Lost in Austen
Colin Firth had viewers swooning 25 years ago as the dashing Mr Darcy in Pride and Prejudice
JANE AUSTEN’S romantic novel Pride and Prejudice has long been a telly favourite and there have been five different versions over the years, but Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth caused a stir when they played Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy back in 1995.
It was such a phenomenal success that 100,000 video box sets were sold while the BBC drama was still on air and 10 million people watched the final episode.
The six-part series by multi-award-winning TV adapter Andrew Davies, was first broadcast 25 years ago on September 24 and the cast included Alison Steadman as Mrs Bennet, Julia Sawalha as Lydia Bennet and a young Emilia Fox as Georgiana Darcy.
Anna Chancellor, who played Miss Caroline Bingley, is actually related to Jane Austen and is a direct descendant of the writer’s brother Edward.
Andrew Davies, who went on to adapt Moll Flanders, Tipping the Velvet and Sense and Sensibility for the BBC, injected the mini-series with a sexiness that was only ever implied in the novel and wrote the famous scene of Mr Darcy emerging from the water in a wet shirt after going for a swim to cool off after a long journey. Many people are surprised to find the scene does not exist in the original novel.
Colin Firth also went on to play a Mr Darcy in the Bridget Jones movies and once said: “I was delighted to become a popular culture reference point. I’m still delighted about it actually, and I still find it to be weird.”
Costumes were designed by Dinah Collin and a bra company suggested that its own products had given the actresses an artificial lift during filming. The BBC promptly issued a correction saying that any support came from “historically authentic soft corset, Empire-line ties under the muslin or ... the actresses’ own uplifting performances”.