Hello, I’m Emerald Fennell, the screenwriter and director behind the new adaptation of “Wuthering Heights.”
“Wait till you see your dresses, Cathy.”
In this particular scene, we embark on a fascinating tour of Thrushcross Grange, Cathy’s marital home. The sequence features Edgar Linton and his ward, Isabella, brilliantly portrayed by Shazad Latif and Alison Oliver, as they show the now-married Cathy Linton, played by the wonderful Margot Robbie, around her new residence.
Remarkably, this entire sequence was filmed in a single, continuous take by our incredibly talented camera operator, Ossie McLean, renowned as one of the world’s best Steadicam operators.
The aesthetic of Thrushcross Grange is intentionally striking: its hallways are bathed in an “arterial blood red.” This bold color choice wasn’t arbitrary. As one character states, “I said it should be the most beautiful color in the world. The color of my wife’s sweet face. Here, look the freckle from your cheek.”
The design of Thrushcross Grange aimed to be both alluring and unsettling, a subtle blend of beguiling beauty and underlying grotesqueness. Production designer Suzie Davies and I meticulously discussed how to evoke this uncanny feeling, ensuring it felt subconscious rather than overtly dramatic.
A fascinating detail is the material used for the padded wall panels: they were created with photographs of Margot Robbie’s actual skin, including her veins and freckles, printed onto fabric, then overlaid with a thin layer of latex. This choice underscores a key theme of the Victorian era: a profound preoccupation with containing nature.
We see this theme reinforced with a taxidermied lamb, a stark symbol of nature’s containment. Later, Nelly Dean, played by the unbelievable Hong Chau, observes Cathy’s reaction.
“Nelly. Nelly. Nelly. Nelly!”
“Yes, Cathy.”
“Well, you have been quiet.”
“Quiet?”
The library, presented as a “collector’s cabinet,” further emphasizes this idea with lacquered hands holding various natural artifacts. The entire setting speaks to the book’s core theme: the human desire to control nature and the consequences that arise from such attempts. This is subtly mirrored in Cathy’s own appearance—her necklace is enormous, almost suffocating, and her dress is incredibly tightly corseted. “As for the rest, this is good.”