Last Updated on February 15, 2019
Janeites rejoice! Goldcrest Films has concluded a deal to sell, finance and distribute a film adaptation of Jane Austen’s final novel draft Sanditon – a quick-witted, delightful comedy, from the most acclaimed British novelist of all time.
But you’ll have to wait… read on for the most recent news about the upcoming costume drama.
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In Sanditon we find a new heroine, Charlotte Heywood, whose clear-sighted common sense is often at war with romance. At the age of twenty-two, Charlotte is about halfway between Pride and Prejudice’s Elizabeth Bennet, and the closer-to-spinsterhood Anne Elliot, who, in Persuasion, finds herself in the difficult position of having been persuaded, years prior, to break off an engagement to a promising young lieutenant.
Note: This post is about the upcoming movie adaptation. If you are looking for news of the new mini-series for PBS Masterpiece, that’s here.
Sanditon is a brand new, never before seen Jane Austen; this will mark the first time that her last novel (or draft, or fragment) has been adapted into a feature-length period film. Called equal parts sparkling satire and romantic comedy, the new costume drama will be directed by Jim O’Hanlon, who also directed the much acclaimed BBC series of Jane Austen’s Emma (2009), starring Romola Garai.
When Charlotte Heywood is invited to spend the summer season at Sanditon she accepts immediately, intrigued to see (not-so) polite society at play in the newly fashionable sea bathing resort. Here she meets a host of classic Austen characters from the imperious nouveau-riche Lady Denham (Rampling) to her impoverished ward Clara, and from the lecherous Sir Edward, to the dashing, feckless Sidney Parker and his hypochondriac sisters. Like all Austen heroines, Charlotte watches the comings and goings of this self-indulgent world with increasing incredulity; but can she herself resist the attractions of the heart?
Originally titled “The Brothers,” the unfinished novel was written in 1817, the last year of Jane Austen’s life. When she passed away in July of that year, she left two unfinished would-be novels, including the first eleven chapters of Sanditon. The manuscript was bequeathed to her niece, and in the 1970s it was completed by “Another Lady” who, though a previously published author herself, chose to follow Jane’s own example of anonymity. Author Marie Dobbs was living in Moscow as a diplomat’s wife. Looking for a subject unlikely to attract the KGB, she turned her attention to the completion of a classic novel and Sanditon was published in 1975.
What was there left to worry about in completing Jane Austen’s last manuscript? Only the way she wrote it. Her language, her integrity and her painstaking methods of work– that terrifyingly accurate and meticulous technique– combine to give us the same sense of serenity and assurance in the six novels in which she brought her world to life and made it real for us. None of these things can be faithfully copied. And for their deficiencies in this seventh novel, I do apologize. – Marie Dobbs
Holliday Grainger has been cast as our heroine Charlotte Heywood. No stranger to the costume drama, Grainger has played the leading roles of characters from may eras. You can find her in everything from Cinderella, My Cousin Rachel, Tulip Fever, Anna Karenina, Jane Eyre, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Great Expectations, to The Borgias.
Now, Grainger will be playing the part of a character who is “a very pleasing young woman of two and twenty” who escorts the Parker’s to the sea after a carriage accident. “Charlotte was to go, with excellent health, to bathe and be better if she could; to receive every possible pleasure which Sanditon could be made to supply by the gratitude of those she went with; and to buy new parasols, new gloves and new brooches for her sisters and herself at the library, which Mr. Parker was anxiously wishing to support.” – JA
Max Irons (Bitter Harvest, Tutankhamun, Woman In Gold, The White Queen, Dorian Gray) is cast in the role Sidney Parker “with his neat equipage and fashionable air” in the upcoming Jane Austen adaptation. “There is someone in most families privileged by superior abilities or spirits to say anything. In ours, it is Sidney, who is a very clever young man and with great powers of pleasing. He lives too much in the world to be settled; that is his only fault.” – JA
Oscar-nominee Charlotte Rampling (Lady Spencer in The Duchess, Aunt Maude in The Wings of the Dove, Lady Sylvia in My Uncle Silas, Anne Boleyn in the BBC’s Henry VIII and His Six Wives) is to star as Lady Denham, a twice-widowed woman who received a fortune from her first husband and a title from her second, who has set her sights on turning Sanditon into a fashionable seaside resort.
Pascal Degove, Managing Director Goldcrest Films said “Charlotte Rampling is responsible for so many indelible performances, she is perfect for the crucial role of the scheming Lady Denham. This is a genuinely fresh take on a well-loved genre – we expect enormous excitement from cinemagoers and distributors alike.”
