Wuthering Heights with Carole Bell and Adriana Herrera

Welcome back to The Race and Regency Pod.

Today, we are joined by Carole Bell and Adrianna Herrera. 

Carole Bell is a cultural critic, writer, and researcher exploring media, identity, public opinion, and the politics of art and entertainment. Carole’s writing inspires and influences so many writers, thinkers, and readers. She writes about books, new and old, she writes about movies, politics, culture. Carole not only has a finger on the pulse of culture at large, but also the wherewithal to inform it through her incredible writing. She’s written about books and authors for print and online media, including The Atlantic, The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, BookPage, Book Riot, Shondaland, and theGrio.

You can find more of her work here: portfolio.cvbell.com

Adriana Herrera is a USA Today Best Seller Author. She loves writing stories about people who look and sound like her people, getting unapologetic happy endings.  She has written successful romance fiction and erotica, such as her trilogy: A Caribbean Heiress in Paris, An Island Princess starts a Scandal, and A Tropical Rebel gets the Duke; her Dating in Dallas Books include: Here to Stay and On the Hustle; There’s also the Sombrano Studios Books, The Dreamer Series, and other standalone books as well. She won a Ripped Bodice Award in 2020 and the Audie Award in 2023. 

You can find more of her work here: adrianaherreraromance.com

Carole and Adrianna share with us their thoughts on the new adaptation of Wuthering Heights by Emerald Fennell. They also leave us with some incredible recommendations for what to read and watch to satisfy the historical fiction hunger that might emerge post-Wuthering Heights.

To learn more about the Race and Regency Lab, visit https://www.raceandregency.org/

The Race and Regency Pod works as a dynamic sonic space to lend an ear to all things Race and Regency. Using the intimacy, accessibility, and fluidity of the medium, this podcast brings together the public, artists, curators, librarians, scholars, and cultural critics who share their passion for questions of race in this period. Unlike ideas and engagements that can often stay confined behind academic paywalls, this podcast facilitates space for community members and connoisseurs of the Regency era to think together and build together. 

Listening with and to a range of people who speak in varied accents and tones, The Race and Regency Pod works as a practice in embodied scholarship. We imagine what enthusiasm and engagement sound like when directed towards sharing, community building, resistance, and self-expression. This podcast will house diverse conversations that expand the conception of the Regency era thematically, geographically, and temporally, by considering how we inherit formulations of race from this period and engage with them now.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Race and Regency Pod, a dynamic sonic space to lend an ear to all things race and Regency. This podcast brings together the public, artists, curators, librarians, scholars, and cultural critics who share their passion for questions of race in this period. Unlike ideas and engagements that can often stay confined behind academic paywalls, this podcast facilitates space for community members and connoisseurs of the Regency era to think together and build together. I am your host, Shruti Jain. Today we're joined by Carol Bell and Adriana Herrera. Carol Bell is a cultural critic, writer, and researcher exploring media, identity, public opinion, and the politics of art and entertainment. Carol's writing inspires and influences so many writers, thinkers, and readers. She writes about books, new and old, she writes about movies, politics, culture. Carol not only has a finger on the pulse of the culture at large, but also the wherewithal to inform it through her incredible writing. She's written about books and authors for print and online media, including The Atlantic, The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, Bookpage, Book Riot, Chandaland, and so on. Adiana is a USA Today best-selling author. She loves writing stories about people who look and sound like her people, getting unapologetic, happy endings. She has written successful romance fiction and erotica, such as her trilogy, A Caribbean Heiress in Paris, An Island Princess Starts a Scandal, and The Tropical Rebel gets the Duke. Her dating in Dallas books include Here to Stay and On the Hustle. There's also the Somrano Studios books, The Dreamer series, and other standalone books as well. She's won a Ripped Bodys Award in 2020 and the Audi Award in 2023. Carol and Adriana share with us their thoughts on the new adaptation of Wuthering Heights. They also leave us with some incredible recommendations for what we can read and watch to satisfy the historical fiction hunger or historical romance hunger that might emerge post-Wuthering Heights. Welcome to the Race and Regency Pod, Carolyn Adriana. I'm so glad you could join us. Thank you for having us.

