Conversation with Friends (2022) Review: Why The Anticipated TV Series Left A Good Part Of Its Viewers Disappointed
Two years after the sensational TV series Normal People, an adaptation of Sally Rooney’s second novel, we got an on-screen adaptation of her debut book, Conversations with Friends, written and published in 2017. Highly anticipated by both the original book fanatics and those who were charmed by the 2020 TV show version of Sally’s universe, Conversations with Friends amassed a lot of expectations from its loyal viewers. Directed by Lenny Abrahamson and written by Alice Birch, (who both worked on Normal People), the series was bound to echo the successful adaptation and feed our collective hunger for more of Rooney. But against all odds, the series received mixed critical and public reception, which leads me to ask myself: what makes Conversation With Friends lack the unanimous success of its ancestor?
The Book
The author’s literary debut Conversations with Friends gave her her initial success. Writing about a complicated love square between two young women and an older couple, Rooney crafted a meticulous and intelligent examination of modern relationships. The story takes place in Dublin's literary scene, an environment Rooney herself is very familiar with. Rooney’s social and political commentary is cleverly ingrained throughout the novel, oftentimes in the characters’ exchanges, which makes the book a gem full of stimulating ideas and thoughts. The Irish author was submerged by a wave of success for her sharp intelligence. Critics also praised her realistic take on modern communication (texts and emails) and how such correspondence affects relationships.
The TV Series and How Faithful It Was to the Novel
Compared to the book’s success, the TV adaptation was received with far different attitudes. The viewers’ mixed feelings about the series goes to prove a bigger point: a good book doesn’t guarantee a good movie/show. To adapt a novel isn’t a mere visual translation of words: it requires a careful understanding of the story and a keen sensibility for preserving its essence. If we deconstruct the relationship between the literary and film formats of Conversation with Friends, here’s what we get:
Where The Two Meet
When it comes to the portrayal of loneliness in literary worlds, Rooney’s sensible and impressively accurate depictions are as good as it gets. In both the books and the TV shows, characters undergo periods of isolation and loneliness in their college lives. While in Normal People, Connell was a more transparent character and was even given a therapy speech to help the audience fully grasp his isolation and alienation. In Conversations with Friends, we get a protagonist who is more passive and reserved, and therefore far harder to read. The series was able to flawlessly transcribe this opaque quality about Frances, the protagonist, as she goes through a period of intense isolation from her friends and family. As she wanders alone across her massive and intimidating university campus to sit at the library and study for hours, we can’t help but empathize with her and her loneliness, which was the effect intended in the book. The book’s setting and environment are also perfectly portrayed in the series: the dullness of Frances' small life, reduced to her apartment, the local bookstore, and the eventual bars she goes to around the empty Dublin. We can thank COVID for that.
Another element that was faithful to the book was one of its prominent themes: frustration over modern-day communication and corresponding via texts and emails. In my humble opinion, I think it is why the literary version of Conversations with Friends is so successful. Rooney ventured into unknown territory and finally modernized the way communication is depicted in books. I’m sure we’ve all been in a position where we can’t seem to decipher a text, or worse, are left overthinking a reply. Rooney not only explored the nuances of this new form of communication, but put her finger on our universal struggles when it comes to texting/emailing, whether it is a friend, a family member, a romantic interest, or a married woman whose husband you’re having an affair with. While there is an argument about the difference in pacing between the book and the series, both formats manage to accurately convey the subtle nuances of corresponding online.
Lastly, another aspect of the book that was preserved and maybe even accentuated in its adaptation is the unlikeable qualities of its protagonists, Frances and Nick. I’ve always been fascinated by unlikeable characters. I think it is a very bold choice to defy the norms and force the readers and/or viewers to stick with someone that is insufferable on many levels, yet that forces us to find something tolerable in them, something that we can empathize with. Conversations with Friends is the perfect example that we don’t need a lovey-dovey, relatable protagonist to enjoy a story. And there are many things not to like in the series protagonists: their selfishness, passiveness and lack of communication, to start with. It is natural to expect that seeing the characters played as real people on screen would humanize them, eventually overshadowing their unlikeable qualities, but quite the opposite happened in this case. The actors who played Nick and Frances, Joe Alwyn et Alison Oliver, were able to fully convey the characters’ lack of life and numbness, which makes me question if their performances were successfully faithful to the book or secretly mediocre.
Where The Two Differ
In terms of the actual adaptation of the book and formatting the story into 12 episodes, the series made some bold choices when it comes to what is kept from the book and what is being thrown away. For instance, while Sally Rooney dedicated many pages at the beginning of the book to thoroughly exploring the early stages of Nick and Frances’s affair and how it developed, the series reduced their encounter to one single episode, which considerably shortens their interactions before deciding to see each other, making the whole thing feel very rushed and unrealistic. Ironically, while the protagonist's relationship was condensed in the beginning, the rest of the story felt much slower than in the book. The series turned towards the passivity of the characters in contrast with the chaos of their lives, a notion that was reinforced by an emphasis on moments where nothing virtually happens. The overall result is a slower pace which frustrated many un-entertained viewers.
One of the big controversies about the TV show adaptation is that it lacks the emotional tension of the book. The story is not action-based and fast-paced in its literary format. But the novel is still thrilling to read because of how Rooney juggles moral dilemmas and complexities of the characters’ relationships and their betrayal of one another. The simple notion of a sexual and emotional affair between a woman and a married man is captivating enough. Yet, while the sex scenes do not lack in the series, we are left with a desire for more emotional tension between the characters. The TV show creators’ choice to focus on the characters’ inner conflicts and internal turmoil strips the audience from all the thrills and fascination that we find in the book. To top it off, the actors are in desperate need of more on-screen chemistry. While the sexual tension between Normal People’s actors, Daisy Edgar Jones and Paul Mescal, is palpable and almost unbearable throughout the entire show, it is hard to sense Alwyn and Oliver’s supposedly overwhelming attraction through our screens.
Ultimately, the series simply lacks depth. Rooney’s insightful and clever exploration of relationship dynamics got a little bit lost in translation. In fact, ironically, there aren’t a lot of conversations. Although the novel was praised for its intellectual discourses and nuanced social commentaries, most part of the TV show doesn’t have dialogue and relies on short musical montages or aggressive sex scenes to tell Rooney’s story. And while the series flirts with the 3-dimensionality of its characters through minimal backstory, it fails to achieve the psychological depth of the original work. It is only in the characters of Bobbi (Frances’s ex-girlfriend) and Melissa (Nick’s husband) that we get deeper into the heart of Rooney’s story, both of which are astonishingly portrayed by Sasha Lane and Jemima Kirke, giving the fictional characters the life and realness that lacks in Alwyn and Oliver’s performances.