Just John Films have optioned Jennifer Wright’s biography of Victorian abortionist Madame Restell, Variety can confirm, with the writer behind Netflix’s “Persuasian” film set to adapt the book for screen.
Published by Hachette, the New York Times-bestseller “Madame Restell: The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Old New York’s Most Fabulous, Fearless, and Infamous Abortionist” recounts the jaw-dropping life of British-born Madame Restell.
“’Madame Restell’ tells the story of one of the boldest women in American history; a self-made millionaire, a celebrity in her era, a woman beloved by many of her patients and despised by the men who wanted to control them, a businesswoman, a scofflaw, an immigrant,” reads the synopsis. “A shrewd capitalist and full-throated media war agitator, Madame Restell made it big in 19th century New York by providing safe abortions. The series tracks Madame Restell’s life, from early New York’s immigrant slums...
Published by Hachette, the New York Times-bestseller “Madame Restell: The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Old New York’s Most Fabulous, Fearless, and Infamous Abortionist” recounts the jaw-dropping life of British-born Madame Restell.
“’Madame Restell’ tells the story of one of the boldest women in American history; a self-made millionaire, a celebrity in her era, a woman beloved by many of her patients and despised by the men who wanted to control them, a businesswoman, a scofflaw, an immigrant,” reads the synopsis. “A shrewd capitalist and full-throated media war agitator, Madame Restell made it big in 19th century New York by providing safe abortions. The series tracks Madame Restell’s life, from early New York’s immigrant slums...
- 4/30/2024
- by K.J. Yossman
- Variety Film + TV
Persuasion Review — Persuasion (2022) Film Review, a movie directed Carrie Cracknell, written by Ron Bass, Alice Victoria Winslow and Jane Austen and starring Dakota Johnson, Cosmo Jarvis, Henry Golding, Richard E. Grant, Ben Bailey Smith, Yolanda Kettle, Jordan Long, Simon Paisley Day, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Lydia Rose Bewley, Agni Scott, Stewart Scudamore, Mia McKenna-Bruce, [...]
Continue reading: Film Review: Persuasion (2022): Dakota Johnson Stars in a Somewhat Clueless Jane Austen Adaptation...
Continue reading: Film Review: Persuasion (2022): Dakota Johnson Stars in a Somewhat Clueless Jane Austen Adaptation...
- 7/16/2022
- by Thomas Duffy
- Film-Book
Every 10 or 15 years, a new attempt is made to adapt “Persuasion,” Jane Austen’s emotionally nuanced final novel. The latest iteration, directed by Carrie Cracknell and written by Ron Bass and Alice Victoria Winslow, takes significant liberties with language and tone. Austen’s Anne Elliot is a good-natured and competent young woman who is overlooked by her silly family and unhealed from the heartbreak of her former engagement to Captain Wentworth eight years prior.
In the Netflix film, Anne (Dakota Johnson) is a wine-toting klutz who tends to blurt out her thoughts at large dinner parties à la Bridget Jones. When her father Sir Walter (Richard E. Grant) goes into debt, the family moves to a slightly smaller mansion in another town, bringing Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis) and another suitor, Mr. Elliot (Henry Golding) back into the fold.
Austen purists will be relieved that most of the original characters (minus Mrs.
In the Netflix film, Anne (Dakota Johnson) is a wine-toting klutz who tends to blurt out her thoughts at large dinner parties à la Bridget Jones. When her father Sir Walter (Richard E. Grant) goes into debt, the family moves to a slightly smaller mansion in another town, bringing Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis) and another suitor, Mr. Elliot (Henry Golding) back into the fold.
Austen purists will be relieved that most of the original characters (minus Mrs.
- 7/16/2022
- by Harper Lambert
- The Wrap
Jane Austen is given a modern media twist in the Netflix film “Persuasion,” from first-time feature film director Carrie Cracknell.
Starring Dakota Johnson as Austen heroine Anne Elliott and Cosmo Jarvis as the love of her youth, Frederick Wentworth, the movie stays fairly true to the basic plot of Austen’s beloved final novel, but updates it by having protagonist Anne speak directly to camera. As Anne learns the man whose heart she broke is returning, now a much more socially suitable war-celebrated ship captain, the audience becomes who she turns to as she expresses her internal monologue of feelings, or even for sassy observations about her overly-dramatic younger sister.
