Television needs to stop rolling out Charles Dickens adaptations – and this is coming from someone whose lockdown project was writing an Oliver Twist prequel about Nancy (binned after three chapters due to insufficient oom-pah-pah). There’s no argument here against these being some of the greatest novels by one of the most important writers who ever lived. But after having been adapted at least 28 times across TV, film and stage, the BBC is about to launch yet another take on Great Expectations.
The latest version of bright orphan Pip’s (Fionn Whitehead) dreams of escaping life as a blacksmith’s apprentice to become a proper gentleman – due to air on BBC One this weekend – is the second dark Dickens adaptation from Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight. It follows his 2019 adults-only take on A Christmas Carol – which at a quick count was only the 128th adaptation of the novel. Knight says he chose Great Expectations next because it is “a story of class mobility and class intransigence” that remains “very timely”. This is a fair point – these are Dickensian times indeed.
