The Bloomsbury group were known for breaking convention and rejecting Victorian social norms, so what better subject matter for the BBC to push the boundaries with when it comes to costume drama?
Life in Squares, which takes its title from the famous quote that the Bloomsbury set “lived in squares, painted in circles and loved in triangles”, follows the lives of Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, Clive Bell, Duncan Grant, Lytton Strachey and John Maynard Keynes in the 1910s.
It also forms part of a new era of BBC period dramas such as Wolf Hall and Peaky Blinders that seek to take “massive risks with tone”, after drama commissioner Ben Stephenson declared he was no longer interested in comfortable Jane Austen adaptations last year.
Take a look at what’s in store:
There's a liberating amount of 'illegal' gay sex
Duncan Grant and Lytton Strachey in bed together
The Bloomsbury group were well known for their interweaving affairs with members of the same sex, and the drama does not shy away from portraying them on film. Director Simon Kaijser said homosexuality was illegal for such a long time in the UK, he wanted to "give it back to everybody who was gay in those times".
Corsets are thrown out of the window immediately
Vanessa Bell prizes herself out of her corset in episode one
To hell with convention! This is not a cosy period drama for those who fancy curling up on the sofa to a twee trip down memory lane. Virginia Woolf and her sister Vanessa Bell strip off their corsets and throw them out of the window in the first three minutes of episode one, and even suggest they will do away with napkins altogether (what would Mrs Carson think?)
HBO's Girls was cited as an influence
Vanessa Stephen (Phoebe Fox) and Clive Bell (Sam Hoare)in bed
Lena Dunham's hit series was mentioned as a stylistic touchstone to director Kaijser before embarking on the shoot. While the series is not nearly as sexually liberated as Girls (Virginia Woolf does not spend half her time on camera naked), there is an unromanticised honesty to the sex scenes.
The way it's shot is 'very Instagram'
Clive Bell (Sam Hoare) proposes a toast
Warm tones and muted colours make up the palette of Life in Squares in scenes that could have their own Instagram filters named after them. The filming was purposefully "impressionistic" to reflect the Bloomsbury group's championing of the artistic style, with a hand-held camera used throughout.
It has shabby-chic at its heart
Vanessa Bell's house in Lewes, East Sussex
Forget pristine costumes worn once and bundled into the wardrobe van forevermore, some costumes are worn repeatedly in this period drama. While there may be servants, hat boxes and horse-drawn carriages, their rooms are shabby and covered in art. This is high bohemia of the early twentieth century, after all.
