbourne. But when she realizes that her presence—and Lizzie’s absence—will ruin a beloved story, she struggles to keep everything on track. Unfortunately, though, her arrival causes quite a stir—and while Mrs. Bennet (Alex Kingston) despises her from the very beginning, flighty Mr. Bingley (Tom Mison) finds her fascinating.
Originally aired in the UK as a four-part series, Lost in Austen is a delightfully imaginative story—offering a fun (and slightly irreverent) twist on a dearly loved classic without making a mockery of it.
While the setup is a bit sketchy, the story plays out exactly as you might expect it would if a modern-day woman were to show up in one of Austen’s novels: all hell breaks loose. And for fans of Austen’s work, it’s a whole lot of fun to watch it all play out. Even more fun, however, are the slightly exaggerated (yet perfectly appropriate) portrayals of the well-known characters. Sweet and devoted Mr. Bingley, for instance, comes off as cute but clueless. Mrs. Bennet is wonderfully batty, while Mr. Bennet (Hugh Bonneville) is droll and condescending. And Mr. Darcy (Elliot Cowan) is shockingly cold and stiff. In other words, he’s exactly as he was written—but he’s nothing like the wildly romantic character that fans have made him out to be. As a result, the clever characterization makes the story feel less like the charming (yet stuffy) romantic classic that it’s become and more like the romantic comedy that it was when it was written.
If you’ve never read Pride and Prejudice, though, you might find yourself lost in the details. You won’t know what Amanda knows—and, thus, you won’t know why, for instance, she hates Mr. Wickham (Tom Riley) from the first time they meet.
As for me, once I got over the fact that Lost in Austen changes many of the details of a beloved classic, I was able to sit back and thoroughly enjoy this entertaining Austen-based adventure. Be sure to check it out now, before Hollywood sinks its claws into it for a reported 2011 remake.
