When I tell you I had an out of body experience over the weekend, I mean it.
It was a tame Saturday night, where my best friend and I ordered take out, chilled a bottle of prosecco, and proceeded to watch one of the best (and cheesiest) period dramas of the 2000’s, Pride and Prejudice (the movie, not the TV series).
Starring Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennet and Matthew Macfadyen as Mr. Darcy, the 2005 film is an adaptation of the 1813 Jane Austen novel of the same name. Of course, most of the movie is just them secretly pining over each other, and at the very end (spoiler alert) finally getting together for a total of like five minutes before it ends.
We basically have Elizabeth’s mother, Mrs. Bennett, trying to find her five middle class daughters advantageous marriages with wealthier men in England as the main storyline. They focus a lot on Elizabeth’s older sister, Jane, and her relationship with the wealthy bachelor Charles Bingley, who recently moved to an estate in nearby Netherfield in rural England.
And there’s one scene towards the beginning of the movie where Elizabeth is visiting Jane at Charles’ estate, when Jane falls ill and must stay longer to recuperate. That’s when Elizabeth gets into a feisty conversation with Mr. Darcy, but mainly, Charles’ sister, Caroline Bingley.
The three of them are going back and forth discussing what defines an accomplished woman, and I’m sitting there staring at the TV wondering why in the hell Caroline looks so damn familiar. I’m asking my friend, ‘Who is Caroline? What’s the name of the actress who plays her?’, because I’m 85% certain that it’s Beth Dutton (AKA Kelly Reilly) from Yellowstone.
Sure enough, after a quick Google search, she confirms that the actress is, in fact, a very young and baby-faced Kelly Reilly. And when I tell y’all my jaw hit the FLOOR in that moment… I was stunned.
I mean, I’ve seen the movie countless time, but not in the last few years since Yellowstone came out, so I had totally forgotten who a lot of the other supporting characters in Pride and Prejudice were.
And I’ll tell you what, I don’t think I’ve been that shocked in a long time. Kelly is so young in this movie, and while she looks pretty much the same, I still couldn’t believe my eyes.
So if you need some Beth Dutton in your life to hold you over until Yellowstone Season 5 premieres later this year (hopefully), go ahead and put Pride and Prejudice in the Amazon video queue.
You’re welcome for the top notch investigative journalism, ladies… and sorry, not sorry, to the guys who will probably be forced to watch the cinematic masterpiece that is Pride and Prejudice now this weekend:
Here’s that iconic scene where Elizabeth and Caroline verbally spar and, in my opinion, Mr. Darcy falls in love with Elizabeth:
And honestly, Kelly’s ruthless character in this movie isn’t all that dissimilar from Beth’s character in Yellowstone:
