The Pursued and the Pursuer

Both the writer and star of the new “Masterpiece Theatre” romantic comedy, “Take a Girl Like You,” felt a deep connection to the material.

For Andrew Davies, adapting Kingsley Amis’ 1960 novel about the art of seduction was a nostalgic trip back to his own personal experiences as a young man coming of age in England in the late ‘50s. And for the comedy’s leading lady, Sienna Guillory, playing the part of virginal schoolteacher Jenny Bunn, gave her insight into how far women have progressed in the last 40 years.

When the book came out, “I was exactly the same age as Jenny,” says the 64-year-old Davies, who has also penned the acclaimed adaptations of “Wives and Daughters,” “Emma” and “Pride and Prejudice.”

“I still have lots of photographs of what we were all wearing and what we were all doing,” says Davies. “I still have records and albums that I bought then. I used to go to jazz clubs and everything. It

is quite a romantic time of life [being twentysomething]. It’s all about falling in love.” Guillory, who was born in 1975, believes “Girl” is a socially significant piece for women in their 20s. “All of us girls who take feminism for granted and expect to be treated as equals, this shows how it was and how much has changed, and shouldn’t we all be grateful.”

Blond and beautiful, Jenny Bunn turns all the men’s heads in a small country town near London when she arrives from Northern England to begin work as a schoolteacher. One person who immediately pursues her is Patrick Standish (Rupert Graves), a charming but ruthless Lothario--a Latin college professor who has seduced practically every girl in town.

When Patrick first sees Jenny strolling down the street, it’s lust at first sight. Though Jenny is taken with the handsome Patrick, she’s insistent that she keep her honor until she’s married.

“Patrick and Jenny are young and full of hope in different ways,” says Davies. “Patrick’s hope is to seduce every woman he comes across and Jenny’s hope is to fall in love with a lovely guy like Patrick.”

Patrick, says Davies, is based partly on Amis himself. “He once said that when he was looking for subject matter for a new novel, he would look at himself and take some aspect he didn’t particularly like, exaggerate it, push it to its limits. Of course, with Patrick the aspect is his predatory sexuality.”

Though he is a predator, women can’t resist Patrick. “It is a lovely performance by Rupert Graves, really, that mixes up that ruthlessness with a rather sweet boyishness that is rather disarming,” says Davies.

“The guys who do well with the ladies are the guys who do well with the ladies for a reason,” says Guillory. “They are charming and you want to be with them and they make you feel special and they listen to you.”

Guillory had never read Amis’ novels before being cast as Jenny. “Kingsley Amis has this reputation of being this terrible misogynist, this kind of over-educated man who writes about seducing poor barmaids and stuff,” she says.

But while reading Davies’ script, she realized “Girl” actually mirrored her mother’s own life in the late ‘50s. So to prepare for Jenny, the actress read her mother’s diaries from that period.

“She went to art school,” says Guillory of her mother. “My mother had to bargain with her father, who was a very serious businessman. He was absolutely distraught with the idea of her going to art school, so she said, ‘OK. I’ll do a year in the London School of Fashion for you, in exchange for a year of art school.’ After that [art school], she went off and did her own thing. She managed to escape the mold.”

Guillory believes Jenny’s more conservative nature was in part because she came from Northern England. “The racy southerners were sort of up to all sorts of things that your proper northern respectable families didn’t dream of,” she says.

And Jenny’s profession is a key to her personality. “Every day she sees children,” says Guillory. “She works with children, so her happiness is children and children is marriage. [In her eyes] there is no such thing as a family unit outside of marriage.”

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“Masterpiece Theatre: Take a Girl Like You” airs Sunday at 9 p.m. on KCET. Concludes the following Sunday. The network has rated it TV-PG (may be unsuitable for young children).