Every neighbourhood should have a great lady. The great lady of Sanditon was Lady Denham; and in their journey from Willingden to the coast, Mr. Parker gave Charlotte a more detailed account of her than had been called for before. Sanditon itself could not be talked of long without the introduction of Lady Denham. That she was a very rich old lady, who had buried two husbands, who knew the value of money, and was very much looked up to and had a poor cousin living with her, were facts already known; but some further particulars of her history and her character served to lighten the tediousness of a long hill, or a heavy bit of road, and to give the visiting young lady a suitable knowledge of the person with whom she might now expect to be daily associating. -Sanditon
Along with satire and the romance, Willow and Thatch hopes that the new period drama will give us a glimpse into what it would have been like to have used the Georgian era seaside bathing machines, those “four-wheeled carriages, covered with canvas, having at one end of them an umbrella of the same materials which is let down to the surface of the water, so that the bather descending from the machine by a few steps is concealed from the public view, whereby the most refined female is enabled to enjoy the advantages of the sea with the strictest delicacy.” Who would you like to see as the costume designer for Sandition? All those bathing costumes…
UPDATE 9/6/2017: Willow and Thatch spoke with Sanditon’s producer, and unfortunately filming has been delayed until the spring or summer of 2018. Based on that information, Willow and Thatch suspects that Sanditon is likely to have its theatrical premiere in 2019. We may not be pleased, but we will wait!
Written for the screen by leading British playwright Simon Reade, Sanditon is produced by Reade and Guy de Beaujeu for Fluidity Films; “Her legions of fans worldwide will be thrilled with Sanditon’s romance, comedy, sardonic wit and its clever take on the modern obsessions of health and wealth that is quintessentially Jane Austen. We’re very excited to be working with Goldcrest on a project that sits perfectly in the company’s pantheon of British classics.” Goldcrest’s Nick Quested and Pascal Degove will serve as Executive Producers.
Below is a detailed synopsis from Fluidity Films, with the last bit of SPOILERS left out. Even still, the synopsis is rather detailed and has SPOILERS so skip down to the next image of a feather if you want to avoid them altogether.
“Tom Parker has a dream – to transform the sleepy South Coast village of Sanditon into a fashionable, bustling seaside health resort, whatever the weather. One of life’s eternal optimists, he puts his faith into his fellow man’s incurable hypochondria, cheerfully hoping to cash in on their misery. But even when his coach and horses crash into a farmland ditch, he doesn’t stop to ask if he was going too far, too fast. It’s likely his venture, too, will take a tumble.
Undaunted, Tom Parker repays the hospitality of the gentleman farmer on whose land he crashed, by inviting the farmer’s daughter, Charlotte, to spend the summer season at Sanditon. Thus the old world and the new, the natural and the artificially constructed, collide in a coruscating satire on a (not so) polite society on the make.
Sanditon is a hive of activity – property speculation, tea-room development, seafront opportunists and medical quackery. Or it would be if it had any visitors.
Not one to suffer fools, twice-widowed entrepreneur Lady Denham believes she is being fleeced by most of her family and by Tom Parker. She also suspects the motivations of her impoverished ward, the captivating Clara, who seems oddly content to endure the lascivious attentions of the lecherous Sir Edward, Lady Denham’s nephew.
Tom Parker’s family is a collection of meddling hypochondriacs who finally agree to visit for the summer, but not for their health as they don’t believe in sea air (more in the comfort of toast and hot chocolate). Instead they visit to help make Sanditon look busy for their brother.
Through a series of comic misunderstandings they have also invited a Mrs Griffiths down from London with her three charges – the silly, fashion-obsessed twins, the Miss Beauforts; and the beautiful, but (genuinely) sickly Miss Lambe, a very wealthy West Indian heiress. Lady Denham quickly identifies the rich but ailing Miss Lambe as the perfect wife for Sir Edward, putting aside her prejudice for financial expediency.
Like all Austen heroines, Charlotte watches the comings-and-goings of this crazy self-indulgent world with increasing incredulity; her common sense and strong notions of morality seemingly at odds with those around her. But, like Emma Woodhouse, Elizabeth Bennett, Catherine Morland and Eleanor Dashwood before her, Charlotte is not as worldly as she might think and things are not always as they appear.
Into this heady seaside mix comes young Sidney Parker, Tom’s dashing 21 year old brother, who brings a London insouciance and social daring to Sanditon. He mocks all those around him, including Charlotte, for their country simplicity.
To her great surprise, Charlotte finds herself falling in love with Sidney, but is he all that he seems? He brings two friends to Sanditon – the feckless Reginald and Henry, the jilted lover, en route to self-imposed exile in the East Indies. Soon Charlotte begins to wonder if she is simply an unwitting pawn in one of Sidney’s elaborate games, particularly as he seems overly solicitous of the beautiful Clara. Moreover, he is being chased by Sir Edward’s vampish sister, Miss Denham.
To release her heart from Sidney’s hot and cold affections, Charlotte announces she will shortly return home to her father’s farm. But not before Sanditon’s first ball, to be held at the new assembly rooms. Sanditon’s story strands unravel during the ball and its aftermath…”
© Fluidity Films 2015
Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, including Northanger Abbey, Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Persuasion, Sanditon, and juvenilia. In Sanditon Austen explored “her interest in the verbal construction of a society by means of a town – and a set of families – that is still in the process of being formed.”
