Daisy Edgar-Jones: Emma Thompson in Sense And Sensibility is all-time favourite

Daisy Edgar-Jones has said Dame Emma Thompson’s performance of Elinor Dashwood in Sense And Sensibility is one of her “favourites of all time”.

The 28-year-old actress, best known for Normal People, stars in the upcoming adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel opposite 1917 star George MacKay’s Edward Ferrars.

The film comes more than three decades after the 1995 Ang Lee movie which starred Dame Emma and won the actress the academy award for best screenplay adaptation.

Speaking at the London premiere for the film, Edgar-Jones said: “Emma’s performance in the film is one of my favourites of all time and so I was so inspired by it.

“I’m always very inspired by performances.

“I’m an actor. That’s the thing I love the most. It’s definitely something that has just been in my mind since I was young and first saw the film.

“I think that’s the beautiful thing about adapting. You can take all of the history and all the things that you love about previous adaptations and the book itself, and then it’s just about letting go really and just just trying to say the words as authentically as they feel to me and see what comes.

“I feel very lucky to play Eleanor Dashwood.”

Edgar-Jones went on to praise Austen for her ability to “unpick the inner workings of a mind”.

“She’s just magic,” she said. “It really was exciting to revisit Sense and I think it just feels like such timeless themes.

“It’s just incredible that an author like Jane Austen, writing 200 years ago, is still being adapted time and time again.

“It’s just such a testament to how brilliant her writing is.

George MacKay and Daisy Edgar-Jones (Ian West/PA)

PA Wire

Her fellow co-stars, Esme Creed-Miles and MacKay, however opted not to watch the original film, whose characters Marianne Dashwood and Edward Ferrars were portrayed by Kate Winslet and Hugh Grant, to avoid comparing or impersonating them.

Speaking about Winslet, Creed-Miles said: “She’s such an inspiring actress, but I hadn’t seen the film.

“I chose to not watch it just because I wanted to not be comparing and despairing because they’re both so amazing, and I think I’ll watch it now and probably enjoy it.”

MacKay added: “I understand that interpretation to be very special, so I didn’t watch it.

“I hadn’t watched it, and I still haven’t because I wanted to keep it clear in my head to not be scared, to imitate or to try and impersonate.

“So I just left it for my own interpretation.”

He went on to praise Austen’s “timeless” writing and how the themes continue to resonate today.

He said: “The context is so specific to the time but the themes of balancing oneself, of the balance between your emotional impulses and physical impulses versus the social expectations – that’s timeless.

“It was kind of surprisingly present and natural to dive into that time.”

Sense And Sensibility will be out in cinemas on September 25.