{"id":625885,"date":"2026-09-16T00:52:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T00:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/625885\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T00:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T00:52:09","slug":"why-george-mackay-hasnt-watched-ang-lees-sense-and-sensibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/625885\/","title":{"rendered":"Why George MacKay Hasn’t Watched Ang Lee’s ‘Sense and Sensibility’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe cast of Georgia Oakley\u2019s Sense and Sensibility graced London\u2019s Leicester Square at the film\u2019s world premiere on Tuesday night, and to quote Jane Austen<\/a> herself: They were very amiable indeed.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe latest Austen adaptation from Focus Features<\/a> \u2014\u00a0out Sept. 25 in the U.K. and Oct. 16 in the U.S. \u2014\u00a0had fans in a frenzy as Daisy Edgar-Jones<\/a>, Esme Creed-Miles (daughter of The Odyssey\u2018s Samantha Morton), George MacKay<\/a>, Herbert Nordrum, Frank Dillane, Bodhi Rae Breathnach and Fiona Shaw donned their finest ensembles and made their way down the media line.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhat I love about this story is that it champions, particularly through Elinor and I guess through Edward as well, people who put others first,\u201d MacKay, playing the noble Edward Ferrars, told The Hollywood Reporter on the grassy, green carpet, where pastel-colored flowers sprouted up from the ground and a live cellist played. \u201cIt\u2019s very difficult to have stories centered [around] characters who hide their emotions, and it\u2019s not a particularly shiny quality to put others in front of you all the time. It\u2019s chivalrous, but it\u2019s difficult to translate. And I love that Jane Austen, in her writing, does that so beautifully with a character like Elinor. And in this film, Edward gets to share in that a little bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe 1917 star did confess he has opted not to watch Ang Lee<\/a>\u2018s 1995 Sense and Sensibility with Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant and Alan Rickman \u2014 the very film that won Thompson her Oscar for best adapted screenplay. \u201cAnd I hadn\u2019t read the book before I became part of this project, and so I didn\u2019t really have that pressure,\u201d MacKay continued about shouldering the weight of the Sense and Sensibility legacy and Austen\u2019s adoring fanbase.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI knew [the film] in the ether to be something of a great import, but I elected not to try and see the film so I didn\u2019t do exactly that \u2014 didn\u2019t put pressure on myself. I let my interpretation be my own, [I was] led by the script that Diana Reid wrote for this, and so the pressure wasn\u2019t too bad in the end,\u201d said MacKay, who did confirm shortly after that he\u2019ll be watching 1995\u2019s Sense and Sensibility after the premiere.<\/p>\n

\n\tNormal People and Twisters star Edgar-Jones, looking a vision in grey with a black choker, stopped for just a moment, where she mulled over her best Austen-esque advice for matters of the heart. \u201cOh, I heard this recently \u2014\u00a0I think it was Ethan Hawke so I cannot claim it,\u201d the Briton laughed to THR. \u201cIt\u2019s something along the lines of, \u2018The person in love is always the person who wins.\u2019 Because to feel love and be in love is when you feel most alive and that is magic. Like, lean into passion and I think that\u2019s what Elinor learns throughout the film. So I thought that was beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFrom Blue Jean filmmaker Oakley, adapted by Diana Reid, the feature follows one of Austen\u2019s most beloved stories. When Henry Dashwood dies, his wife (Caitr\u00edona Balfe) and three daughters are left with an inheritance of just \u00a3500 a year. In a shock to them all, much of his estate is left to a son from his first marriage, John (Tom Brooke), whose wife Fanny (Stacy Martin) delights in immediately moving into their large house.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut this is a scandal-clad love story, of course, and Edgar-Jones\u2019 Elinor soon finds she is of interest to Edward Ferrars (MacKay), while Marianne juggles two different men: the roguish John Willoughby (Dillane) and gentlemanly Colonel Brandon (Nordrum). Shaw stars in a supporting role as Mrs. Jennings.<\/p>\n

\n\tOakley also tried to put her own spin on the story and focus on Reid\u2019s screenplay. She said on Tuesday that the movie is much different to Lee\u2019s, particularly because of the age difference between the sisters. \u201c[They\u2019re] much closer together in age in reality, and so I guess I was looking to get under the skin of a certain type of sister dynamic. For me, it was important that they were closer together in age. But also, the visual language is very different. The locations are very different.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe continued about the eternal allure of Austen and deciding to adapt Sense and Sensibility again: \u201cWhat interested me was that Austen is writing about themes that are inherently contemporary, and there is still, for young women today, such a negotiation to be had between what the world tells them they can expect from their lives and what it\u2019s actually prepared to offer them. That negotiation happens usually between the teenage years and your mid-20s to mid-30s, and I feel like that hasn\u2019t changed at all. We\u2019re still living in a world where the rules have been made by men for men, and so I think in that respect, it\u2019s really a timeless story, and felt like a good time to adapt it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBritish screen icon Shaw concurred. \u201cI read [the book] again last week,\u201d she giggled to THR. \u201cThat\u2019s how much I love it\u2026 She\u2019s a fantastic writer.\u201d On how to describe Mrs. Jennings to theatergoers new to the character, Shaw replied: \u201cI\u2019d say she\u2019s one of the most benign creatures in literature, and it was a privilege to play. She reminded me of all the best people I knew when I was a kid \u2014\u00a0when people were loud, ebullient, unselfconscious, and very funny.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tTim Bevan and Eric Fellner of Working Title Films produce alongside India Flint of November Pictures and Jo Wallett. The project follows Focus and Working Title collaborating on the 2005 adaptation of Pride & Prejudice, another Austen classic novel, and the 2020 adaptation of Austen\u2019s Emma.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The cast of Georgia Oakley\u2019s Sense and Sensibility graced London\u2019s Leicester Square at the film\u2019s world premiere on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":625886,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[265756,67227,321,69469,93,35995,47454,61,1042,60,21288,303],"class_list":["post-625885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ang-lee","tag-caitriona-balfe","tag-celebrities","tag-daisy-edgar-jones","tag-entertainment","tag-focus-features","tag-george-mackay","tag-ie","tag-international","tag-ireland","tag-jane-austen","tag-united-kingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=625885"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625885\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/625886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=625885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=625885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=625885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}