In 2013, author Chris Brindle acquired the original Lefroy Sanditon manuscripts from the USA and set about writing a stageplay based on the two fragments. The play is a script-in-hand, in costume production of Sanditon, the play. You can stream some of the filmed play on YouTube here.
If you enjoyed this post, you’ll want to wander over to The Period Films List. You’ll be especially interested in the Best Period Drams: Georgian and Regency Eras List. You’ll also want to see Costuming Pride and Prejudice, and the interview with Caroline Jane Knight. The New Yorker article Reading Jane Austen’s Final, Unfinished Novel may also be of interest.
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Diane
February 12, 2021 at 9:31 pm (4 years ago)This is rather a forlorn hope, but are there any updates on this project? Was it canceled? Their website is still as it was in 2017…or 2015? I think there’s plenty of room in the Austen catalog for this version. I love all the actor choices, and it would be wonderful to have an adaptation I could watch with my young nieces, rather than one of the sexed-up versions Andrew Davies puts out nowadays. 🙁 I enjoyed the non-sexy parts of the series last year, but the cancellation was unforgivable. And I was quite disappointed that Marie Dobbs’ version was cast aside entirely. I think Davies didn’t even read it.
Leigh
January 31, 2020 at 9:09 am (5 years ago)I’m afraid that Theo James has stolen the role of Sydney Parker and it would be near impossible for anyone to own this role as he does!
gigi
March 5, 2019 at 12:09 pm (6 years ago)when can we see this movie ?
Brianna Degollado
July 10, 2018 at 4:49 pm (6 years ago)Masterpiece has just released that they will make a TV movie of Sanditon. Is this the same or a different project all together???? I’m soooo confused
Willow and Thatch
July 10, 2018 at 5:23 pm (6 years ago)It’s the same one!
Melissa Johnson
October 6, 2017 at 3:06 pm (7 years ago)I secretly hope someone will uncover an antique chest filled with unpublished Austen novels.
sarah
September 6, 2017 at 7:31 pm (7 years ago)not entirely thrilled with the casting of holliday grainger (nothing against her, she just doesn’t fit my picture of charlotte heywood), but i do love max irons. i’m sooooo looking forward to this, as i love marie dobbs’ completion of the novel. i pretty much have a permanent smile on my face every time i read it (it’s one i love to re-read)! i’ve been wanting it to be adapted for a long time – i just hope they do it justice! it’s too bad it’s a film adaptation, not a mini-series, but maybe if it’s popular someone will decide to do that at some point as well.
Mary Gaither Marshall
January 16, 2017 at 4:34 pm (8 years ago)Are there any updates about when the film will be released? I am giving a presentation about Sanditon at the Jane Austen Society of North America’s annual conference in Huntington Beach in October 2017. I would like to include information and perhaps show a trailer for the film. I edited and transcribed Anna Austen Lefroy’s Continuation of her aunt’s novel.
Willow and Thatch
April 24, 2017 at 7:57 pm (7 years ago)So sorry for the late reply. It’s still in development, but filming is delayed, see the post.
Susan
December 24, 2016 at 9:34 pm (8 years ago)I love that they are using this version of Sanditon for the movie. I love this book. I have read other completions of it, but this is by far the best.
Ruth
December 31, 2016 at 9:04 am (8 years ago)Susan
Utterly, utterly agree with you! Another Lady’s ending was the most complete of the endings ventured for the delight that is Jane Austen’s Sanditon.
….Can’t wait to see it!
John Barnes
September 7, 2017 at 2:15 pm (7 years ago)Marie Dobbs did a brilliant job on completing JA’s fascinating story. The only on set on the Sussex coast (one up for -perhaps – Bexhill!).
Lynn Bischoff
October 23, 2016 at 2:29 pm (8 years ago)Looking forward to seeing this,. Charlotte Rampling is a wonderful actress. I have always enjoyed whatever I have seen her in.
Wendy Mac...
June 16, 2016 at 10:37 pm (8 years ago)Absolutely divine reading, this is by far the best blog I have ever read on the subject of movie costume and period dramas. I have even found a few movies that I didn’t know about and have ordered them to watch. Just wonderful…
Karylee Marin
September 7, 2017 at 3:26 pm (7 years ago)AGREED!
L Middleton
April 24, 2016 at 8:05 pm (8 years ago)Looking forward to this – wonder who will play Charlotte? The fashions of 1817 while still following the classic Regency high-waisted “empire line” were much more elaborate than pre- Waterloo with the skirts becoming more bell shaped and decorative and the bonnets were getting larger – the costume designer can have fun with this………!
Tiffany Haskin
February 15, 2016 at 2:38 am (9 years ago)I am beyond excited for this! The world can always use more Jane Austen!
Karylee Marin
September 7, 2017 at 3:25 pm (7 years ago)YESS!! And YES!