SPEAKER_02 2:36

Thank you for having us. I'm really excited about this podcast. I've been uh having podcast envy for a while. I haven't recorded anything in a while, and um, I'm really excited to be here for this.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Awesome! Well, maybe let's just begin with we have all watched it now. Um, how do we feel? Our overall first reaction, got reaction. Carol, do you want to get us started?

SPEAKER_02 3:01

You know, it's so funny. I'm I'm really torn a bit because I love looking into adaptations. And with adaptation, there's so many different things that people want to get out of it. You know, some people who are fans of the book want more faithfulness. Um, other people who aren't familiar with a book just want, you know, a great epic, sort of gothic story. They're they're um attracted by the idea of these like beautiful people being tragically attracted to each other. So, uh, but for me, being someone who sort of is steeped in the period and and the literature, for me, I want some sense of faith or honoring the text. And I didn't, I didn't really get that. I didn't feel that. Um, even if you update the period of time, you know, there's certain, I think there's certain there's a certain crucial essence to a text. Um, and I feel that uh while the sort of fatal attraction of it is there, uh, there's just so much in substance that is just missing and in narrative. And, you know, one thing, if nothing else, the Bronte's are absolutely just not just masters of um emotion and passion, but also of narrative and structure and plot. And uh that is not in this film at all. Uh, you know, the the film kind of does violence to the plot, and um, so I had a problem with that. But at the same time, I was very aware that it did have some emotional heft to it. Um, so we can get into that later. But, you know, even in weeks after release, the people in my um where I saw it were like really moved, and I know that my students were really moved. So do you agree, Adriana?

SPEAKER_01 4:46

I mean, yeah, pretty much in broad strokes, yes. I I mean, I I am one of those people, like I there are certain adaptations that I love. I also love like retellings, like especially in film, like Ten Things I Hate About You is one of my all-time favorite um uh retellings. There is something to be said about a retelling that's interpreted with like a view of the past that's different. All in all, I feel like if you're gonna take a work that is that has endured, like Wuthering Heights, and for so many of us, like I was actually at a dinner party last night and was having this conversation that there's so little in the canon that has people of color in it, and that it's like really the characterization is about identity, and like Heathcliff is maybe like one of maybe four characters in like the canon of like that period of literature that is like a racialized character and like his race and his identity, and like what society does to him because of it is such a central theme of who he is, and why, even though he is such a difficult character, you still feel for him. And so, to me, like taking that away from Heathqua is basically like it just kind of like neuters the character for me in terms of like all the things that I find compelling about Heathqua's as a character when I read Wuthering Heights when I was like a teenager and how it imprinted on me. Like, to me, that's the question. Like, if you're gonna take a work that already has the meaning and that has endured that people are still talking about, and you're gonna adapt it and like bring your own point of view to it, then what are you saying? And to me, like I felt like I'm gonna walk away from that movie feeling like I had a new insight into that work, that like there was something like interpreted from like what Bronte was saying that felt fresher or interesting or anything really, and and I mean aesthetically, sure. I feel like visually it had some really stunning moments. You know, Isabella's the actress that played Isabella was like really fascinating to watch. Like I felt like the characterization of Isabella was like really interesting. It had some of the most uncomfortable moments, but I thought were the only moments that actually like drew me in. Um, Linton, Travesty, uh Nelly, Travesty. Um, the way those characters I feel like were were treated in this adaptation to me. Like I felt like you know, Linton, I just didn't understand why he was the way he was in that movie, and the way that Nelly's was treated also felt weird. So anyway, um all in all, I have uh very conflicted feelings about this film. I I just don't understand why it exists, other than I think the filmmaker wanted to make a pretty movie.

