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A bold, witty and fresh adaptation of Jane Austen's novel which, while thoroughly modern, retains the spirit and much of the language of the original. It is night and an exhausted Jane Austen sleeps over the recently completed manuscript of her novel Emma. Her four nieces steal in and decide to act out the text and, after her initial anger on being wakened, Jane herself takes the role of Mr Knightley. The excitable teenage girls often try to take the story into their own realms of fantasy but are always brought back to the real text by Jane. 'full of life and vitality – an admirably lively, daringly provocative adaptation' - Daily Telegraph 'ebullient and mischievous' - The Times
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Jane Austen's
EMMA
adapted for the stage by
Martin Millar and Doon MacKichan
NICK HERN BOOKS
London
www.nickhernbooks.co.uk
Contents
Title Page
Original Production
Notes on the Play
Characters
Emma
About the Author
Copyright and Performing Rights Information
Emma was first presented at the Gilded Balloon Theatre during the 1998 Edinburgh Festival and subsequently on a tour which included Watford Palace Theatre before transferring in October 1999 to the the Tricycle Theatre, London. The original cast was as follows:
EMMA
Doon MacKichan
JANE AUSTEN/MR KNIGHTLEY
Nicola Redmond
NIECE ONE/MISS BATES
Gillian Hannah
NIECE TWO/JANE FAIRFAX
Lucy Briers
NIECE THREE/MRS WESTON/
Abigail McKern
MRS ELTON
NIECE FOUR/HARRIET SMITH
Lucy Scott
FRANK CHURCHILL
Adam Croasdell
MR ELTON/MR WOODHOUSE/
Michael Matthus
ROBERT MARTIN/MRS COLE
Other characters played by members of the company
Director
Guy Retallack
Designer
Dora Schweitzer
Notes on the Play
Our Inspiration
Jane Austen often wrote at night, her only real privacy, and spent much of her day looking after a myriad of nephews and nieces. She guarded her manuscripts and only when finished did she sometimes allow them to be acted out by her young relatives in a sitting room or barn, Jane often taking the part of the leading man.
As our play begins, it is night and an exhausted Jane Austen sleeps over the recently completed manuscript of her new novel, Emma. Four of her young nieces steal on stage and after some quarrelling decide to purloin the text and act it out. Jane is awakened and after her initial anger, allows the girls to begin to tell her story. Irritated by the absurd posturings of one niece playing Mr Knightley, Jane Austen takes this role and keeps it whilst the real Emma and Mr Wodehouse enter, the nieces providing the many other characters. These excitable teenage girls often try to take the story into their own realms of fantasy but are always brought back to the real text by Jane.
The nieces in effect perform the show, each taking mostly one main part for themselves. They never leave the stage but sit on benches behind the area where the action unfolds. They provide an energetic vocal and physical chorus to support the story, never upstaging, always alert and always slightly in awe of their ‘Aunty Jane’. They are the show’s life-blood, and their energy (on the cusp of puberty, full of sexual tension and excitement) drives the show. Their costumes are period with attitude – Empire-Line dresses fall open to reveal the girls wearing modern pedal-pushers and trainers, allowing them the freedom of movement to be at once feminine and tomboyish – one minute they dance wildly to the Prodigy, the next they execute a perfect Scottish reel.
The Set
Ideally the actors create the pictures in a dynamic ensemble performance. Therefore the set can be minimal, with three benches and an old toy box, from which come the props, normally one per character (i.e. for Mrs Elton a feather boa, Mrs Bates a lace hat, Jane Fairfax a volume of Proust). While sitting on the benches, the nieces would usually act as a chorus and commentary on the proceedings, before invading the stage to play their other characters.
Jane Austen
We were very keen for the same actress to portray Jane Austen and Mr Knightley because we felt that a lot of Jane Austen’s voice is in this ideal man. This doubling can be easily achieved with a clever costume design (we used a long frock coat and leather boots – both masculine and feminine) and with the simple putting on of glasses to signify the change between Jane Austen and Mr Knightley, in addition to the obvious physical and vocal transformation. She remains on stage at all times, watching her book unfold, guiding the nieces, and seeing her heroine undergo her painful journey. She can be as close to or as far from the action as your production requires but she is always our simultaneous narrator and commentator.
