New Wilde Papers on Display in New York

From The Irish Times comes this article about some of Wilde's "lost" drafts and letters, which were gathered by the eleventh Marquess of Queensberry and recently donated to the Morgan Library and Museum in New York. The collection includes a draft of "The Selfish Giant", in Constance Wilde's handwriting. Digitised images are available online here.

Dorian Gray Trailer

It's finally here! And, well... I'm underwhelmed.

DG Film News

I'm a little behind and may have missed something, but here are a couple of tidbits:

• Some photos from the film, some new and some not, and one of the unspoiled portrait; and
  
• A lengthy interview with Ben Barnes, most noteworthy because he confirms that there are nude scenes and homosexual kissing in the film. I suppose that answers my concerns as to whether the film will achieve the right homoerotic balance.
  

Everything's Coming up Dorian

Here's an interesting blog: The Weblog of Dorian Gray. The author has been collecting editions of The Picture of Dorian Gray for five years now, and is using the blog to document them one by one.

A musical adaptation of the novel will be running in London over the summer. It's not the first musical theatre version of the novel, but it does follow Matthew Bourne's relatively recent ballet production (itself not the first dance adaptation either, of course). And with the film due out later in the year, this sure is one popular story.

Fangoria has some cast and filmmaker comments on the DG film, with some interesting things to note. Ben Barnes says, regarding Rebecca Hall's character:

[Dorian] doesn’t exploit Emily. Despite Henry’s fears, Dorian shows his humanity instead, making it a triangular, stake-raising moral dilemma.

So it seems Emily Wotton might be a replacement/equivalent for the character of Hetty Morton, the girl Dorian toys with for a while near the end of the novel, and then leaves, convincing himself that he's doing a noble thing.

Then Colin Firth says:

My character, Lord Henry, actually has an arc to play, whereas the book contains no journey or conflict.

Hmm. Surely Lord Henry's tragedy is that he doesn't develop? He only "spouts famous Wilde lines", fails to practice what he preaches, and learns nothing from Dorian's descent into sin. Lord Henry cuts a tragic figure in that regard, and in fact this aspect to his character is, I feel, one of the only things Will Self got right in this dreadful Dorian: An Imitation -- Lord Henry learns nothing, gains nothing, and all his wit is ultimately proven empty. I certainly hope he isn't made to suffer regret or redemption in the film. He is the devil, after all, or a certain kind of tempter, and that shouldn't be forgotten.

Having returned from holiday hiatus and sifted through about twenty Dorian Gray Google Alerts, I can only report two items of some note. One, that Dorian Gray has made many website's lists of top movies of 2009, and two, that many film reviewers are referencing the plot of The Picture of Dorian Gray when they talk about the Brad Pitt film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I haven't seen it and can't report on the accuracy of such a comparison. ;)

Rebecca Hall: "Textual purists will probably be very upset with me"

Well, no, honey, it's not your fault the filmmakers decided to invent a whole new character!

From scifi.com: Dorian Gray Goes Wilde

"And then I arrive after the 25-year gap period as his child that's grown up. So the idea is that she's sort of a new woman and quite spirited and a feminist and a photographer. And that's probably all I am at liberty to tell you without giving away any guts."

I just don't know what to say about that.