On Story Episode 1706: Deconstructing Jane Austen

With six novels that produced over sixty adaptations for the screen, the talents of Jane Austen have lived on long past her time on earth. On this episode, the filmmakers behind Sense and Sensibility, The Jane Austen Book Club, and The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, as well as the academic behind the interactive website What Jane Saw dot org discuss how Jane Austen’s themes and stories remain so powerful today.

Studio executive Lindsay Doran has numerous credits on film and television including The Firm, Fallen Angels and of course Sense and Sensibility.

Screenwriter and Producer Robin Swicord wrote the screenplays for Little Women, Matilda, Memoirs of a Geisha and The Jane Austen Book Club.

Janine Barchas is a Professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of Matters of Fact in Jane Austen: History, Location, and Celebrity. She’s also the creator behind the digital heritage project “What Jane Saw” (www.whatjanesaw.org) and most recently, she has co-curated the exhibition “Will & Jane: Shakespeare, Austen, and the Cult of Celebrity,” at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC last year.

Bernie Su is the two-time Emmy Award-winning producer and creator behind The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, Emma Approved and Vanity.