Emerald Fennell Cuts ‘Wuthering Heights’ In Half – Here Are The Characters We Lost

Emerald Fennell was talking about him Accommodations in Wuthering Heights adaptation from the walk, explaining to fans who note that the quotation marks around the title represent that they are interpretations of “things [the book] he made you feel the things you wished happened but they didn’t happen”.

In an interview with Screen Rant, Fennell spoke about the decision to cut the book scene in the middle of his screenplay, after joking that there might be another song, Wuthering Heights 2:

This book is very dense. It’s very difficult. Very sweet. It happens for generations. And I think you do a mini-series, or a ten-episode series where you give all the attention that will be needed to be completely faithful to the book, or, you do what I did here and do your own kind of response.

The decision did not surprise fans familiar with the source, since all the trailers and promotions focused on the actors from the first part of the novel, and did not include any “time jump” versions of Heathcliff of Jacob Elordi, or any of the main characters.

If it’s been a while since you’ve read the book, we’re going through all the main characters who didn’t make it into the film below:

Lockwood

Mr. Lockwood is a character who forms the framework in the first novel, which is the story of “building a nest” in the story, told out of chronological order, through his own narration, and Nelly Dean’s multiple accounts of the history of the landlord, Mr. Heathcliff.

Because the second half of the novel did not make it into the film, it makes sense that Lockwood will not be included, as his arrival as the new tenant of Thrushcross Grange’s occurs at the opening of the novel, but at the “end” of the timeline.

This plot creates a “mystery” within the novel that was not in the film, as her encounter with Heathcliff has been twisted, hardened, and haunted by Cathy’s death for decades begging the question of How such a monster was created in the first place, but we never see Elordi’s character brought down to his true rock.

Hindley Earnshaw

Hindley is Cathy’s older brother who is jealous of Heathcliff’s status as his father’s favorite. When he gets out of control, he is sent to school, only to return after his father’s death to banish Heathcliff from a life of slavery.

Fennell cut the character, naming Cathy Heathcliff after her “dead” brother, and writing Hindley’s abusive and alcoholic behavior into the character of Mr. Earnshaw. Some of the subtleties of the novel are lost in the mix, as Heathcliff’s savior is now his tormentor, and we lose the pure hatred and revenge directed at Hindley when Heathcliff returns as a “gentleman”.

We also lose the climactic moment from the novel when Hindley fails to kill Heathcliff while drunk, realizing that the man has stolen his inheritance and the love of his son Hareton from under him, and is powerless to stop him.

All Second Generation

Where Fennell relies on Cathy’s miscarriage as the cause of her death, the novel sees her give birth to a daughter, often referred to as Cathy II, as the two characters share the same name (one of the most confusing moments in literature). Heathcliff and Isabella also have a son together, named Linton Heathcliff, and we have already mentioned Hindley’s son, Hareton Earnshaw. These three characters form the love triangle of the “next generation” and the story that forms the second half of the novel.

Cathy II is brought up at Thrushcross Grange by Edgar and Nelly after Cathy’s death, Hareton is brought up in squalor by the paranoid Heathcliff (who brings the boy as “low” as Hindley brings him), and Linton is imprisoned by Isabella until his death.

When the sick boy goes to live with his uncle (Isabella and Edgar are siblings in the book, not a ward or guardian), Heathcliff insists that his son live with him at Wuthering Heights, and plans to marry the cousins ​​(Cathy and Linton) in a plot to steal Edgar’s house. He accomplishes his goal, but both Linton and Edgar die soon after, and Cathy II is trapped with Heathcliff and Hareton as a result.

That’s when Heathcliff tells Nelly that he opened Cathy’s grave I not once, but. twiceshortly after his death, and when Edgar was buried next to him. Heathcliff plans to be buried next to her as well, with one side of both of their coffins open so that their remains can “come together” as they decay. Fennell’s famous cemetery Saltburn makes this cut the most shocking part of all. It would be a fan of such a theme in the so many levels.

Lockwood’s arrival at the beginning of the novel follows all these events, and he makes many shocking mistakes in thinking about the relationship of the remaining characters to each other, and is haunted by the ghost of Cathy I in a terrifying vision when she drags her wrists through the broken windows.

The news sends Heathcliff into a tailspin, as he desperately wants to be haunted by his ghost, while cousins ​​Cathy II and Hareton make a budding romance as he begins to teach her to read. Heathcliff’s death creates an opportunity for them to put aside generational trauma and pursue a happy future together, in many ways creating the destiny that Cathy and Heathcliff never had.

Although this is a part of the book that most readers don’t remember or love very much, when we lose it completely, we lose an important part of Heathcliff’s character, his undying love and obsession with Cathy, which is the core of the entire novel. We wouldn’t have Severus Snape time “always” if Heathcliff wasn’t there. Never.

We can’t forget about the two characters who have changed so much they may be different people

Fennell takes a a lot of freedom and the characters of Ellen Dean and Joseph, who were Earnshaw’s servants at first. The film adds new stories to make Nelly a “friend” to Cathy, and the official’s illegitimate daughter, and Joseph becomes the kind of steady BDSM guy that feeds Cathy’s sexual awakening.

Joseph

In the novel, Joseph is called a “Pharisee” and represents the religious trauma and violence that Cathy and Heathcliff experience during their upbringing. He always delivers “fire and brimstone” speeches and long Sunday sermons about sin and condemnation that form the basis for Cathy and Heathcliff’s rebellion when they “turn over” the meetings of heaven and hell in their heads in relation to their love for each other.

His relationship with Zillah is entirely new in the film, and Fennell infuses religious fervor and violence into the suspenseful scene that opens the film to the great joy of a crowd watching someone else be punished. This rewrite gives us a “blindfolded” scene, so I wouldn’t change it for the world.

Ellen “Nelly” Dean

In the books, Nelly is simply a servant/housekeeper who ends up switching between the two houses of Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange each time Cathy gets married. She is not as jealous of Cathy’s relationship with Heathcliff as in the film, and takes on a much more “maternal” role in the novel for Cathy, Heathcliff, and Hareton.

Although Nelly notices that Heathcliff is listening during Cathy’s famous speech, he does not tease her cruelly, and only notices her presence and departure during the terrible moment itself. After a while, he tells Cathy to be quiet, saying that he is “not sure” Heathcliff was just at the door listening, and after a while, when Heathcliff is nowhere to be found, he tells Cathy that he is “sure” he heard their conversation.

Fennell shows that his Nelly gets thrown under the bus because of this when Isabella Linton starts talking about the nurse that shows up Romeo and Juliethis mistakes also lead to tragedy between two lovers. The artistic decision gives us somewhere to direct our anger at Cathy and Heathcliff’s failed romance, but it also takes the spotlight off their poison, by placing the blame elsewhere and making the tragedy seem inevitable.

The conflict raises the stakes, and allows the “fictional” relationship between Cathy and Heathcliff to develop in a way that the novel never quite consummates. Fennell follows that sequence to its natural climax, when Heathcliff offers to kill Edgar at Cathy’s request, and we see where their mind games would have led had they let themselves let go of their inhibitions.