How well does bestselling historical fiction transfer to the TV screen? James Burge reviews Apple TV’s adaptation of Lessons in Chemistry and finds it “well-crafted, effective and intelligent”.
Films and novels are very different things. Broadly speaking, a novel consists of dialogue, descriptions of action and the inner world of characters, and narration. When it is turned into moving pictures, dialogue and action remain, in a slightly different form, but thoughts disappear. Inevitably something will be lost and something may be gained. I think I can safely leave it to you to provide examples of good, bad and ugly film adaptations.
Lessons in Chemistry is the best-selling first novel by Bonnie Garmus, adapted as an eight-part series by Lee Eisenberg and currently being released in stages by Apple TV. How does it survive the transition?
The book has strong characters, an interesting plot and a feeling of contemporary relevance. All those things transfer easily. It is primarily a tale of sex discrimination in 1951 and an oblique meditation on what a woman can do about it. The latter question has rather intriguing and ambiguous answers, but there will be no spoilers here.
In early episodes (only the first three are available at the time of writing) we follow the love affair of two oddballs. Elizabeth Zott (Brie Larson), a woman and a scientist (in 1951 that alone counts as oddball, but there is more) and Calvin Evans (Lewis Pullman), a successful scientist and social disaster.
The feminist struggle is deftly held back from dominating the narrative but it is there and it remains until the end of the day for the viewer/reader to think about.
The faltering progress of the affair is artfully described – in film as in book – and both Larson and Pullman put in fine and appropriate performances. Their appearances gave me pause for thought at first because, for oddballs, they look remarkably like film stars. She is blonde and gorgeous with perfect make-up and poise, he is toned and handsome with an occasional look of gritty determination.
You do sometimes get the impression that the film is set somewhere on the way to Barbieland. Perhaps that is intended to work with the feminist subtext. Maybe, but no matter, because a well-executed recurring memory of a violent assault brings us regularly back to earth.
The gap between us now and 1951 is well illustrated by smart dialogue. Calvin is what we would call a jogger but in a conversation about him we hear: ‘He runs.’ ‘Where does he run to?’ ‘Nowhere, he just runs.’ ‘Weird.’ When he finally gets the point that Elizabeth is actually being prevented from being a scientist because she is a woman, he mentions it to a colleague using a new idiom: ‘This is a case of sex discrimination.’ and gets the puzzled reply, ‘I don’t even know what that means.’
Elizabeth, in a meeting with a senior scientist, finds herself being told, ‘You’re not smart enough.’ She is then instructed, not asked, to enter the ‘Little Miss Hastings’ creepy college beauty contest before finally being dismissed with the parting shot: ‘A smile once in a while wouldn’t kill you!’ Heard that one before?
The book’s great appeal is its knowing, wise and humorously ironic narration – the ‘voice’ of the book. That cannot be filmed. (Full-time narrators are rare in film dramas, perhaps because ultimately they create more problems than they solve).
Of course, the magic of cinematography stands always ready to fill this gap and this series is indeed stylishly shot and edited. There are moments of power and beauty which are not possible in a book. Strangely, one of my favourites is an uncomfortable sequence in which the solitary Zott injects a frog as part of a late night experiment.
But ennui does creep in. We see rather a lot of late night science in sequences that go on long after we have got the point. Add to this a number of apparently inessential elements of the plot which have been removed – they may have seemed superfluous but I’m not so sure they were – and you have a measurable, but not disastrous, debit score for this adaptation.
There is, however, one casualty which is harder to bear: Six-Thirty; that’s the name of Elizabeth Zott’s dog. In the book, this woman’s best friend shoulders some of the burden of narration and comment. His viewpoint from another species equips him rather well to deliver ironic insights. He doesn’t speak, of course, we are just privy to his thoughts.
I like to think that Lee Eisenberg and his team of directors spent some time trying to figure out ways to make the canine commentary work. It would always have been high-risk but the rewards were potentially great. Six-Thirty does have some rather telling looks as the story goes on, but it’s not the same.
This series will develop, twist and turn over eight episodes. On current showing it will continue to be a well-crafted, effective and intelligent drama. But my guess is that in the transition to TV some of the qualities which have made the book such a resounding bestseller will not survive. I’m sure Six-Thirty will have a few things to say about that.
James Burge used to be a film-maker. Now he is writing a novel.
He’s written an number of reviews and features for Historia, including:
The history of history on television
Review: Feminine power: the divine to the demonic
Review: The World of Stonehenge
TV review: The Crown, season 3
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus is shortlisted for the 2023 HWA Debut Crown Award.
Images:
All images courtesy of Apple TV