SPEAKER_00 7:47

Yeah, I mean, I I think what you're saying about what is the adaptation and what are the changes doing for us is probably the heart of the question here, right? But we've we've brought up Heathcliff, which is like uh the whitening of Heathcliff is the elephant in the room, I guess, which is not actually an elephant in the room. But really, the whitening of Heathcliff and then the racialization of um Linton and Nellie Dean, it it does something. And whether or not we are committed to the fidelity to the book, I I guess the question is what is it doing? What is it doing for audiences of both kinds? One who have read and appreciated Wuthering Heights, and one who are just coming for the tragic romance of it all. Really, what does this um racial alteration in three characters do for us?

SPEAKER_02 8:34

Well, for me, you know, it's so funny to me that what people are talking about is only the whitening of Heathcliff. Right? So they go to this movie and they've heard something. Honestly, uh, one person actually said to me, I heard that they whitened an African American character. I was like, honey, no, no, no, no, no, no. There's so many things wrong with that. I I don't even know where to start, right? Not African American, uh, whatever. Um, but moving beyond the misreading, people have only heard rumors of of what was even in the book. Um, the fact that you get rid of this idea that he might be Lascar, he might mean he might be like a of South Asian um or like mixed or gypsy, all of that, like taking that away and then somehow balancing that out with adding two actors who were people of color in other characters and especially who these, you know, the role that these characters play, I felt like it was an attempt to neutralize, neutralize and neuter this idea that uh Heathcliff has been whitened and somehow give us compensation in the form of this um like uh neutral cast other characters. And it is really frustrating. I find that to be like the opposite of balancing anything out. Um, and I know that Adriana's head is about to explode. So what do you think?

SPEAKER_01 10:09

No, I mean, I yes, like I mean, to me, the choices made around like because again, because if you're doing quote unquote blind casting, to me, like why and how and the choices you make, like Linton, who is a character that is, you know, brutal in the book. Uh um, you know, a racist, um, just a a a truly vile character. And and and and his characterization and who he is in that book is such a big piece of who he who heath has becomes. Like the monstrosity of Heath Hub in so many in different ways is fueled in part by Linton's and who he is, right? And so to kind of defang him and then make him into this like like cuck-holded guy who has money but has like no agency in his home, and yet and then make him a a South Asian man is like crazy to me. Yeah, like it was literally specifically to make him Salvation, given like the ambiguity around Heathcliff's like racial identity in the book, in the original source material, felt like a really weird choice to me. Yeah, and I know that, and again, to me, it's like you make everything about race. Well, no, you did like you know what? I mean, I'm just going by what I saw here.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

The text specifically uses the word Laskar, which is South Asian laborer, yeah, and also specifically this fantasy that he could be um Heathcliff could be the son of um an Indian, like a wealthy Indian, but I don't remember what the line is. Um Indian person, right? So you have these two mentions, and instead we get Linton, we get the antagonist, and and and like uh an antagonist that has who is like a non-character, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:05

Like he's kind of just there, and then Nelly, Nellie, who is like the only woman of color in the entire movie, and also to me, Nellie in in the book is so important because through Nellie's eyes, and so much and the interactions, a lot of the interactions she has with Heathcote, is how he is humanized to us, like beyond the obsession and like how he feels for Catherine, which you know is a whole other bowl of yarn. Nellie's is our eyes and like our ears into so many ways. I I and this is just my sense of Emerald Fennel. Like, I feel like I was telling somebody that I feel like Emerald Fennel's like ultimate message for me from the films that I watched, like Saltburn and this, is like the working class is dangerous and like like wants to eat the rich. Like, that's like to me, like her. Like, I feel like I felt that in Saltburn, and I feel it here again. And and I feel like that to me was the portrayal of like Nelly, of Heathcliff in ultimately in this film, like Monstro.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

