'Persuasion' Movie, Based On The Jane Austen Novel, Will Star Sarah Snook From 'Succession'

Jane Austen adaptations will never die. The latest: Persuasion, Austen's last completed novel, is being adapted yet again, with Succession breakout Sarah Snook set to star. The story concerns a young woman who reunites with a man she was once engaged to marry. The book has been adapted several times before, mostly in the form of TV miniseries.

THR says that Sarah Snook is set to play Anne Elliot in Persuasion, based on the novel by Jane Austen. Mahalia Belo is directing from a script by Jessica Swale, the writer-director of Summerland. Persuasion is the last novel fully completed by Jane Austen, published in 1817, six months after her death. The story follows "Anne Elliot, a young Englishwoman of 27 years, whose family is moving to lower their expenses and get out of debt, at the same time as the wars come to an end, putting sailors on shore. They rent their home to an Admiral and his wife. The wife's brother, Navy Captain Frederick Wentworth, had been engaged to Anne in 1806, and now they meet again, both single and unattached, after no contact in more than seven years. This sets the scene for many humorous encounters as well as a second, well-considered chance at love and marriage for Anne Elliot in her second 'bloom.'"

There have been multiple Persuasion adaptations, but, interestingly enough, they've all been made for TV. The only exception is a 1995 version starring Amanda Root and Ciarán Hinds, which was also a made-for-TV movie that ended up being released in US theatres by Sony Pictures Classics. That would make it look like this latest Persuasion the first adaptation to be made specifically for the big screen, so there's that.

Alison Own and Debra Hayward are producing via their Monumental Pictures banner, with BBC Films co-financing. Searchlight Pictures UK's head of development and production Katie Goodson-Thomas is overseeing along with senior development execuctive Pete Spencer and manager Apolline Berty.

I'm one of the few people who doesn't watch Succession, but I have seen Snook in plenty of other things, and she's always delivered, so I'm all for her star continuing to rise. She'll next be seen in a minor role in Pieces of a Woman, the festival title that recently sold to Netflix.