Dialogue
When Josh first proposed that we collaborate to adapt Sense and Sensibility, I had only read one Jane Austen novel, Emma, and felt ambivalent at best. I didn’t see myself as “the Jane Austen type.” Sense and Sensibility, however, captured me. I was entranced by the empathy and conflicts between sisters Elinor and Marianne and by their combination of power and powerlessness in the world that surrounds them. How could I make the story accessible to a modern-day audience, keep it to a suitable length, and have fun while remaining loyal to Austen’s wonderful work?
The answer lay in the relationships among the characters. Josh and I discussed them extensively, considering both Austen’s perspective and our own. (For example, Austen is much more sympathetic to the rogue Willoughby than I am inclined to be!) One of my favorite scenes to adapt was a scene in which Marianne and Willoughby, returning from Allenham, move from a scathing discussion of Sir John and his guests to an intimate, romantic moment.
Read Scene Act I Scene 8, Part 1.
I loved writing this scene because it shows the most salient elements of Willoughby and Marianne’s relationship: their love of exclusivity and criticism, and their deeply romantic, but almost pre-scripted, attachment to one another.
When Elinor interrupts them, the three share an awkward conversation before Willoughby departs and Elinor confronts Marianne. This led perfectly into a sung confrontation between Elinor and Marianne that Josh had already begun to work on—check the Music link soon for “The Pleasantness of an Employment”!