There's a class warfare. There's a there's a what a conservative would call a class warfare that is really destructive. Yeah, there's an obsession, right? The obsession with the beautiful uh person above your station. Uh, and I find I find that fascinating because there's so much that's taken away, but that's like the only thing that remains, really. And this this thing of getting rid of the narrative frame, I'm sorry, that is just like dumbing things down, and that is not helping us. But also, you know, I don't like to ever impute, um, you know, to assume that I understand what the writer or author are thinking. But I will say this that Emerald Fennel's work seems very sort of like visually stunning and shocking, but not substantive to me. That's what I've seen so far. But also, though, Margot Robbie, I admire her work in Barbie, but she is the producer here. And to me, I don't know if you know if this was just an Emerald Fennel thing or Margot Barbie thing or Margot Robbie thing, but the end result is that we are getting rid of so much of the richness. You get rid of the whole second generation thing, which is, you know, the whole Heathcliff raise raises himself up, and then he has this scheme so that the next generation gets to actually enact the the coming together of Kathy and Heathcliff, but like we have it in the second generation. And to just completely eliminate that, and also, you know, playing with Kathy's age, I think the only person who benefits in any of those changes, it's not the audience, it is the actress because she gets a really interesting deathbed scene, although I don't think it was that well acted. You know, it makes the it makes this more of a star vehicle for one person because even Heathcliff doesn't get that much screen time.

SPEAKER_01 15:11

At one point I was like, is this just a self-insert? Like, is this like Emerald Fennel's fantasy of herself as Catherine and as Jacob Alordy as a Heathcliff in her like teenage fantasy, which she has talked about in the press tour about how like this really is like her teenage self, like the sense of that story that she had as a teenager reading it? In many ways, it does feel like that. It feels like an adolescent fantasy of this like toxic struggle of an adolescent fantasy version of Wathering Heights.

SPEAKER_02 15:45

Yeah, of Wathering Heist. Yes. Can we talk though, then just as an offshoot of why she had the specific adolescent fantasy in which the race of Heathcliff is is is not a thing. It's she specifically has said that she envisioned the person who's on the book cover, right? Yeah, but there's a reason the person on the book cover looks a certain way. And if you look at the adaptations, the New York Times had a really good piece that looked at six different adaptations, screen adaptations of Weather and Heights. And really the consistent thing is that the first thing people do to make this book acceptable, socially acceptable, the first thing they did when they decided to adapt it was take away the racial aspect. That's the first thing they do. And once they do that, also with the cover, then generations after, who let's face it, aren't really paying that much attention to the text in the first place. You know, unlike Austin's work, like Pride and Prejudice, I don't think as many people are really going back to the text. And certainly all the people that I spoke to, no idea what's in the text. Everybody I spoke to one two, everyone said, and I did ask, what is your experience with the text or previous annotations? And their previous experience was always zero. I mean, they understand there's supposed to be um, you know, conflict. He's not, he's clearly not Mr. Darcy, you know, he's not an ideal match. But uh, but they don't know the richness of the class conflict and the power dynamics and um the racial subtext, the 19th century racial subtext. Like they don't, they don't have that background.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

I'm thinking how much of that has to do with what both of you said is Emroll Fennell's adolescent desire. Like I know that she said that in press tours and stuff like that, but I'm thinking if using the adolescent memory of the book as a justification for simplifying characters in terms of race, but also just internal complications that every character has is giving too little credit to an adolescent. I feel like adolescents are so full of the potential to imagine complicated desire. Haven't been entirely disciplined into this yet. And you mentioned earlier, Carol, about the the neutering that happens, and really it's a neutering of desire. The book complicates desire, it it makes it um difficult to believe, but also it's happening. You're compelled by this desire that you should not be compelled by.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

I mean, something that I have always found fascinating as someone that reads a lot of romance, so reads a lot of a lot of text with desire and sexuality in it. And one of the things that has always struck me, and I don't, and and specifically like text, I think like of course there this happens a lot, but I think a theme that is always really fascinating to me to read, written by white women or interpreted by white women, is like shame and degradation. To me, it like like the only sexual encounter that I felt like really went into the erotic was the sexual encounter in which there's a well, this is a spoiler, like they're having sex in her house, like on a table, and Heathcliff is like telling her all the different ways in how he's he's gonna kill her husband, Linton. Yes, and like you know, like kind of but inside he's like having sex with her, and it's like telling her, like, is this how you love? Is this how you love? Is this how you love? And like really shaming her. And that's like the I think like the most erotic sex scene. And there's so many like different layers of like shame and degradation and sexuality, like with Jacob, um, with Heathcliff and Isabella, like that whole thing. Come on. And like I think there's like a there's like a a conflation there of like desire and shame felt really like present to me.

