Nearly 200 years after the author's death, almost all of Jane Austen's novels have been brought to the big screen. Now, Lady Susan will be getting the movie treatment, thanks to Amazon Pictures and Roadside Attractions. The Love & Friendship trailer, which you can view below, stars Kate Beckinsale and Chloe Sëvigny as Lady Susan Vernon and her American friend, Alicia Johnson. I've got all the details here, so read on, Janeites!
Published in 1871, some 54 years after Austen's death, Lady Susan is an epistolary novella. The film takes its name from Love and Freindship [sic]: a piece of Austen's juvenilia, also epistolary, written in 1790.
The story centers on the eponymous Susan, an attractive widow who seduces men and schemes to make good matches for herself and her daughter, Frederica. The novella plays against common romance tropes — and Austen's own literary habits, as well — by focusing on a protagonist who entices much younger men to fall in love with her.
Love & Friendship marks Beckinsale and Sëvigny's long-awaited reunion. Back in 1998, the two appeared together in The Last Days of Disco. Both films are directed by Whit Stillman.
Love & Friendship premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival. It opens in theaters on May 13.
Image: Roadside Attractions
