BBC's epic War and Peace starts tomorrow

Blackleaf

Blackleaf

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Move over Downton Abbey - a new trailer for BBC drama War and Peace promises love, sex, battle and intrigue and is certainly not for the faint hearted with passionate scenes in the bushes.

It's been hotly tipped as the must-see drama of 2016, and now the BBC has released the first trailer from forthcoming drama adapted by Andrew Davies and starring Lily James, 12 Years A Slave star Paul Dano, James Norton and Gillian Anderson.

Set against a stunning snowy backdrop, lead James - who plays Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky - declares 'I love her', aptly setting the scene for a spectacular six-part adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's literary epic which starts tomorrow night on BBC One.

FIRST LOOK: Lily James swaps Downton for Russian aristocracy as she shares kiss with James Norton in first trailer for BBC's epic War and Peace adaptation

By Sarah Tetteh For Mailonline
2 November 2015
Daily Mail


The cast of the BBC's new adaptation of War and Peace, starring Lily James and James Norton, centre

Move over Downton Abbey - a new trailer for BBC drama War and Peace promises love, sex, battle and intrigue and is certainly not for the faint hearted with passionate scenes in the bushes.

It's been hotly tipped as the must-see drama of 2016, and now the BBC has released the first trailer from forthcoming drama adapted by Andrew Davies and starring Lily James, 12 Years A Slave star Paul Dano, James Norton and Gillian Anderson.

Set against a stunning snowy backdrop, lead James - who plays Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky - declares 'I love her', aptly setting the scene for a spectacular six-part adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's literary epic.


Lovers: Lily James and James Norton play lovers in the BBC adaptation of War and Peace

Lily looks stunning in the trailer with her hair in cascading curls tumbling down her back as she glides through the snow.

Wrapped up against the winter chill in a floorlength baby blue coat with fur trimming and a matching fur hat, the trailer shows Lily and the cast looking sensational in fashionable period costume of the time.

James, strolling arm in arm with her looks dashing in a dark jacket, matching fur hat and leather gloves, and added a splash of colour with a yellow waistcoat. Lily and James are supported by an impressive supporting cast that includes Gillian Anderson and Jim Broadbent.


Elegant: The cast look dapper in colourful and chic costumes that embodied the fashion of the time


Star turn: Gillian Anderson leads an impressive cast line-up for upcoming BBC epic War and Peace


James stars as Natasha Rostov, pictured centre, in the BBC's adaptation of War and Peace alongside Norton as Prince Andrei, right, and Paul Dano as Pierre Bezukhov, left


Leo Tolstoy’s classic novel was last portrayed by the BBC as a 20-episode production with Anthony Hopkins in the lead role in 1972.

This version, a co-production between the Weinstein Company and BBC Cymru Wales Drama, was adapted by screenwriter and novelist Davies, best known for his work on the BBC’s 1995 version of Pride and Prejudice.

With scenes of lust and intrigue, including steamy clenches in the bushes, it is certainly not for the faint-hearted.


Passionate: Couple go in for a smooch in secret when they are alone in the bushes as part of gripping six part series coming to the BBC


I'm in love my friend: James boldly declares his feelings to a stunned dinner party in the trailer for epic drama


Enchanting: Lovers take a spin around the ballroom dancefloor in stunning period costume

The trailer sees a passionate Prince Andrei standing up to declare: 'I'm in love, my friend' as he addresses a stunned dinner party.

But scenes of war soon follow, with Little Miss Sunshine star Paul Dano fiercely declaring: 'I challenge you,' in another dramatic segment.

Before long, guns, rifles and pistols are out as full blown war breaks out in gripping scenes from the new BBC adaptation of War and Peace.


Dramatic: Paul brandishes a firearm as he prepares for battle in the new adaptation, the first the BBC has taken on since 1972's 20 episode version starring Anthony Hopkins as the lead


War: The battle scenes promise to keep fans glued to the screens - though the bloody battle is not for the faint hearted

The trailer ends with the chilling words: 'Everything ends in death, everything.'

The voiceover sets the scene at the beginning with the hopeful note: 'In the shadow of war, can young lives shine?'