SPEAKER_02 19:39

But also, I mean that tone that that this version is going to be about that shame is signaled from I want to say the very first scene, right? Because like the first or second scene is um, or one of the early scenes is Kathy seeing the sexual encounter of two of the servants. Yes. And um, and it is kinky, and she's walk, she's watching from above, like in the stables or something, like through a hole. And to me, you know, the fact that you would put that center stage is like this sets the tone for the whole thing. And I don't know, one, it's it's it told me this is gonna play way too much for shock value, right? It's not just that um it's uh I'm watching something and it's uh erotic and it's it's naughty and I shouldn't be here, but it's also that it needs to be this thing that not only do I not really understand what sex is, because she's young when she's watching, but also, you know, the the animalistic references because they're you know, they're using like um some sort of um is it yeah, like um like like he has a harness, a harness, like a bit in her mouth. And and this isn't they didn't get that from the kink store down the road, right? Like they got that literally from being uh uh you know on the farm or whatever. But I don't want to be completely hating on it completely because I I do want to say when I teach, when I talk about how visual design is a part of the storytelling, I'm always thinking it's going to be in service of the story. And to me, that was not in service of the story, it was only in service of itself.

SPEAKER_01 21:21

Yeah, I mean I mean, I think us like again, like some of the visuals of the movie I thought were like really beautiful. Like there's like that scene when she is like crying and he's it's like that marble staircase, and she's in the like there are moments that are like really visually stunning, but again to me, I couldn't understand it. Like I couldn't understand, like, is this like Alice in Wonderland and is this like this warped version of like the ideal? Because like when she was at in you know, at in Linton's in her in her marriage home, it was all This bright cake, it's almost like you're inside a cake, right? Yeah. And then, you know, Wuthering Heights is just like dilapidated and terrible. Let's not even talk about her dad and what they did to her.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

The architecture of Wuthering Heights is not even, it bears no relationship to anything that that doesn't look like a 19th century ruin. I don't know what it looks like. It actually, you know what it reminded me of? And this is going to sound crazy. To me, their home looked like something from Game of Thrones.

unknown 22:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:30

Well look like the real world. So it's very disorienting because I feel like I'm I was inhabiting like multiple different types of worlds. Like sometimes we are in period costume at the beginning. And then sometimes we are in fabrics and colors. Like I don't, I don't understand what worlds we're in. But nonetheless, I do think there's an emotional connection that's made. If you are coming from this a little bit more fresh and innocent of the text, I do think that it is emotionally gripping. And I will admit that it's not just that I saw other people crying. I tear it up. I didn't sob, but I did tear up at the end. So it got me somehow. So I don't know. There was an emotional connection that was made, even with all. I feel like some of these things we're talking about were sort of barriers to narrative, barriers to understanding. But the emotion sort of like uh broke through nonetheless.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

We should talk about the skin room because I have so many feelings about the skin room.

SPEAKER_02 23:31

Yes, please.

SPEAKER_01 23:33

That my jaw dropped. I did, I did have also a feeling when he licked the wall, they were out. There was a one point where they're like about to make out and he shows up. And like I think this is to me, like I feel like there were moments, like erotic moments in that movie that were just flashes of like this is so great. I wish he would have she would have just done more of that. Right. But so the skin room is so Linton, you know, makes has built her this this room and he's painted it the color of her skin because he's thick, like obsessed with her white skin. And I think a friend of mine who's white inside is like, oh my god, I thought that was so amazing. Like he's obsessed with her. And I'm like, had Linton been white, I think it would have worked better for me. This brown man, like making a skin like a pink room that it's the pink of her skin. The room to her, the pink of her skin just felt so warped to me. If you're layering also like the whitening of Heathcliff and everything else, and the browning of Linton.

