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Tony Duff (Sam Neill) finally gets up the courage to propose to Lucinda Vane (Wendy Hughes) but he is too late. Lucinda has fallen in love with someone else and denies ever having given Tony reason to believe he had a chance.
Curator’s notes
This scene is lifted almost verbatim from the book where it is set in a different house, one designed by Tony. Here they are in Lucinda’s own home – presumably to save on sets for budgetary reasons – so her comments about the drapes make no sense. A tight budget is presumably also why Lucinda’s courtship by Hugo Brayford (Barry Quin) is elsewhere reduced to a practically wordless montage. Instead, apparently intent on making the most of Sam Neill’s presence, we have been shown how faithfully Tony Duff courted Lucinda and how positively she responded.
Wendy Hughes and Sam Neill are both consummate actors with strong screen presence, but neither character comes off well in this scene. Lucinda’s rebuffing of Tony makes her look shallow, particularly when we have not seen her naively bedazzled by Hugo’s glamour. And it’s hard to feel much sympathy either for Tony, after he dismisses Lucinda as ‘stupid’ when she rejects his proposal. The failure to understand their motivations makes it difficult for us to want them to be together or to believe in their romance.