With scenes featuring childbirth, blazing rows and steamy bedroom moments, it looks like there will never be a dull moment in the highly anticipated War and Peace.


Graphic: Scenes of childbirth will be shown in the six episode adaptation by Andrew Davies and starring Lily James, 12 Years A Slave star Paul Dano, James Norton and Gillian Anderson.


New life: A child is born in the gripping new trailer for War and Peace. Leo Tolstoy’s epic novel was last tackled by the BBC as a 20 episode production with Anthony Hopkins in the title role in 1972


'Everything ends in death, everything.' Final gripping message ends the trailer for War and Peace


War And Peace’s famous love triangle – between best friends Prince Andrei Bolkonsky and Pierre Bezukhov and sweet Natasha Rostova – is as dramatic as any of the book’s epic battle scenes


Gillian Anderson as Anna Pavlovna who entertains on a spectacular scale in the series as a society hostess

Adrian Edmondson (famous for starring as psychopathic punk Vyvyan Basterd in Eighties sitcom The Young Ones, below), as Count Rostov, does his Russian Cossack dance





Lily James, top as Natasha, is well known for her role as Lady Rose in Downton Abbey, bottom







Read more: Lily James shares kiss with James Norton in BBC's War and Peace trailer | Daily Mail Online
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C

Curious Cdn

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I take it that War and Peace is in the public domain now and Leo doesn't receive a rouble for it.
 
Blackleaf

Blackleaf

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Last year was said to have been a belter for British television, with dramas such as the Tudor-era Wolf Hall. But, with 2016 starting with War and Peace and with Beowulf, it looks like this year is going to be an even better year for British television (the best in the world) than last year was.

So have YOU read War and Peace? Stars of new BBC Russian epic which launches tonight admit they have never ploughed through Tolstoy's classic novel

TV adaptation of War and Peace is to begin on the BBC tonight at 9pm
Based on the classic novel by Leo Tolstoy which is more than 1,300 pages
Several of the stars of the series have admitted they hadn't read the book
Among them Lily James said she only read the novel when she landed her part

By Jennifer Newton for MailOnline
3 January 2016
Daily Mail

With its mix of romance and drama charted over 1,300 pages, War and Peace is known for being a long and demanding novel to read.

But despite a TV adaptation of the book set to be begin on the BBC tonight, even some of the stars of the production have admitted to never reading the classic before landing their roles.

The epic novel about the French invasion of Russia seen through the eyes of five aristocratic families, by Leo Tolstoy, was first published in 1869 and took the author more than six years to write.


Several of the stars of the the BBC's adaptation of War and Peace have admitted to never reading the book before landing their roles in the show

It is considered one of the great novels of the literary world but also as a tough read, given its length and the fact it has more than 600 characters.

And several of the stars set to feature in the opening episode of the adaptation have admitted to the Telegraph only reading it when landing their roles.

Lily James, who plays Natasha Rostov in the epic, said she had never read the book but was hooked once she started ploughing through it while on the set of Downton Abbey.

She said: 'I was reading it while we were filming Downton Abbey. I'd be reading between takes at the dining table. The director would call "Action" and - bang!- the book would be back under the table.'


Actress Lily James, who plays Natasha Rostov in the series, had to read the novel in between filming Downton Abbey


James Norton, who plays her love interest, left, and fellow star Paul Dano also admitted only reading the book after landing their parts

James Norton, who plays her love interest Prince Andrei, admitted he only managed a few pages of the classic before filming began, while on the set of another TV show.

He added: 'The only bit I read before was when I was sitting at that bus stop, waiting for the cameras to turn around. I got through around ten pages.'

While Paul Dano, who plays Pierre Bezukhov, admitted when he did get round to reading it, he found a few parts difficult to get through.

But he explained: 'I'd always meant to get round to reading War and Peace. I was very excited to read it when I got the job.'

The hotly-anticipated BBC One drama boasts an impressive cast including Harry Potter's Jim Broadbent and The Fall's Gillian Anderson.


The adaptaion of the novel starring Paul Dano, Lily James and James Norton begins tonight on BBC1


Other big names to star in the TV adaptation include former Only Fools and Horses actor Jim Broadbent, left, and The X-Files actress Gillian Anderson, right. The screenwriter is Andrew Davies, famed for adapting Pride and Prejudice in 1995

It has been adapted by Andrew Davies, who is best known for his huge success in the 1995 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth.

Mr Davies has since worked on Vanity Fair, Bleak House and Sense And Sensibility, to name a few.

However, he too admitted he had never read War And Peace until he was asked to consider adapting it for TV by Faith Penhale, head of drama for BBC Wales.

"I took it with me on holiday, and you know what? Once you get into it, it's a page-turner," he said.

"Great characters, thrilling action scenes, lots of battles (of course), a classic duel, several love stories, with seductions, betrayals and a happy ending for some, but not all, of our favourite characters. What's not to like?"

War and Peace starts tonight on BBC1 at 9pm

WAR AND PEACE IN A MINUTE: ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT TOLSTOY'S EPIC NOVEL ON LIVES AND LOVES ON RUSSIAN ARISTOCRACY


The novel War and Peace is more than 1,300 pages long covering the themes of love, loss and repression in 19th century Russia

Widely regarded as one of the greatest novels of all time, War And Peace is a door stopper of a book at more than 1,300 pages, melding fact and fiction and covering universal themes of love and loss, repression and redemption.

It begins in 1805 during the reign of Tsar Alexander I and leads up to the 1812 invasion of Russia by Napoleon’s Grande Armée, a tumultuous period in Russian history.

It tells the stories of two fictional grand aristocratic families – the bohemian, free-spending Rostovs and the high-minded, military Bolkonskys – and their circle of acquaintances as they socialise, quarrel and fall passionately in love.

Not only does it have a charismatic teenage heroine, but there are also flirtations and duels, epic battle scenes, tragic deaths and a love triangle.




Read more: So have YOU read War and Peace? Stars of new BBC Russian epic which launches in tonight admit they have never ploughed through Tolstoy's classic novel | Daily Mail Online
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Blackleaf

Blackleaf

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Blackleaf's expert review of episode 1 of the BBC's War and Peace, which was shown last night:

ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT (5 out of 5)

A stunning piece of television, showing once again that the BBC is the best in the world at costume dramas. Great acting, lavish costumes, bloody battle scenes and stunning cinematography. A masterpiece. And, rather unusually in this day and age, the episode wasn't ruined by pointless political correctness (as Beowulf was). This is going to be a global hit.




Beeb's sexed up War and Peace is so lavish even Napoleon would be dazzled: CHRISTOPHER STEVENS hails adaptation of Tolstoy's classic as a masterpiece

By Christopher Stevens for the Daily Mail
4 January 2016
Daily Mail



The eccentric Russian genius Count Leo Tolstoy always insisted that his War and Peace was not a novel but a new kind of literature – part history, part philosophy, part psychology.

There’s no doubting what screenwriter Andrew Davies’s magnificent new TV adaptation is: one hundred per cent epic love story, told at the gallop. The entire production is like a Napoleonic cavalry charge on the emotions, and the opening hour-long episode was nothing less than a sweeping victory.

Davies, a 79-year-old former university lecturer, has transformed many classic books into television serials, including Vanity Fair, Bleak House, The Way We Live Now and most famously Pride And Prejudice (the version with Colin Firth in a wet shirt). As if that wasn’t enough, he also created House of Cards.


Sexed-up: There’s no doubting what screenwriter Andrew Davies’s magnificent new TV adaptation is: one hundred per cent epic love story, told at the gallop


Saucy: The entire production is like a Napoleonic cavalry charge on the emotions, and the opening hour-long episode was nothing less than a sweeping victory

But War and Peace will be his masterpiece. It has everything the perfect costume drama demands, in such lavish quantities that even the most profligate Russian oligarch would feel he’d got his money’s worth.

Officers resplendent in glittering uniforms talked with ladies in acres of shimmering silk, as the camera swooped through the golden rooms of a Petersburg soirée. Cannonballs crashed into the earth on Austrian battlefields, hurling bodies across the screen in fountains of blood and dirt. Raindrops hung like jewels on the gilt-traced windows of carriages, and snow settled on the furs of young lovers as they skated on frozen ponds.