“I think the use of the breaking of the fourth wall was something that we tried to be very kind of thoughtful and considered about,” Cracknell, a multi-award-nominated theater director, told TheWrap. “We experimented a lot on set with it.
Starring Dakota Johnson as Austen heroine Anne Elliott and Cosmo Jarvis as the love of her youth, Frederick Wentworth, the movie stays fairly true to the basic plot of Austen’s beloved final novel, but updates it by having protagonist Anne speak directly to camera. As Anne learns the man whose heart she broke is returning, now a much more socially suitable war-celebrated ship captain, the audience becomes who she turns to as she expresses her internal monologue of feelings, or even for sassy observations about her overly-dramatic younger sister.
“I think the use of the breaking of the fourth wall was something that we tried to be very kind of thoughtful and considered about,” Cracknell, a multi-award-nominated theater director, told TheWrap. “We experimented a lot on set with it.
- 7/15/2022
- by Jolie Lash
- The Wrap
Jane Austen completed the manuscript for “Persuasion” in 1816, the year before her death. But even then, more than 200 years ago, she anticipated the conversation Hollywood is having today, putting these words into Captain Harville’s mouth: “I do not think I ever opened a book in my life which had not something to say upon woman’s inconstancy. Songs and proverbs, all talk of woman’s fickleness. But perhaps you will say, these were all written by men.”
Anne Elliot — bright, heartbroken and, at the ripe old age of 28, facing the risk of lifelong spinsterhood — naturally agrees, not to Harville’s point that it is woman’s nature (more than man’s) to forget those they’ve loved before, but to the fact that “the pen has been in [men’s] hands,” and thus, the history of literature betrays a gender bias. Two centuries later, the world is still struggling to even that balance,...
Anne Elliot — bright, heartbroken and, at the ripe old age of 28, facing the risk of lifelong spinsterhood — naturally agrees, not to Harville’s point that it is woman’s nature (more than man’s) to forget those they’ve loved before, but to the fact that “the pen has been in [men’s] hands,” and thus, the history of literature betrays a gender bias. Two centuries later, the world is still struggling to even that balance,...
- 7/15/2022
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
Exclusive: MRC Film has named its romance label, led by Elizabeth Cantillon, Bisous Pictures—also announcing the appointment of Sydney Fleischmann as VP, Development and Production.
Bisous Pictures’ first film Persuasion, starring Dakota Johnson, Cosmo Jarvis, Henry Golding and Richard E. Grant, is an adaptation of the Jane Austen novel, which debuts on Netflix today. Carrie Cracknell (Broadway’s Sea Wall / A Life) directed the film—made with Mad Chance and Fourth and Twenty Eight Films—in her feature debut, from a script by Alice Victoria Winslow and Ron Bass.
Going forward, the label will explore a wide range of stories within the romance genre that are inclusive and expansive, traditional and modern, original and literature based, and real-life stories that serve all audiences. It remains in development on previously announced projects including:
Photos of You, based on Tammy Robinson’s novel, which is being adapted for the screen by Tom Dean. Jenny Gage and Tom Betterton of All This Panic are attached to direct. Pic centers on Ava, who after a devastating diagnosis, breaks off her engagement, decides to throw herself a groom-less wedding, and becomes somewhat of a sensation and voice of empowerment. She discovers that it’s never too late to find the love of your life. 28 Summers, adapted by Allie Hagan. Based on Elin Hilderbrand’s #1 New York Times bestselling novel, 28 Summers explores the agony and romance of a one-weekend-per-year affair, its profound impact on the lovers and the lives of the people around them. The Return, adapted by Tom Dean. Based on Nicholas Sparks’ novel, which spent 22 weeks on bestseller lists, focuses on an injured army doctor who moves into his late grandfather’s home in New Bern, North Carolina, where he encounters two women whose secrets will change the course of his life.
Fleischmann comes to MRC from Duplass Brothers Productions, where she was most recently a development and production executive. She notably served as an executive producer on that company’s HBO anthology series, Room 104.
“We’re proud to unveil our name, Bisous, the french word for kiss, which honors our label’s focus on the romance genre in all its various forms,” said Cantillon. “We also welcome Sydney, a fantastically talented exec, to our team as we continue to expand our label and we cannot wait to introduce our first film, ‘Persuasion,’ to audiences alongside our partners at Netflix.”
MRC Film’s releases have collectively earned more than 6B in worldwide box office and received accolades including 12 Academy Award nominations and 11 Golden Globe noms. Coming up for the company is writer-director Matt Charman’s Netflix film The Mothership, starring Halle Berry. It recently released David Frankel’s Paramount+ dramedy Jerry and Marge Go Large, starring Bryan Cranston and Annette Bening, and has also been behind films like Ted, Knives Out, Baby Driver, Babel and The Lovebirds. MRC has co-financed films including The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run, the Peter Rabbit franchise, the second and third installments of Hotel Transylvania, 22 Jump Street, Think Like a Man Too and Fast & Furious 7. It’s also a partner of Deadline’s parent company Penske Media in two joint ventures in publishing and content, where both companies hold significant ownership.
Bisous Pictures’ first film Persuasion, starring Dakota Johnson, Cosmo Jarvis, Henry Golding and Richard E. Grant, is an adaptation of the Jane Austen novel, which debuts on Netflix today. Carrie Cracknell (Broadway’s Sea Wall / A Life) directed the film—made with Mad Chance and Fourth and Twenty Eight Films—in her feature debut, from a script by Alice Victoria Winslow and Ron Bass.
Going forward, the label will explore a wide range of stories within the romance genre that are inclusive and expansive, traditional and modern, original and literature based, and real-life stories that serve all audiences. It remains in development on previously announced projects including:
Photos of You, based on Tammy Robinson’s novel, which is being adapted for the screen by Tom Dean. Jenny Gage and Tom Betterton of All This Panic are attached to direct. Pic centers on Ava, who after a devastating diagnosis, breaks off her engagement, decides to throw herself a groom-less wedding, and becomes somewhat of a sensation and voice of empowerment. She discovers that it’s never too late to find the love of your life. 28 Summers, adapted by Allie Hagan. Based on Elin Hilderbrand’s #1 New York Times bestselling novel, 28 Summers explores the agony and romance of a one-weekend-per-year affair, its profound impact on the lovers and the lives of the people around them. The Return, adapted by Tom Dean. Based on Nicholas Sparks’ novel, which spent 22 weeks on bestseller lists, focuses on an injured army doctor who moves into his late grandfather’s home in New Bern, North Carolina, where he encounters two women whose secrets will change the course of his life.
Fleischmann comes to MRC from Duplass Brothers Productions, where she was most recently a development and production executive. She notably served as an executive producer on that company’s HBO anthology series, Room 104.
“We’re proud to unveil our name, Bisous, the french word for kiss, which honors our label’s focus on the romance genre in all its various forms,” said Cantillon. “We also welcome Sydney, a fantastically talented exec, to our team as we continue to expand our label and we cannot wait to introduce our first film, ‘Persuasion,’ to audiences alongside our partners at Netflix.”
MRC Film’s releases have collectively earned more than 6B in worldwide box office and received accolades including 12 Academy Award nominations and 11 Golden Globe noms. Coming up for the company is writer-director Matt Charman’s Netflix film The Mothership, starring Halle Berry. It recently released David Frankel’s Paramount+ dramedy Jerry and Marge Go Large, starring Bryan Cranston and Annette Bening, and has also been behind films like Ted, Knives Out, Baby Driver, Babel and The Lovebirds. MRC has co-financed films including The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run, the Peter Rabbit franchise, the second and third installments of Hotel Transylvania, 22 Jump Street, Think Like a Man Too and Fast & Furious 7. It’s also a partner of Deadline’s parent company Penske Media in two joint ventures in publishing and content, where both companies hold significant ownership.
- 7/15/2022
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
Jane Austen certainly wrote some plucky, sassy protagonists. Anne Elliot was not one of them. The first chapter of “Persuasion,” Austen’s final novel, describes Anne as having “an elegance of mind and sweetness of character.” Anne’s love interest, the dashing Captain Wentworth, later claims there is “no one so proper, so capable as Anne.”
The Anne illustrated in Austen’s novel sounds genteel and gracious. The Anne in Netflix’s “Persuasion,” the first straightforward film adaptation of the novel since 2007, is described similarly by her dearest friends. And yet, perhaps in an attempt to make her more relatable in our current resurgence of messy female characters, she also spends much of the film breaking the fourth wall and cracking wise.
Screenwriters Ron Bass (“My Best Friend’s Wedding”) and Alice Victoria Winslow (“Hot Spot”) have given one of Austen’s more demure heroines the “Fleabag” treatment. Luckily for them,...
The Anne illustrated in Austen’s novel sounds genteel and gracious. The Anne in Netflix’s “Persuasion,” the first straightforward film adaptation of the novel since 2007, is described similarly by her dearest friends. And yet, perhaps in an attempt to make her more relatable in our current resurgence of messy female characters, she also spends much of the film breaking the fourth wall and cracking wise.
Screenwriters Ron Bass (“My Best Friend’s Wedding”) and Alice Victoria Winslow (“Hot Spot”) have given one of Austen’s more demure heroines the “Fleabag” treatment. Luckily for them,...
- 7/11/2022
- by Lena Wilson
- The Wrap
“He’s a 10,” the leading lady enthuses to an older woman about a young man she fancies in this latest screen adaptation of Jane Austen’s final novel — and if that line doesn’t throw you for at least a small loop, there are other mightily anachronistic ingredients in this new Persuasion that may well strike Austen fans, among others, as more than a tad unpersuasive. Breaking down and eradicating period niceties and replacing them with more modern attitudes and phraseology appears to be the central agenda for prominent British theater director Carrie Cracknell in her feature film debut, and while it’s easy to resist some of the cheap-shot modern dialogue that runs through the adaptation by old pro Ron Bass and writer-actress Alice Victoria Winslow, it also shouldn’t be impossible to admit that, since we already have Roger Michell’s outstanding 1995 film adaptation, a cheeky redo might also be welcome,...
- 7/11/2022
- by Todd McCarthy
- Deadline Film + TV
Jane Austen knew a thing or two about complicated women and the way they move through the world. The author’s iconic bibliography — from “Pride and Prejudice” and “Emma” to “Sense and Sensibility,” and those are the just the English class curriculum bangers — has always hinged on indelible heroines and their Regency-era attempts to get their lives in order. These stories are both beholden to their time and place and undeniably universal in their concerns and charms.
Austen’s books have inspired all manner of adaptations on both stage and screen, from the faithful (Ang Lee’s luminous “Sense and Sensibility”) to the lightly loosened and even the straight-up free-wheeling (“Bridget Jones’s Diary”) to the mostly inane (“Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”). Austen’s books incisively depict a specific time in British life, but her keen understanding of human interactions and desires can happily be transplanted to a range of stories.
Austen’s books have inspired all manner of adaptations on both stage and screen, from the faithful (Ang Lee’s luminous “Sense and Sensibility”) to the lightly loosened and even the straight-up free-wheeling (“Bridget Jones’s Diary”) to the mostly inane (“Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”). Austen’s books incisively depict a specific time in British life, but her keen understanding of human interactions and desires can happily be transplanted to a range of stories.
- 7/8/2022
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Click here to read the full article.
Jane Austen purists will be aghast, but if you go with director Carrie Cracknell’s playful makeover of the author’s ruminative last completed novel into a buoyant Regency rom-com, you could be pleasantly surprised. Freely mixing language lifted from Austen’s prose with distinctly modern words and attitudes — this is a movie in which someone is described as “electrifying” in a pre-electric age — Persuasion is sufficiently bold and consistent with its flagrant liberties to get away with them. It also helps that the novel’s long-suffering protagonist, Anne Elliot, has been given irrepressible spirit and an irreverent sense of irony in Dakota Johnson’s incandescent performance.
It’s easy to argue that Austen’s darkest, most mature novel was never meant to be treated like Emma, but Johnson, in her most lighthearted role to date, makes us complicit in Anne’s wry...
Jane Austen purists will be aghast, but if you go with director Carrie Cracknell’s playful makeover of the author’s ruminative last completed novel into a buoyant Regency rom-com, you could be pleasantly surprised. Freely mixing language lifted from Austen’s prose with distinctly modern words and attitudes — this is a movie in which someone is described as “electrifying” in a pre-electric age — Persuasion is sufficiently bold and consistent with its flagrant liberties to get away with them. It also helps that the novel’s long-suffering protagonist, Anne Elliot, has been given irrepressible spirit and an irreverent sense of irony in Dakota Johnson’s incandescent performance.
It’s easy to argue that Austen’s darkest, most mature novel was never meant to be treated like Emma, but Johnson, in her most lighthearted role to date, makes us complicit in Anne’s wry...
