- Little Women is always presented if you're British as this universal book.
You don't think of it as specifically American.
I think the first thing that I learned was Americans think it is an American book.
There's this deep sense of loving possessiveness about it.
And I realized I was probably being very bold by taking it on.
- I think that something essential about the American character is reinvention.
Like we elect a president every four years.
We're constantly reinventing who we are, what our identity is.
- I think maybe the American spirit is about throwing yourself into things and living a full life and being tenacious and enthusiastic and determined.
- The sisters are constantly reinventing themselves and I think that it's a truly exciting thing to be forgiving, to be introspective, and to grow.
And that's essential to the American character and I hope that we remember that.
- I do think that there's a courage and a boldness about the March girls that does feel very American.
I never wanted them to be like British girls putting on American accents.
Although, there were some tweaks when we went out in Britain at Christmas at the tail end of 2017 where people were saying, "Why are they talking with American accents?
"Why are they talking about the Civil War?"
Because there are some people who pick up the book and they think that they're English.
You know, it's bizarre.
- As a Brit, it certainly opened my mind to America at that time.
Here you have two sections of the American public who are at odds with one another, and it was an enormous tragedy.
- I think when I read the book as a child, I was really unaware of the significance of the Civil War and at the time in which this was taking place, and the moral consequences of what that fight was about.
(soft music)
