Miss Austen Regrets
Sunday, February 7 at 9:00 p.m. on WPBT2
Approaching her fortieth birthday, Jane Austen (Olivia Williams, Emma, The Sixth Sense) appears happily unmarried. When asked by her young niece Fanny (Imogen Poots) to help her vet potential husbands, Jane’s confident composure is threatened as she finds herself looking back on her own potential suitors and the choices she has made. Could potential family financial ruin have been averted if she’d accepted the proposal of a wealthy landowner? And what about the handsome young physician Jane meets as a result of a family illness?

Northanger Abbey
Sunday, February 14 at 9:00 p.m. on WPBT2
In Jane Austen’s gentle parody of gothic fiction, Felicity Jones (“Meadowlands”) plays romance addict Catherine Morland. