{"id":6262,"date":"2026-06-17T10:24:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T10:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/?p=6262"},"modified":"2026-06-17T10:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T10:24:11","slug":"review-miss-austen-tv-mini-series-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/06\/17\/review-miss-austen-tv-mini-series-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Miss Austen (TV mini-series, 2025)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The fascination with all things Jane Austen never seems to diminish, and here is the BBC\u2019s latest offering, a four-part mini-series focused on Jane\u2019s sister, Cassandra. It\u2019s set in 1830, but with many flashbacks to events earlier in Cassy\u2019s life, which inevitably involve Jane. Neither sister ever married, but both were engaged, Cassy to Tom Fowle, who died on a trip overseas, and Jane, very briefly, to Harris Bigg-Wither. The series also invents a suitor for Cassy on a seaside holiday to Sidmouth, possibly because so little else happens in the sisters\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n

The 1830s part of the story is centred on some letters Jane wrote to Eliza Fowle. Eliza has been dead for some years, but now her husband is dying and Cassy wants to retrieve the letters, to keep them out of the hands of those who would publish them and expose Jane\u2019s (and Cassy\u2019s) private lives. It\u2019s a flimsy excuse for the story, so we get endless shots of Keeley Hawes, as Cassy, poring over letters, crying or outraged or simply remembering events far in the past (cue flashbacks).<\/p>\n

There\u2019s some business with Eliza\u2019s surviving daughter Isabella, and finding a home for her now that her clergyman father is dead and she\u2019ll need to leave the parsonage, and there\u2019s a suitor for Isabella to complicate the issue. Cassy takes charge (she\u2019s portrayed as something of a bossy boots), but in the end her efforts are foiled and Isabella marries her doctor admirer.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not a great expert of the costumes of the 1830s, but it struck me that the very plain fabrics chosen for all the women would be far less practical than the printed patterns which were becoming very common then with greater industrialisation. I wasn\u2019t to impressed with the Regency-era costumes, either; Jane appears to own only one gown, in bright turquoise, and Cassy\u2019s yellow gown was eye-wateringly bright.<\/p>\n

However, that\u2019s a minor grumble. The series is worth watching, if you don\u2019t mind the fact that virtually nothing happens. The acting is, as you\u2019d expect from the Beeb, superb. A pleasant way to pass a few hours, although I\u2019m not sure that it does justice to Jane\u2019s personality. I far preferred the fun-loving Jane in Miss Austen Regrets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The fascination with all things Jane Austen never seems to diminish, and here is the BBC\u2019s latest offering, a four-part mini-series focused on Jane\u2019s sister, Cassandra. It\u2019s set in 1830, but with many flashbacks to events earlier in Cassy\u2019s life, which inevitably involve Jane. Neither sister ever married, but both were engaged, Cassy to Tom […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6262"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6264,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6262\/revisions\/6264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marykingswood.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}