SPEAKER_02 24:45

If you were trying to deracinate this story, don't do that.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

Yeah. Yeah. It was, it did not work for me. To me, that is diabolical.

SPEAKER_02 24:56

And I didn't think about it at the time, but now, in retrospect, paired with the fact that you know, ostensibly we're trying to deracinate the story and neutralize um the conflict around race, why is that? What then why do you do that? Um again, I'm just gonna say, you know what? As much as I think it does violence to the story that is this great accomplishment um of Emily Bronte's, I do think there's a narrative in there. And honestly, if I'm grading this on a curve, which clearly we are, I mean, or at least the world is, then compared to what we're getting, we're getting so little, people haven't seen sort of like um enduring passion and in a in a while. I feel like people haven't, I think people are thirsty for that. And every time, every time, how is it that time after time when there's some sort of romance adjacent adaptation and people show up for the theaters and people are into it, and everyone goes, Wow, people are into romance? That's so shocking.

SPEAKER_00 26:07

What why are we shocked by this? Particularly period romance, right? Yes, yes, specifically. What's that about? So maybe both of you could like take us a little bit into the um historical fiction part of it all, and what is this about this romance that is period that is historical fiction? You mentioned earlier the sets looking a little bit like um Game of Thrones. So clearly it's invoking a popular culture sense of period drama, period romance. Not really sure of what period. Yes, intermixing the past all together, right? Maybe could you maybe take us into that? What is the state of historical fiction now and adaptations? What's going on here?

SPEAKER_02 26:45

Well, I I was just say that thing about where you can't quite place the period is very uh common. Um, I think that's that's part of the whole fantasy of it all, right? Um, so fantasy in a way sort of supplanted historical romance as the sort of go-to escapist subgenre. Um, I think one of the things that when I've written about African-American historical romance, one of the things I say, the reasons that I think it's so attractive and why people should not be afraid of it. I think a lot of people are afraid to read African-American romance. They think it's gonna be a too much of a downer. What I say is that no, what's great about African-American romance is that it taps into stakes that really, really matter, right? So it has the drama, it has the high stakes, and yet it also has the triumphing over these, you know, these incredible odds, um, I think that make the love story that heightens the love story, right? Enriches the love story. Um, and I think that's partly what people, why people are attracted to historical romance and also to fantasy. But then the other side of me, the cynical side of me, worries that, you know, partly it's just uh people want to sort of like escape the modern world period and our our current politics period, and they think that somehow the 19th century is like more attractive, which is very, very disturbing to me.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

I mean, I think part of the reason why people think that they can escape into the 19th century with romance is because a lot of the romance that is out there that is set in the 19th century really is not like trying to say anything about history. That's what they call like the wallpaper regencies, which is you know, like the the the the time and place is kind of just like the trappings of it, it's the aesthetic, but it's not like yeah, informing a lot of like the characterizations other than like scandal or ruination or like that, or like you know, whatever. But I mean, I think historical fiction and it's interesting, it's a interesting moment because there's been a conversation about historical romance for years now, saying like, you know, like the it's people are just not interested as much in historical romance. And so to me, it's like a fascinating time because I feel like we are there are like these like things in popular culture, like Bridgerton, for example, that are like historically historical adjacent, that are very popular for reasons, and then there's stuff like the Gilded Age, which is very informed in real history that are like aesthetically beautiful and visually so beautiful, amazing cast of actors, and it's very popular. When it comes to like the books, I think it's been interesting, like it just hasn't spilled over as much, and I think part of it is because I think I mean we've talked about this before, Carol. I think historical romance, I think publishing waited too long to make historical diverse and to bring in stories that were a little different than like just like the Regency, like the Georgia Hare, like you know, derivatives that we had for so long.