House Style
There is a rebellious bold spirit to the piece – it is physical, truthful, moving and funny. It is the essence of Austen – caustic, dark, but ultimately forgiving. As Jane Austen said ‘Pictures of perfection, as you know, make me sick and wicked.’
Our actors don’t have much rest, they comment vocally and physically throughout the show. Quick changes are vital to the spirit of the show, particularly Woodhouse who goes from leering vicar to lusty farmer to valetudinarian, often without pause. With so much happening on stage it is essential to keep a focus, and the nieces are integral to this. (Emma and Frank Churchill are the only characters who just play themselves. It is as if they are from another world.)
Remember that this is simply a guide. Stick to the text but reinterpret it as you wish. That pertains to the music and the stage directions as well. It is fast, witty and vibrant and populated with real people, and that is the point, they are real people. It is a modern reworking, but despite our occasional irreverence, the wit and genius of Jane Austen must shine through.
Doon MacKichan,Martin Millar
Characters
JANE AUSTENEMMAMR KNIGHTLEYHARRIET SMITHROBERT MARTINFRANK CHURCHILLJANE FAIRFAXMRS WESTONMR ELTONMRS ELTONMRS COLESMISS BATESMR WOODHOUSEMISS BICKERTONNIECE ONENIECE TWONIECE THREENIECE FOUR
For ideal doubling, see cast list on original production page
Scene 1
JANE AUSTEN is asleep centre stage. All four nieces enter and perform a rap dance to the music of Me’Shell’s ‘If that’s your boyfriend’.
NIECES. You say that’s your boyfriend,You say I’m out of line, Funny . . . he said I could call him up anytime.
You could call me wrong, say that I ain’t right But if that’s your boyfriend he wasn’t last night.
Now I’m the kind of woman, I’ll do almost anything to get what I want. I might play any little game. Call me what you like but you know what to do. You’re just jealous, cos he wasn’t with you.
I don’t mean no harm. I just like what I see And it ain’t my fault, if he wants me.
That’s what I want, and the feeling was right. If that’s your boyfriend he wasn’t last night.
Boyfriend, yes I had your boyfriend.
If that’s your boyfriend, if that’s your boyfriend, If that’s your boyfriend he wasn’t last night!
The music comes to a rude halt when they discover JANE AUSTEN in the room. One of them is brave enough to steal the book she is working on. She reads.
NIECE ONE (sotto voce). Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence: and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.
NIECE TWO. She dearly loved her father, but he was no companion for her. He could not meet her in conversation, rational or playful; for having been a vale . . . vale . . .
NIECE ONE. Valetudinarian.
NIECE TWO. . . all his life, without activity of mind or body, he was a much older man in ways than in years; and though everywhere beloved for the friendliness of his heart and his amiable temper, his talents could not have recommended him at any time.
All look depressed at prospect of a dull novel.
NIECE THREE. They lived in Highbury, (Squeals of delight from the other nieces.) a large and populous village, amounting to a town, to which Hartfield, in spite of its separate lawns and shrubberies and name, did really belong. The Woodhouses were first in consequence there. All looked up to them.
NIECE FOUR. Is there a handsome hero?
NIECE ONE (flicking through pages of novel). Yes . . . Mr Knightley.
The nieces quarrel about who is to play MR KNIGHTLEY.
NIECES. I’m him . . . no I am . . . no I’m him . . . no, me . . . me . . . me etc.
NIECE TWO (beginning tentatively and then growing in confidence). Ah, Mr Woodhouse! Delightful to see you! It is a beautiful moonlit night, is it not? Delightful to see you! A beautiful moonlit night is it not? I say, did you ever see a more beautiful moonlit night? I must say, it is a . . .
JANE AUSTEN (having woken). What are you doing?
NIECES recoil.
NIECE ONE (slightly sulky having just been caught out). Just playing.
JANE AUSTEN. With my book? My new book?
NIECE FOUR. We just wanted to know the story Auntie Jane. Sorry.