And because this was a Davies adaptation, there were moments of sexual drama that veered towards raunchy titillation. Lily James, as the young heroine Natasha, stepped naked and soft-focused out of a bathtub and into the folds of a towel held up by her maid.

Tuppence Middleton, as the wicked Hélène, did a striptease through the imagination of her boyfriend Pierre (Paul Dano) before she lay on a satin counterpane, flaunting a bare buttock and cooing.

Purists will say that these scenes are not in the original. And that just goes to show the purists don’t know what they’re talking about, because the book is as sexually explicit as a 19th century Russian work possibly could be.

Tolstoy’s characters have sex on the brain. Pierre is tormented by his weakness for courtesans. Natasha and her cousin Sonya are swooning for the touch of a man. And Hélène makes Madonna look like a virgin. Naturally, these passions could not be spelt out on the page. It is part of Tolstoy’s skill that, both in War and Peace and his other great work, Anna Karenina, he makes readers feel the emotions without ever describing the physical act.


Extravagant: The adaptation has everything the perfect costume drama demands, in such lavish quantities that even the most profligate Russian oligarch would feel he’d got his money’s worth


Faithful: Purists will say that these scenes are not in the original. And that just goes to show the purists don’t know what they’re talking about, because the book is as sexually explicit as a 19th century Russian work possibly could be

There’s no doubt, for instance, that Hélène and her depraved brother Anatole have had an incestuous affair. In the book, we guess this because Pierre hears a rumour – on the screen, Davies does not have to be so coy, and so we saw Tuppence and Callum Turner, as Anatole, under the bedcovers.

The marvel of this adaptation is not its saucy frills but the fidelity of the camerawork to Tolstoy’s intensely detailed descriptions. The opening moment when Napoleon surveys the enemy at Austerlitz, the emergence of the Pavlograd hussars on horseback from the trees, the barren magnificence of the palace where Prince Andrei’s father and sister live in seclusion – all these were captured with magical accuracy.

The only problem was one that has affected every book adaptation since television began: minor characters will elbow their way to the front of the story, if the actors are bold enough. This can be highly entertaining, but it also distorts the narrative.

In this case, it was Stephen Rea as the oily Prince Vassily, manipulating Pierre into marrying Hélène, and Rebecca Front as the impoverished but pushy mother of a vain young guardsman, who stole every scene.


Accurate: The marvel of this adaptation is not its saucy frills but the fidelity of the camerawork to Tolstoy’s intensely detailed descriptions. Pictured, from left, Pierre Bezukhov (Paul Dano), Natasha Rostov (Lily James) and Prince Andrei (James Norton)


Cast: The only problem was one that has affected every book adaptation since television began: minor characters will elbow their way to the front of the story, if the actors are bold enough


Natasha is still a child: wait till we see her at her first ball, before we judge Lily James (centre). And 31-year-old New Yorker Dano (left) has one of the greatest roles in all literature, as the billionaire wrestling with his soul: he will have to give the performance of his career


Brian Cox, with one blind eye, was the obese Russian general Kutuzov

What is to be done? The director can hardly ask Rea and Front to stop being so slyly fabulous. And if they did step back, there were plenty of other stars in cameo roles, ready to bewitch us.

Adrian Edmondson was Natasha’s doting, dim-witted father, capering like a cossack on the dancefloor at his daughter’s party. Brian Cox, with one blind eye, was the obese Russian general Kutuzov, with tears running down a face like decayed parchment.

This didn’t leave much room for the three main characters to shine, but perhaps it is too early in their story. Prince Andrei (James Norton) hasn’t found his heart, and is cruel to his feeble wife, Lisa. There’s little here to like, yet.

Natasha is still a child: wait till we see her at her first ball, before we judge Lily James. And 31-year-old New Yorker Dano has one of the greatest roles in all literature, as the billionaire wrestling with his soul: he will have to give the performance of his career.

The BBC could not have chosen a more ambitious work than War and Peace. The sheer scale of this drama would impress Napoleon himself.

 
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