Give me your favourite period drama adaptations

[PicklingGherkins]

I have a rare day to myself. I usually fall upon Pride & Prejudice (BBC Jennifer Ehle version). I remember liking the BBC version of Vanity Fair and Wives and Daughters but haven't seen them since they first aired. Any other ideas or should I resign myself to an afternoon of wine and Colin Firth (there is no right or wrong here)

Oooh I'd have to go with the Jennifer Ehle version of Pride and Prejudice. North and South, Wives and Daughters, The Buccaneers and the Zelah Clarke/Timothy Dalton BBC version of Jane Eyre. It is by far the best.

Cloudywee and Kikashi. It is my favourite version. I don't actually think Dalton is too handsome. I think it just works. The scene from chapter 23 is incredible.

I had no idea that Aldous Huxley wrote the screenplay for the Welles version. It explains a lot. It was that film that promoted me to read the novel.

Much Ado About Nothing with Kenneth Branagh, Emma Thompson,, Kate Beckinsale and Denzel Washington. It’s beautifully filmed and a feel-good performance

I love the music in the Keira Knightly P & P; and the dirt and the squabbling

And yes of course Wolf Hall is the very best TV there’s been in ages!

Can I just say thank you all!! I can't wait to work my way through this list (dare I start you off on classic books 😀). I was quite ignorant of a lot of your favourites but I endeavour to catch up - roll on staycation.

I can only echo many of these really but I don't think anyone has mentioned Little Dorrit (Claire Foy/Matthew McFadden) which was done in the same episodic style as Bleak House

Otherwise

Bleak House ( Gillian Anderson)
Far From The Madding Crowd (Paloma Baeza)
Jane Eyre (Ruth Wilson )

Whilst I love the old Branagh Much Ado the new American Black and White Version is very good also

Oh and the Little Women with Winona Ryder

I can’t believe nobody has mentioned Poldark. Just sat and my way through the last episode of the current series. You could always rewatch the earlier ones. You can never have too much Aiden Turner.

cold comfort farm is just ace

also love the 80s version of mapp and lucia - well worth a watch

oh how could I have forgotten Emma Thompson’s Sense and Sensibility!!!

The scene were she spills her heart to her sister breaks my heart. Now I have to try and find it to watch again...

Wasn't the ridiculous ending (the 2 leads standing on a mountain in Africa with her in trousers) from a mostly very good BBC adaption of Wives a Daughters? I love that.

Also Lilie Langtry with the same beautiful actress who plays the mean egocentric 'new mother' in Wives.

The lovely actress is Francesca Annis. Lillie Langtry is ITV and was recently repeated, it's worth getting hold of. Some of it is bit false but it's well done on the whole, the costumes are fab. Peter Egan's Oscar Wilde is great in it.

Francesa Annis is beautiful I remember seeing her in A Pin to See The Peepshow on TV in the 70's - with Bernard Hepton and John Duttine. I was only about 10 but the story really stuck with me. Wish I could see it again. I do have the book though by F. Tennyson Jesse based on a true story.

Wolf Hall, superb.

Alan Bates in The Go-Between is another excellent adaptation. Harold Pinter wrote the screenplay.

It's only as I've got older that I understand the opening line of the book/film: 'The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.'
I hadn't a clue what this meant when I first read the book/saw the film as as a teenager.

And Love & Friendship based on a Jane Austen manuscript/letters is sublime. It's currently on Netflix!

Annoyingly I missed Lady Susan recently what is the verdict from any of you costume drama\ Jane Austen lovers? I wonder if I could get hold of it?

I watched Love and Friendship, it was brilliant! Have read ‘Love and Freindship’ (sic) but not Lady Susan, made me want to hunt it out!

Cranford with Judi Dench and Eileen Atkins. Love it. Watch it every winter.

Not quite sure it's what you are looking for..but Dangerous Liaisons with John Malkovich is just breathtakingly stunning.

Isn't Lady Susan part of Love And Friendship (the film) and not a separate film even though it's a separate book? I thought so.

Moll Flanders with Alex Kingston.
Keira Keighley p&p (I don't like her in anything but this)
Poldark

Adored wives and daughters and I'm just about to start North and South as I am rather fond of Richard Armitage

I've heard good things about Daniel deronda

I know it is not a period drama adaptation but ive just finished Versailles which was fabulous but annoyingly they have cancelled it after the third series mid story.

Think I just love anything with a good costume department

Oh it could be MrStark It's taken from J.A's very early writings isn't it?

I'd love to see a version of Sanditon her unfinished book.

Ref. Daniel Deronda it had a very stilted Romola Garai in it. Which put me off, the costumes were great though!!

I wasn't keen on Keira's version of P&P the direction was weird, That bit on the swing in the farmyard!!

Pandora's If you love costumes then Lillie Langtry would really get you!

pandora Daniel Deronda is good. Jodhi May and Hugh Bonneville are very good in it.
I'm also sad about Versailles - I shall miss the beautiful boys 9and girls) - costumes and settings were so sumptuous - a real treat (for the eyes) even if the history was subverted.

I like the Richard Armitage North and South - he is perfect for the part (although Daniela Denby Ashe is not the raven haired, slim Margaret I imagine from the novel). I didn't like how the adapter had changed the storyline especially about how and why Margaret starts to fall for Thornton.

To all dramatists - STICK TO THE BOOK - if it is still successful after a hundred odd years there is good reason for it!

I love a costume drama and am marking place and working my way through the thread, but the recent-ish War and Peace on the Beeb comes to mind. More enjoyable than I'd expected.

I was so impressed by North and South too. Came across it on ITV7 or some other tinpot channel, so wasn't expecting much, but it was excellent.

furlined, I had no idea there was an earlier Mapp and Lucia! Who was in it?