Netflix’s upcoming adaptation of Pride and Prejudice is reportedly set to leave out the iconic Mr Darcy wet shirt scene, made famous in the 1995 BBC miniseries.
The streaming giant is said to be reworking Jane Austen’s beloved classic novel into a TV series with Everything I Know About Love creator Dolly Alderton on board to write the episodes.
The six-part series will star The Crown’s Emma Corrin as Elizabeth Bennet, and Slow Horses star Jack Lowden as Mr Darcy, with Olivia Colman taking the part of scheming matriarch Mrs Bennet.
With production set to get underway this year, it has now been reported that Lowden’s Darcy will not be tossed into a lake as part of the new series in order to avoid ‘objectifying men’.
A source told The Sun that Netflix bosses ‘don’t want a repeat’ of the iconic scene from the BBC series.
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The moment is not in the original 1813 novel from Austen, although it has been credited with changing Austen in the popular British imagination – and has been referenced/spoofed time and time again in the years since.
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Yet the BBC show’s writer has admitted he never intended the scene to be a swoon-worthy affair.
The miniseries writer Andrew Davies told the BBC at the time of the show’s 20th anniversary: ‘When women started pinning Colin’s picture on their walls, it was a puzzle and a surprise because I just thought it was a funny scene.
‘It was about Darcy being a bloke, diving in his lake on a hot day, not having to be polite – and then he suddenly finds himself in a situation where he does have to be polite.
‘So you have two people having a stilted conversation and politely ignoring the fact that one of them is soaking wet.’
However, a Professor Deborah Cartmell of DeMontford University, who specialises in Austen, has said the TV adaptation has ‘almost usurped’ the novel.
She told the Beeb: ‘Since it came out, every cultural reference to Jane Austen, and every adaptation, has had as much to do with Andrew Davies as it does to Austen.
‘I’ve taught the lake scene so many times and when my students read the novel for the first time they are absolutely shocked that that scene isn’t in it.’
Metro contacted Netflix for comment.
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