Gillian Anderson Will Change Your Expectations of Miss Havisham

An orphan boy meets an escaped convict, a crazed rich woman, a bewitching girl, and grows up to have great expectations of wealth from a mysterious patron, on Great Expectations, Charles Dickens’ remarkable tale of rags to riches to self-knowledge, starring Gillian Anderson (The X-Files, Bleak House), David Suchet, Ray Winstone, and Douglas Booth.  The three-hour mini-series airs in two parts on Masterpiece Classic, Sunday, April 1 and 8, 2012 at 9 p.m. on WCVE PBS/WHTJ PBS.

Anderson appears as one of Dickens’ most haunting creations: Miss Havisham, a bride-to- be who was jilted at the altar years before and has worn her fading wedding dress ever since, surrounded at home by the fossilized remains of the marriage feast and hell-bent on getting even with the male sex.

Newcomer Booth stars as Pip, the promising young man who is snared in Miss Havisham’s lair. On the way to becoming a gentleman, he falls in love with Miss Havisham’s beautiful adopted daughter, Estella, played by Vanessa Kirby (The Hour).

Great Expectations airs during the bicentennial of Dickens' birth and marks the fifteenth Masterpiece adaptation of the great novelist’s works, including the acclaimed Bleak House, starring Anderson; Little Dorrit, the winner of seven Emmy awards; and David Copperfield, which introduced the very young Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) to American audiences.

As part of the Dickens bicentennial, Masterpiece will also broadcast its sixteenth Dickens production, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, an unfinished work that will be given a new ending by writer Gwyneth Hughes (Five Days, Miss Austen Regrets).

AIRS Sunday, April 1 and 8 at 9 p.m. on WCVE PBS/WHTJ PBS