"The quintessential rags-to-riches tale, of impoverished Yorkshire lass Emma Harte making her way to the top of the fashion business, was published in 1979 but it anticipated and appealed instantly to the self-improving, bootstrap-straining, money-hungry, power-mad, ambition-laden mood of the decade to come."
"We open in the late 70s with Emma Harte in a limousine and her multimillionaire grande dame prime. She is played by Brenda Blethyn, who has, at last, cast off her drab Vera garb and shuffling gait after 14 series. Instead, she has embraced a gorgeous silver-grey bouffant wig and equally lavish wardrobe."
"A mole has leaked Emma's medical records, suggesting she is physically on the skids. Harte shares are plummeting! The papers are saying you're finished! Emma marches into her steel and marble headquarters in what is absolutely New York and not Liverpool, and tells her minions that they need to control the narrative with press releases."
Barbara Taylor Bradford's 1979 novel 'A Woman of Substance' tells the rags-to-riches story of Emma Harte, a Yorkshire woman who builds a fashion empire to become extraordinarily wealthy and powerful. The novel resonated with 1980s ambitions for self-improvement and success. Originally adapted for television in 1985, a new eight-part miniseries adaptation by Katherine Jakeways and Roanne Bardsley brings the story to contemporary audiences with lavish production values. The narrative opens with elderly Emma as a multimillionaire facing a crisis when leaked medical records suggest declining health, causing her company's shares to plummet. Emma responds by attempting to control the narrative through strategic press releases while navigating ongoing feuds with rival families, particularly the Fairleys.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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