By Sam Pynes
Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, Community Players in Beatrice, Final Dress Rehearsal, Thursday December 5 2024
I’m always a little apprehensive when it comes to plays and movies that seek to continue or riff on beloved stories. So often, in the attempt to make a statement about the work, or the time-period or culture that produced it, there is a loss of what made the story meaningful or impactful. They do sometimes produce some true humor, or convey relevant or just social commentary, but I sometimes wonder in the end if they might as well have been a wholly new or unconnected story. The truly great plays in this category of “fan-fiction,” in my opinion, are the ones that are able to build on the story or themes of the original, or at least play with them in a way that understands the historical and cultural context that it was created in and the story it was trying to tell. Fortunately this is indeed one of the better ones, and was exceedingly charming, with some surprising underlying themes that understand and build on Austen’s own.
Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley is the first of a trilogy of plays By Lauren Gunderson and Margot Melcon (along with The Wickhams and Georgiana and Kitty) that explore the world Pride & Prejudice following the close of Austen’s seminal story, specifically examining the lives of the other Bennet sisters in the setting of a Christmas gathering. Elizabeth ends her story by inviting her sisters to Pemberley, so it only seems natural to start a new story there.
Austen’s books are full of lasting truths and memorable characters. They were produced in a culture and time that had many different prejudices and sensibilities than our own, especially and most starkly in the way Regency society was ordered, and the lack of freedom and mobility in its classes and genders. In our own day and age we have different priorities, and many, I think we rightly presume to be improvements over past social norms. I do wonder sometimes what future people will think of our society, and if they will judge us as harshly as we judged the ones that came before. Austen herself wrote her stories to explore how middle class women might break free of social pressure to find lasting love and happiness, and this play continues that theme.
Ah Mary Bennet, the forgotten Bennet sister (though not quite as forgotten as Kitty, or whatever her name was). It was delightful to return to this world in a novel story, and especially one so smartly written. It was also a small lesson in character and genre. The play itself understands the effect of bringing Mary to the forefront of this sort of story and comments on it. It also inches its way toward farce without crossing over into it, Mary herself expressing detest for the genre before it goes too far. This is still a Mary who has no time for frivolities outside of the stark truth, but as the main character of her own story she is now narratively equipped to express it a little more confidently. Lizzy and others comment on this shift in how Mary has come to be like her older sisters, and they chalk this up to maturity, but we the audience as well as the play itself know that of course she needs to be this way – she has changed roles – this is her story now! Which in the end, is what this sweet play is all about. Mary comes to the forefront by calling people into the light, and other former protagonists recess into the warm shadows of side characters and confidants.
There is also a prevailing and very Christmasy theme of sisterhood, forgiveness, and understanding, as the Bennets delicately reincorporate and seek to understand eachother now that they are adults in their own right, with more choice and more awareness of the power they have in their choices, even when their society tells them otherwise.
A beautiful set and costumes take the audience back to the Regency era, including an exquisite 19th Century piano-forte, and delicately tailored frock-coats. A Christmas tree sits center, and is slowly decorated throughout the play, as characters argue about the relative merits of this imported German tradition. I also appreciated the set painting and very real books on the shelves and in characters’ hands throughout. The play is performed with period British accents of different shades, which adds to the setting without losing any of the words.
The Bennet sisters reunite at Pemberley, the Darcy ancestral estate. They are all now married, except Mary Bennet (played with subtle energy by Jenny Sutphin), who continues to feel like a third wheel. (Kitty is also unmarried, but absent from this story.) Jane Bingley (Raine Anderson) and Charles Bingley (J.J. Purdom) are equal parts excited and apprehensive to be expecting, while Elizabeth Darcy (Morgan Fox) plays the peacemaking host. Her husband Fitzwilliam Darcy (M.C. Sothan) is the tolerant voice of reason and has clearly settled into married life. Lydia Wickham (Marissa Saure, with bright energy) arrives to break the peace, and Mary retreats further behind books and the piano-forte. Enter Arthur de Bourgh (Noah Mason).
Arthur immediately notices the books in the room, just as we saw Mary do earlier, and we immediately know what kind of story this will be. Sutphin and Mason do a tremendous job of being sweetly awkward in a very normal way as they bond over the fact that they are reading the very same book. That book is a book on Zoology in which Lamarck gives his evolutionary theory of acquired characteristics. Accident? Certainly not, as throughout the play the theme of “nature vs. nurture” peaks through. Mr. Darcy wonders aloud why all the Bennet sisters are so different in temperament and personality, even though they have the same parents and upbringing (nature), while the uninvited houseguest Anne de Bourgh (imperiously played by Tyina Morgan) makes the very opposite assertion about the Bennets who all grew up in the same place (nurture). This play isn’t really about evolutionary theory however, but rather about whether love can be both orchestrated and real. It can, Darcy asserts, “just ask Bingley.” It is not nature or nurture alone, but our choices that make the difference. Sothan brings a quiet confidence to Darcy, while Purdom brings a liveliness to Bingley that made the stage feel very warm indeed. These are the signposts to Mary that good men can be found who are stable and loving, and as Bingley puts it “have faith in their women all the year round.” Anderson and Fox likewise play happily married women who still retain their spark and autonomy. A good man may be hard to find, but there are at least two here, and maybe a third for the kind and curious to find. Even the story’s villain is trapped into thinking that social security and pressures mean they must marry in a certain way, but this story offers a hope that there is always another way, and that everyone deserves a life partner that they can truly love for who they are and be loved in return, no matter the social pressures. I think Austen would approve.
All too many words to say that this is a play for the Marys reading Pride & Prejudice who think that the story can’t be about them, and that finding love and connection is for other people. I hope you find time to enjoy this delightful holiday return to the world of Pemberley!
If you go: Miss Bennet runs December 6-15, 2024, Fridays and Saturdays 7:30PM and Sundays at 2PM. Ticket information at https://www.beatricecommunityplayers.com/.
Sam Pynes is an actor, writer, and story enthusiast. Mostly harmless. Current Managing Editor of Appearing Locally.
As always, if you liked this content and want more, please join our email list and like us on Facebook!