Why The Wuthering Heights Casting Is Causing Controversy

The Wuthering Heights movie cast has been released. And while we adore both Margo Robbie and Jacob Elordi, are they an accurate cast for this classic novel adaptation?

Saltburn director Emerald Fennell is joining forces with Margo Robbie’s production company LuckyChap Entertainment to deliver the adaptation of Emily Brontë’s novel. The movie is currently in pre-production and filming is expected to begin next year in the UK.

Wuthering Heights is an incredible gothic story known to be one of the bestselling books of all time. Since its release in 1847, it has received classic status in English literature and has been studied carefully by many. The book follows two families, the Earnshaws and the Lintons over the course of two generations. It is most famous however for its tragic love story between the two main characters, Catherine and Heathcliff.

The novel has already been adapted to film several times since its publication, most notably in recent years directed by Andrea Arnold. So why is this new adaptation causing so much controversy?

 

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Well, Jacob Elordi is set to play Heathcliff. He is described several times in the novel as dark-skinned and Romani. The issue is not just that Elordi himself is white and therefore unfit for the role. It’s also that one significant theme which runs throughout the book is how Heathcliff is treated poorly by other white characters because he is a person of colour.

Regarding Margo Robbie’s role as Catherine, we are dealing with a thirty-four-year-old who is meant to be playing a teenager. Don’t get us wrong, Margo is an amazing actor who has only wowed us in past roles, however, Catherine’s role probably needs to be executed by a younger actress.

The entire premise of the story is centred around how race and class inevitably forbid the relationship between Catherine and Heathcliff. Therefore it is hard to understand why Elordi was chosen for this specific role.

Fans of the book are understandably not impressed by the casting. One user wrote on X (formerly Twitter), “The Wuthering Heights casting is so awful that I thought it was reported by a parody account”.

the wuthering heights casting is so awful that i thought it was reported by a parody account at first

— jolien 🪩 (@_mirroredheart) September 23, 2024

emily brontë showed up in my dream and told me that the wuthering heights adaptation must be stopped at all costs

— abrish (@cxrnerrstone) September 25, 2024

If the movie is anything like Saltburn it will no doubt be cinematically beautiful. However, roles with certain descriptions should be reserved for actors who fit the narrative.

It is unlikely that the movie will be an accurate adaptation of the novel if Heathcliff is played by a white person and Catherine is played by a thirty-four-year-old.

Emerald, we think you may have missed the mark with this one.

Words by Ava Grace