Ominous pause.
JANE AUSTEN. It’s all right.
NIECES sit down round JANE AUSTEN and she hands the book to NIECE TWO.
Go on then.
NIECE TWO (resuming MR KNIGHTLEY but a little subdued). Ah! Mr Woodhouse! Delightful to see you! It is a beautiful moonlit night, is it not? Delightful to see you! (Starting to overblow the character to the delight of the other giggling nieces.) Did you ever see a more beautiful moonlit night? Ah!
JANE AUSTEN. Mr Knightley is not a brainless coxcomb! Mr Knightley is like . . . like . . . this.
JANE AUSTEN becomes MR KNIGHTLEY. NIECE ONE becomes MR WOODHOUSE.
NIECE ONE (as confident young man). It is very kind of you, Mr Knightley to come out at this late hour to call upon us. (NIECE TWO tells him he should play it old.) I am afraid you must have had a shocking walk.
MR KNIGHTLEY. Not at all, Sir. It is a beautiful moonlit night, and so mild that I must draw back from your great fire.
NIECE ONE. But you must have found it very damp and dirty. I wish you may not catch cold.
MR KNIGHTLEY. Dirty, Sir? Look at my boots. Not a speck on them.
NIECE ONE. Well that is quite surprising for we have had a vast deal of rain here. I wanted them to put off the wedding. Ah, poor Miss Taylor, it is a sad business.
NIECE THREE and FOUR (to JANE AUSTEN). Who’s Miss Taylor?
JANE AUSTEN. Miss Taylor was Emma’s governess. She just got married today to a Mr Weston.
NIECE ONE. Poor Miss Taylor.
MR KNIGHTLEY. Poor Emma and Mr Woodhouse if you please, for you will sorely miss her, but I cannot possibly say poor Miss Taylor. It must be easier for Miss Taylor to have only one to please rather than two.
NIECE FOUR. Emma! Who’s playing Emma?
NIECE THREE and FOUR discuss whom of the two of them would be better for the part but are superseded by NIECE TWO. The next two speeches are simultaneously read by the nieces and the real EMMA and MR WOODHOUSE as they appear from the audience.
NIECE TWO / EMMA (fading in). . . . especially when one of those two is such a fanciful troublesome creature. That is what you have in your head, I know, and what you would certainly say if my father were not by.
MR WOODHOUSE / NIECE ONE (fading out). I believe it is very true, my dear, indeed. I am afraid I am sometimes very fanciful and troublesome.
NIECE ONE and TWO re-take their seats on the bench with the other NIECES.
EMMA. My dearest papa, you do not think I could mean you, or suppose Mr Knightley to mean you. What a horrible idea! Oh, no, I meant only myself. Mr Knightley loves to find fault with me, you know – in a joke – it is all in a joke. We always say what we like to one another. And have you forgotten, papa, one matter of joy to me, that I made the match myself. I made the match four years ago and to have it take place and be proved in the right, when so many people said Mr Weston would never marry again, may comfort me for anything.
MR WOODHOUSE. Ah, my dear Emma, I wish you would not make matches and foretell things, for whatever you say always comes to pass. Pray do not make any more matches.
EMMA. I promise to make none for myself, but I must indeed for other people. It is the greatest amusement in the world. Everybody said that Mr Weston would never marry again but I believed none of it. I planned the match and I was blessed with success.
MR KNIGHTLEY. I do not understand what you mean by success. Success supposes endeavour. You made a lucky guess and that is all that can be said.
MR WOODHOUSE. Emma never thinks of herself if she can do good to others, but my dear, pray, do not make any more matches. They are silly things and break up one’s family circle grievously.
EMMA. Only one more papa. Only for Mr Elton. Poor Mr Elton. I must look about for a wife for him.
NIECES all applaud EMMA.
Scene 2
JANE AUSTEN. Miss Harriet Smith was a girl of seventeen whom Emma knew very well by sight and had long felt an interest in, on account of her beauty.
All nieces stretch their hands up to be picked. JANE AUSTEN puts her hand on the shoulder of NIECE FOUR who becomes HARRIET.
EMMA (