- 7/8/2022
- by David Rooney
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Make no mistake: filmmaker and theater director Carrie Cracknell is a Jane Austen super-fan. Like many Brits, she spent her teenage years consuming the beloved author’s work, first at school — her first Austen, assigned by a beloved teacher: “Pride and Prejudice” — followed by a self-assigned journey through the rest of Austen’s oeuvre, plus the requisite repeated watchings of iconic cinematic adaptations. The Jennifer Ehle- and Colin Firth-starring “Pride and Prejudice” miniseries? Cracknell estimates she watched it “seven times, back to back” as a teen.
“I’ve always found the combination of this proto-feminism, of these women trying to make sense of the world that they’re trapped in, but also the romanticism and the kind of utter joy and the warmth of her storytelling, to be a really compelling combination,” Cracknell said in a recent interview with IndieWire. “It was one of the backdrops of growing up for me.
“I’ve always found the combination of this proto-feminism, of these women trying to make sense of the world that they’re trapped in, but also the romanticism and the kind of utter joy and the warmth of her storytelling, to be a really compelling combination,” Cracknell said in a recent interview with IndieWire. “It was one of the backdrops of growing up for me.
- 6/28/2022
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Netflix has released the first trailer for “Persuasion,” the upcoming period film starring Dakota Johnson, based on the classic 1817 Jane Austen novel.
Published after Austen’s death, “Persuasion” was the final completed work of the writer, and is considered one of her most mature and sophisticated novels. The story revolves around Anne Elliot (played by Dakota Johnson in the film), an isolated 27-year-old struggling to move on after she broke her engagement with Frederick Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis), after being persuaded by family friend Lady Russell (Nikki Amuka-Bird).
After seven years, the two come back into each other’s orbit when Anne’s family rents their home to his sister and her husband. Anne quickly finds herself caught in a love triangle between her former fiancé and her cousin, William Elliot (Henry Golding), who will inherit her father Walter’s (Richard E. Grant) estate. With her friends and family pushing her to be with William,...
Published after Austen’s death, “Persuasion” was the final completed work of the writer, and is considered one of her most mature and sophisticated novels. The story revolves around Anne Elliot (played by Dakota Johnson in the film), an isolated 27-year-old struggling to move on after she broke her engagement with Frederick Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis), after being persuaded by family friend Lady Russell (Nikki Amuka-Bird).
After seven years, the two come back into each other’s orbit when Anne’s family rents their home to his sister and her husband. Anne quickly finds herself caught in a love triangle between her former fiancé and her cousin, William Elliot (Henry Golding), who will inherit her father Walter’s (Richard E. Grant) estate. With her friends and family pushing her to be with William,...
- 6/14/2022
- by Wilson Chapman
- Variety Film + TV
A misunderstood Dakota Johnson trapped in a tumultuous love affair? No, this isn’t the fourth “50 Shades” film
Johnson leads the latest Jane Austen adaptation of “Persuasion” for Netflix, premiering on the streamer July 15. The quiet longing of protagonist Anne Elliot will soon be known stateside, thanks to theater director Carrie Cracknell making her feature directorial debut with the Netflix film.
Cracknell famously directed Jake Gyllenhaal in Broadway’s “Seawall/A Life” and most recently Vanessa Kirby in “Julie” and also helmed 2012 short film “Nora,” commissioned by the Guardian, the Young Vic, and The Space theaters.
“Rain Man” Oscar winner Ron Bass co-wrote the “Persuasion” script with Alice Victoria Winslow.
The official Netflix logline reads: Living with her snobby family on the brink of bankruptcy, Anne Elliot (Johnson) is a non-conforming woman with modern sensibilities. When Frederick Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis) — the dashing one she once sent away — crashes back into her life,...
Johnson leads the latest Jane Austen adaptation of “Persuasion” for Netflix, premiering on the streamer July 15. The quiet longing of protagonist Anne Elliot will soon be known stateside, thanks to theater director Carrie Cracknell making her feature directorial debut with the Netflix film.
Cracknell famously directed Jake Gyllenhaal in Broadway’s “Seawall/A Life” and most recently Vanessa Kirby in “Julie” and also helmed 2012 short film “Nora,” commissioned by the Guardian, the Young Vic, and The Space theaters.
“Rain Man” Oscar winner Ron Bass co-wrote the “Persuasion” script with Alice Victoria Winslow.
The official Netflix logline reads: Living with her snobby family on the brink of bankruptcy, Anne Elliot (Johnson) is a non-conforming woman with modern sensibilities. When Frederick Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis) — the dashing one she once sent away — crashes back into her life,...
- 6/14/2022
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
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