Miss Austen explores the mystery of why Jane Austen’s devoted sister Cassandra destroyed some of the celebrated author’s letters.
The four-part period drama, airing in the UK on BBC One in February and in the US on PBS Masterpiece in May, is based on Gill Hornby’s novel and imagines what may have led Cassandra to make the decision.
It begins in 1830, some 13 years after Jane has died, as spinster Cassandra (The Durrells' Keeley Hawes) hears from her family friend Isabella Fowle (Vigil's Rose Leslie). Isabella’s father is dying and when he passes away, she must vacate their rectory to make way for the new incumbent.
Cassandra dashes off to support Isabella, but before the house changes hands, she must also locate Jane’s correspondence with Isabella’s late mother Eliza, because she fears it being made public. But Cassandra’s challenging sister-in-law Mary Austen (W1A star Jessica Hynes) – Isabella’s aunt and Eliza’s sister – also wants the letters.
When Cassandra finds the papers, however, they cause her to re-examine her past, as flashbacks from 1797 to 1817 reveal the romantic woes she faced as a younger woman, played by The Midwich Cuckoos' Synnøve Karlsen, when budding writer Jane (Zog's Patsy Ferran) was contemplating her own place in the world.
Here, Keeley Hawes and Jessica Hynes reveal what to expect from Miss Austen….
Miss Austen is a really enticing period drama. What was the appeal for you?
Keeley Hawes: “I had been hoping for something like this. I was interested in doing something about love, and this is a story about love in all its forms. It's about sisterly love, romantic love, unrequited love, and at this time in the world, it’s something that we can all sit and give ourselves over to and enjoy. So it ticks a lot of boxes for me. It’s almost like we are getting a new Jane Austen story in itself.”
Jessica Hynes: “It is done with such respect for Jane and her most important relationship, which was with her sister, Cassandra. Period drama isn't always as complex but the script was really exploring complex female relationships. Jane Austen wrote about women with strong characters in terms of integrity and values, and that's what comes through in this as well. I'd not read a Jane Austen novel before and I read "Mansfield Park" because of this, and I was like, ‘She's amazing!’ She was a brilliant writer, so I feel I am enlightened to the beauty of Jane Austen after this job.”
How do you see your characters?
Keeley Hawes: “Cassandra is an extraordinary woman for the time. In flashbacks she is engaged to Tom Fowle [Isabella's uncle, played by Calam Lynch] and shortly after their engagement he goes away for a year and sadly doesn’t return. For the rest of Cassandra’s life she doesn’t marry and have a family of her own, despite second chances of love and happiness later in her life. That is heartbreaking, and tells you an awful lot about her.”
Jessica Hynes: “With Mary, there was scope within the script to really mine, not only the fantastic comedy of someone who's thoughtless and mean, but also what lies beneath that. The main theme of the show is about sisterhood and Cassandra and Jane Austen's close relationship. But Mary is always left out. You see flashbacks with the sisters and Eliza [played as a younger woman by Madeleine Walker], but Mary [played as a younger woman by Liv Hill] is not in the bosom of that little group. So there's a complex history and familial relationship that spans the years.”
We see Cassandra hunting for and then reading Jane's letters but trying to keep them from the public gaze. Why do you think Cassandra ultimately destroyed them?
Keeley Hawes: “My own opinion is that she did an incredibly noble thing, rightly or wrongly. Lots of Austen fans feel it was an act of cultural vandalism. But she did this to make everything just about Jane’s work. To look after Jane's legacy in the way that she did is the greatest act of love and it's brave. I think she had great foresight. In the world that we live in now, everybody wants to know everyone's innermost thoughts. But we don’t know Jane’s innermost thoughts. That makes her an enigma, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.”
And Mary wants the letters too, doesn’t she?
Jessica Hynes: “Yes, she and Cassandra want them for different reasons. Cassandra is passionately protective of Jane and of private things that some people might find salacious. But Mary’s the widow of James Austen, Cassandra and Jane’s brother. He was a writer too and Mary thinks he was important and that a potential book about the Austens could be mainly about him so she wants to include the letters in that.”
What do you think the drama says about the challenges faced by single women at the time?
Jessica Hynes: “It says a lot about how difficult it was to make different choices, and how society was so firmly structured in favor of certain women. Society would have looked down on Cassandra and Jane for not being married. What mattered was that you were a dutiful wife and mother and to be outside of that was difficult.”
Keeley Hawes: “And we see Isabella Fowle is having to leave the family home after her father’s passing. She is left with nothing after his death, because she is a woman. It’s terribly sad and deeply shocking to think that that’s how things were.”
What was filming like?
Keeley Hawes: “These days, we're all on our phones, but this was a job where we all sat around running through our lines and having a natter and getting to know each other. We were all there in costumes, with our coats on, freezing away in this country house, but actually talking to each other, which was a real highlight. We have a female-led cast by the nature of the story and these are some of our finest actresses and the nicest people that I have ever had the pleasure of working with.”
Jessica Hynes: “It was a great atmosphere, very focused, but a lot of fun. And I love all Keeley’s work. I remember seeing her in It's a Sin, and just being blown away by her performance in it. She's effortless, a great star but just very kind, very generous, very brilliant.”
And how did you find your costumes?
Keeley Hawes: “I have a corset, but it doesn’t have to be that tight – there's nothing nicer than having a costume on and being able to forget about it. But the corset is useful as it helps your posture. There are lots of black costumes in my section of the story as we are all in mourning, but then in the flashbacks there are blasts of colour and a vibrancy that feels youthful. It's a lovely way of distinguishing those two periods.”
Jessica Hynes: “And it was lovely being in such beautiful surroundings with the costumes. I'm not a great fan of corsets,. But luckily, I realized that if I wore my shawl, I could unbuckle it and breathe. No one would know! Also, I’ve often played below stairs. So this is the first time I've ever played above stairs. I’m getting to play a lady!”
Miss Austen will air weekly on BBC One from Sunday 2 February at 9.05 pm. The full season will be available on BBC iPlayer as a box-set from 2 February. In the US, the drama will air on MASTERPIECE on PBS from Sunday 4 May.
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