SPEAKER_02 30:01

But there's so what what I what is so frustrating to me is that there is such brilliant work being done now in historicals or recently in historicals. And I've written about you know the historicals that do great, you know, that actually make the 19th century come alive, that really dig into all of the issues that don't whitewash the facts. That I mean, how can you whitewash a period that is all about, you know, struggle, the struggle for abolition, that is about what's going on with the British colonies and the struggle for freedom and the conflict, you know, in India. We have so many rich stories going on in the 19th century. And to not tap into those, you know, uh is just criminal. But we have these writers who are actually doing it now, not the least of which, of course, is Adriana Herrera, who wrote a brilliant historical series that in the 19th century, um, that, you know, I think is absolutely required reading. And then you have um Amita Murray, who's but who is doing brilliant, brilliant work. And she has a series called the Marley Sisters. And the Marley sisters are biracial uh Anglo Anglo-Indian uh daughters um of um a British aristocrat's second family. Like they're they're basically his second family. And uh after his death, they come to England, and there's just so much rich storytelling, uh, both romantically and also about the period in those works, and that they're just absolutely brilliant and enjoyable. And I think, you know, period fiction doesn't have to shy away from the realities in order for it to still be have joy in it, right? And have love in it. Uh, so I don't know. I just hope that people really seek that out. Obviously, the person who proved that is Beverly Jenkins, right? In in writing American, um, African-American historicals. Um, and so like substance is not the enemy of escapism or of um romance. The gilded age is just such, oh my god, it's such a perfect fascinating. It's fascinating. But you know why Julian Fellows did it so well with the gilding age is because A, he hired a really wonderful historian. Yes. Um, and uh there's uh specific The director's black, the director the director, Sally Richardson Whitfield, like one of the the central figures in this whole production is is a brilliant African-American woman. So, you know, just like that's intentional. Like casting is intentional, uh, casting is policy. And um, you know, the way he tapped into the brilliance of people of color um for this for that story just completely enriched it. It's sort of like our upstairs dancers, except it's not just upstairs dancer. It's yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:56

Well, we don't want our audience to leave this podcast or leave the movie theater thinking that if you watch historical fiction, you're always at the risk of uh adapting it wrong or thinking about the period wrong. Because like both of you just gave us examples of so many writers, including uh Adriana, who are doing such fantastic work with that period, right? So maybe our our listeners who may have enjoyed Wathering Heights or been enraged, moved in any any capacity, can look at all of this other work that you have pointed us to.

SPEAKER_02 33:27

Absolutely. But I also want to say, uh, again, I mean, I'm of so many multiple minds that if I didn't think of this as a historical adaptation, it would be a different experience for me because, you know, when I think about um, as Adriana said, the Alice in Wonderland of it or the Game of Thrones of it, then, you know, there's a lot of yearning on screen. Um, it did move me to like, you know, tear up a bit. And I know that it had that effect on a lot of people. And I know that this movie is giving pleasure to people. And that I do think is important. We talk so much. People talk so much about um the influence of Austin or the influence of hair. And I think even though Wuthering Heights is so like the the epitome of not a happy ending, you know, it's like uh the opposite. Uh, I do think that there is sort of um a blueprint for a romance hero somewhere in Heathcliff. Oh yes. And I think dark romance in a way is sort of like not just dark romance, but some historical romances are like rewriting Heathcliff and making him reformed by his by his love somehow.

SPEAKER_00 34:39

Yeah, maybe so we're thinking here about Heathcliff's afterlives. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 34:44

Yeah. What books can you do you think about when you think about Heathcliff's influence?

SPEAKER_01 34:50

Well, oh my god. Uh Lord Dane, Lord of Scoundrels.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

Oh my god. That is perfect. That is perfect because the whole, the whole I you know, I understand that this is a slur, but this is the word that's used, the whole like gypsy, you know, connection.

