I meant to write this post back in Summer 2022, when Netflix was teasing their adaptation of Jane Austen’s Persuasion to very mixed results. People felt the dialogue was too modern, too far away from Austen’s vision. The whole thing must be a travesty. I haven’t watched the movie even though it’s been out a while (I don’t subscribe to Netflix), so I have no idea if it’s terrible or not. But the ordeal got me thinking. Wild and far-fetched adaptations of many books and plays exist, and while the adaptations themselves may or may not be good, the fact that creators feel free to deviate strongly from the source text is often a good sign that shows the text is popular and entrenched in public consciousness.
The most obvious example of this is Shakespeare. His more popular plays, like Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Othello, The Tempest, etc. have been adapted numerous times, and it seems no change is off-limits. Adaptations can change the setting, the time period, the characters’ genders, even the end of the story. No one would be surprised to see their local theater put on an adaptation of Romeo and Juliet that takes place on Mars and features all the characters as aliens. And while some people might be annoyed by this interpretation, a lot of other people would be excited to go see it!
These wild changes are possible because Shakespeare is well-known and well-loved, and a number of interpretations of his work already exist. In an ideal world, when creators make changes to Shakespeare (or any other text they are adapting), they are making those changes thoughtfully and trying to send a message about something on comment on a theme present in the original text. However, there are so many versions of Shakespeare’s plays that it wouldn’t be unimaginable that sometimes ~interesting~ adaptations are made simply because the adapters are trying to think of what they can do differently to make people show up. When people have seen 10 versions of Romeo and Juliet, and probably have a favorite, how can you make them watch yours?
The freedom to change things about a source text does not exist for most authors who are not as established as Shakespeare and Austen. Books can be incredibly popular and well-known even by people who haven’t read them (Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, for example), but fans still expect any film adaptations to be faithful to the book. The adaptation will be judged as successful or not, by many people, based primarily on how closely it mirrors the book. And this makes a lot of sense when there is only one adaptation. Creators can make changes, but audiences are likely to hate them (think the Ella Enchanted movie.)
So whether Netflix’s Persuasion is good or bad, it’s still a compliment to Austen that creators feel free to play with her characters and her texts. If I were an author, I admit I would probably be annoyed if people made wild changes to my work, but in the end, I’d have to see it for what it was: a sign that I was hugely successful.
What do you think?
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