Comments on: A Ginger Darcy and a Blonde Elizabeth?

By: Rosie

Rosie — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 18:04:35 +0000

["Casting directors have seen it differently in the past. In the 1940 adaptation, Greer Garson’s Elizabeth has blonde hair, while Jane Bennet (Maureen O’ Sullivan) is a brunette."] Greer Garson was a redhead, not a blonde. And even with black and white photography, it's pretty obvious.

By: Abby

Abby — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 17:40:55 +0000

From what I understand, lighter hair was the preference in the Regency era. And as Jane is supposed to be the prettiest of the Bennet sisters(by the era’s standards) it would then make sense for her to have lighter hair. In the 1995 adaptation, I know that they had the actress lighten her hair, and since this was the first adaptation to have Jane with blonde hair, I imagine they must have had some sort of reasoning for this (other than their own personal evisioning of it from seeing previous adaptations, as I imagine was the case in later adaptations).
Personally, I’ve always seen Elizabeth and Darcy as having darker hair, and Jane and Bingley with lighter hair, basically for the same reasons as you said: it just fits their characters I think it could also work the other way round, but it helps to have that visual distinction between the two couples, to emphasise the difference between them.

By: Emelie

Emelie — Tue, 25 May 2010 06:54:55 +0000

What a wonderful post! Really nice to read everything here! Great job and work with all the nice pictures

By: Regina

Regina — Fri, 07 May 2010 12:44:12 +0000

Well, I never did think of them otherwise, but nice post.=) I can’t really compare myself, being dark-haired and dark skinned.=)

By: Sammie

Sammie — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 14:14:55 +0000

Again, another very detailed and insightful post! I remember seeing some illustrations for “P&P” some years ago – early illustrations – and finding it odd that Elizabeth was blonde, lol. However – I don’t know if it’s just my literature classes in America – one common thread we learned was the contrast between the light-haired woman as the beautiful one and the dark-haired woman as the not so beautiful (Shakespeare’s “black wires grow on her head”, James F. Cooper’s dark and light Munro sisters).

By: Ku-chan

Ku-chan — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:47:53 +0000

I think the hair colour is supposed to emphasize Jane and Lizzy’s character differences. While I wouldn’t go so far as to say blonde = bimbo (especially not in the case of the author of this article,) it does suggest transparency and lightness, while dark hair suggests something deeper and more mysterious.
Personally I would quite like to be either one or the other but have to settle for somewhere in between…mousy brown, how boring!

By: Jane Odiwe

Jane Odiwe — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 06:31:49 +0000

What a great post! The only other clue I could think of apart from Lizzy’s dark eyes with regard to her colouring is the one about being tanned: However little Mr. Darcy might have liked such an address, he contented himself with coolly replying that he perceived no other alteration than her being rather tanned — no miraculous consequence of travelling in the summer.
Personally, I always think that Jane was dark too – a family trait. It is interesting to see how much the adaptations have an influence on our perceptions!
Jane Odiwe