SPEAKER_01 35:04

And McKenna. McKenna from Again the Magic.

SPEAKER_02 35:09

So I was going to say, I feel like I see a lot of this in Clayfis, and I've never, I don't remember her talking about it explicitly, but um, I didn't get a chance to go back. But I just feel Heathcliff in some of the Lisa Clayfis heroes. Yeah. I mean even the one that other people say is supposed to be the best, who's not my favorite, but um Um Dreaming of You, Dark Reagan, yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:33

I mean, I've been for sure, born in the world. I mean, for sure, for sure. Um, that is also not my favorite, but I do think like Reese Winterborn, for example, which is one of my favorite heroes of her. McKenna's one of my favorite heroes of her. To me, the ultimate Heathcliff, like embodiment of Heathcliff to me is Sebastian, like Dane from Lot of Scoundrels. Yes. Like the first time I read that book, I'm like, this is Heathcliff. Yeah. If he could have been a romance hero.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

And the and the mother, yeah. I I oh yeah, I completely see that.

SPEAKER_01 36:07

If you if you think about it, it's there.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

So if we had to do a reading list, a romance reading list for people who like Heathcliff, we would put Lord of Scoundrels. I think McKenna, again the magic. Again the magic by Lisa Clapis.

SPEAKER_01 36:22

I would put Dreamy of You by Lisa Clapis. Yes, Dark Craven, absolutely a a descendant of that of that hero archetype of Heathcliff.

SPEAKER_00 36:32

The uniqueness, I guess, of the Bronte's and of the adaptation. Well, not so much of the adaptation, but the bronte of what you're saying, the dark romance bit, is also that neither characters, especially not Heathcliff, they they don't go through a transformation, they stay toxic.

SPEAKER_02 36:48

That's the difference between Bronte's versus romance as it's conceived now.

SPEAKER_01 36:53

Yeah, I mean, unless it's dark romance, dark romance, right? Where the hero doesn't necessarily be get redeemed, which is why they the Bronte's are the original Dark Romans girlies. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:06

Can I ask you both if you could have tea with someone from the Regency, and you can expand this to general big historical period, if you could have tea with someone, who would it be and why?

SPEAKER_02 37:17

I I told you at the beginning that I was gonna give the worst answer. I'm going to give the worst answer. I'm sorry, but it has to be Jane Austen. I uh I'm an I'm a Jainite completist, you know, like I I'm all things Austin, but it's not just that. It is also specifically because I want to explore the inklings of race and commentary on abolition and um and Miss Lamb, the Mystery's heroine within uh an unfinished novel. I think that with Insand, I mean, I think that there's just so much there, and yet most other writers of her period were not touching it. And uh I think that would be fascinating to ask about.

SPEAKER_01 38:00

No, I mean, I don't know. I mean, I probably would say, yeah, like either the Bronte sisters, Austin. Jane Austen was, from what we know, someone that was led a pretty sheltered life. You know, when you are in like a privilege in a position of privilege, I wouldn't say it's something like I wouldn't assume that you would be a person that has insight to like the have and have nots and like the inequalities and the inconsistent cognitive dissonance of the world that you live in. And it seems to me that she did, and it would be I would be curious to know how she was able to like gain perspective. I think she would make for a very interesting partner for a cup of tea.

SPEAKER_00 38:38

Awesome! So it's gonna be Austin and the Bronte's for us.

SPEAKER_01 38:42

Yes, I would love to talk to those Bronte sisters and see what's going on.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

Who DSJ now? Get Emily to watch uh Emerald Funnels Wathering Heights and see what she thinks. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:54

To see what she thinks of that one.

SPEAKER_00 38:56

Yeah, well, thank you, Carol and Adriana, for joining us. Thank you for talking about Wuthering Heights and sharing your thoughts, and we will link your work um in the podcast description.

SPEAKER_02 39:09

Thank you so much. This was really fun.

SPEAKER_00 39:11

Yeah, thank you so much for joining us.