Jane Austen's Period Drama (2024)

Isn’t it sacrilegious to parody Jane Austen stories? Well even if it is, I liked this daft amalgamation of all things sentimentally slushy and period (no pun intended) from her stories. “Miss Estrogenia” (Julia Aks) is eagerly awaiting a proposal of marriage from the dashing and wealthy “Mr. Dickley” (Ta’imua) in best “Little Women” style, when one of her sisters notices some bodily fluid where it ought not to be - well not just at this precise moment, anyway. Before they can get her changed, though, he arrives and immediately assumes the worst and calls for a doctor. Needless to say her sagely father (Hugo Armstrong) can’t wait to get out of the room, and her concerned elder sister “Labinia” (Samantha Stuart) is determined that anything but the truth shall out so as not to offend her sister’s intended. Finally left to their own devices, what could possibly happen amidst all their lace and primness? Aside from the obvious swipes at the failing of the best education available to inform this naive young man of even the most rudimentary aspects of the female body, this also pokes gentle fun at the entertaining levels of ignorance that some of the most empowering of English literature from the 19th century chose to imbue it’s characters with as it’s taboos list was as long as a baby’s arm. It’s quite cleverly and earthily written and though it does stray a little dangerously towards the puerile at times, it’s quite a joyous twenty minutes that worked for me.