Movie Romance
Keira Knightley and Rosamund Pike Reflect on ‘Pride & Prejudice’s Iconic Dawn Scene
Twenty years have passed since Pride & Prejudice came out, but we’ll never forget its iconic dawn scene. It appears the film’s stars Keira Knightley and Rosamund Pike may be in the same boat.
The actresses, who play sisters Elizabeth and Jane in the Jane Austen adaption, reunited to discuss the 2005 film for Vanity Fair. They brought up the fan-favorite moment when Mr. Darcy (Matthew Macfadyen) strides across a foggy field — billowing white shirt and all — to declare his love for Lizzie. (And we can’t blame them. Is there anything more romantic than the “You’ve bewitched me, body and soul” line?)
Pike recalled waking up in the early hours of the morning to see the scene come to life alongside the rest of the cast. “You all got up with us!” Knightley chimed in. “Everyone got up at 3 a.m. and everybody was there.”
Knightley also had a piece of advice for the team behind Netflix’s upcoming, Dolly Alderton-penned Pride & Prejudice miniseries. The Crown’s Emma Corrin and Slow Horses‘ Jack Lowden are set as its two leads. “If they’re not all doing that, then they’re missing out,” Knightley joked. “You’ve all got to be there for all of the scenes, guys.”
“I can’t believe that they’re daring to do another one,” Pike quipped later on in the interview, laughing with Knightley. The Wheel of Time star went on to commend Knightley’s Lizzie as one of the “greatest performances ever.”
“Even now, when you see even a clip of it, I marvel at what you did. I really do,” she added.
The duo also had nothing but praise for Macfadyen’s performance in the film, too. “He can completely mask the niceness and put it under the arrogance and stand-offishness that Darcy appears to have and then melt,” Pike recalled. “Oh, so good.”
Only time will tell if Netflix’s take on Austen’s novel will live up to the standard that the 2005 film set, but we have high hopes, since they’re working with source material that does a good portion of the heavy lifting. “I do think the story has a magic in it that carries you through,” Pike reflected about her own time on set. “I think it being one of those stories that has magic in it, everybody who’s ever associated with that story has quite a magical time.”
