Legend has it that Charles Dickens wrote his magnificent, sprawling novel “Bleak House” as an indictment of the same lethargic British legal system that robbed him of “Christmas Carol” royalties.
Personal enmity can make for sharpened writing. “Bleak House” presented an infuriating portrait of a chancery that cared nothing for the real people hurt by its petty delays and arbitrary rulings.
But the triumph of Dickens’ novel was to turn tables on the courts by beautifully telling the human side of a legal dispute, the instantly infamous estate tangle called Jarndyce and Jarndyce. Now, the novel has a worthy adaptation in the three-disc set of BBC and Masterpiece Theater’s televised “Bleak House.”
The nearly eight-hour set is that rare TV miniseries, the kind that simultaneously tingles your spine and makes you wiggle deeper into the couch cushions, settling in for pure entertainment. Andrew Davies wrote the teleplay, and Anglophiles already revere him for the definitive TV version of “Pride and Prejudice” that starred Colin Firth.
Once Davies was tapped, a magnificent casting team took over. The role of grown orphan Esther Summerson is as crucial to “Bleak House” as Lizzie Bennet is for “Pride and Prejudice,” and here Anna Maxwell Martin meets the challenge as admirably as Keira Knightley did for the current movie run of “P&P.”
Esther must be demure but strong, plain-looking but alluring to those who know her true character, and a moral touchstone for all around her, without seeming a prude. Martin answers every demand, with an original face whose kind smile you can’t help but fall for.
Esther has been hired by the kindly Mr. Jarndyce as a guardian to young Ada, one of the wards of the court in the battle for the rich estate of deceased Jarndyces. Ada falls for dashing cousin Richard, also a ward of the court, and a man convinced he will become rich with inheritance despite decades of a legal battle that has ruined better men.
Meanwhile – there’s always a meanwhile in a Dickens novel, and more than several in “Bleak House” – richer houses are troubled by more lawyers. Lady Dedlock (Gillian Anderson of “X Files” fame) fears the interrogations of family attorney Tulkinghorn (a menacing Charles Dance). She’s somehow connected to London’s poorest neighborhoods, reeking with rat-infested graves and opium dens.
When Lady Dedlock finally sets eyes on Esther, there’s an immediate connection. The rapt viewer is suddenly panicked – please, don’t let this series be over soon. No worries: still two discs and hours of pleasure to come.
Over three discs, Davies has time to indulge in the brilliant side characters created by Dickens. These include the opinionated, infuriatingly limp freeloader Harold Skimpole (Nathaniel Parker), the unctuous law clerk Guppy (Burn Gorman), and the surprisingly effective investigator, Mr. Bucket (Alun Armstrong). All get their due, without ever slowing the relentless plot.
Staff writer Michael Booth can be reached at 303-820-1686 or mbooth@denverpost.com.
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