I'm not one for romance - or at least I thought not. But my eldest son and I spent a week in the rural parts of Lincolnshire, England. We had visited my mother and over the course of two of the evenings, we watched the 1995 British tv series of Pride and Prejudice. It is an absolute peach of a period drama - a wonderful story of five sisters living in the well to do society of England in and around the years 1820 to 1830. It is splendidly done with all the old ways concerning social grace and conduct of these times.
We have Colin Firth as Mister Darcy - the upright aristocrat who does not suffer fools gladly or other types of frivolity. He is a good man, but his blatant honesty is often arrogant and his high opinion of himself often misplaced too. From him, we get the prejudice of the story.
Elizabeth is our heroine and very worthy too. She is a wonderful young lady and the object of all men's attention. She is elegant, graceful and has well-deserved views - perhaps a little headstrong. She does not see eye to eye with Mister Darcy but there is an obvious attraction between Elizabeth and the aristocratic man.
However, the great show stealer for me was the diabolical Mister Collins. A clergyman who is a cousin of Elizabeth and her four sisters. David Bamber plays Mister Collins and in my opinion; his name should be Mister Cringworthy and with the utmost of respect. The man is fabulously awful and the girls find nothing attractive in this man's attentions. He scores an amazing eleven out of ten on the cringometer.
I mean this bloke is so vile that he is dynamic on the entertainment front. David Bamber portrays this character to great effect and should be applauded and given an award for his fine performance. His antics were so amusing and comical and this character was a wonderful garnish to this great story. I particularly like the part when he steals Elizabeth for a dance at one of the social gatherings. The man is a perfection of awfulness and I laughed and cringed at his ill-deserved confidence as he hopelessly tries to woo cousin Elizabeth and win her hand in marriage - making a total fat backside of himself in the process.
He was my favourite character in this story - his entertainment value was splendid. Mother, son and grandson all roared with laughter at this dreadful man's futile attempts to capture the heart of Elizabeth. I found a few clips of David Bamber as Mister Collins (Mister Cringworthy) and had to blog them. Hope you enjoy and if you get the chance; watch this great story.
