Adaptation as revision: Transforming makeover narratives from canonical literature to contemporary Hollywood teen film

Abstract

The 1990s saw a rise in teen girl adaptations of canonical literary texts. This paper works with John Bryant’s concept of adaptive revision to consider particular teen girl adaptations: She’s All That (1999), an adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion (1912), and Clueless (1995), from Jane Austen’s novel Emma (1815). It argues that in transforming literary narratives from page to screen in a third wave feminist context, teen film adaptations present makeover narratives that simultaneously empower and oppress teen girl figures.