ITV has commissioned a season of four of Jane Austen’s famous novels, it has been announced today.
The network has secured Andrew Davies, who worked on Pride and Prejudice and Bleak House for the BBC, to adapt gothic romance Northanger Abbey, which will be produced by ITV Production [formally known as Granada]. Clerkenwell Films is developing Persuasion and Mansfield Park will be adapted by Maggie Wadey and produced by Company Pictures.
Nick Elliot, ITV drama controller, said: “Viewers love Jane Austen. Her stories always make great TV drama and our Jane Austen season will feature the absolute cream of British acting talent. This is such an exciting prospect.”
Classic literature is undergoing something of a renaissance both on the small and big screen. Last year the BBC broadcast modern adaptations of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales to widespread acclaim and is currently airing its Shakespeare season. Dickens’ classic Bleak House, which has been transmitted in the style of a soap opera, has proved popular with viewers and writer Davies has said he would like to adapt Austen classic Sense and Sensibility in the next few years.
The ITV Austen season, which will also include a repeat showing of Davies’ 1997 adaptation of Emma, will not be a modern take on her work.
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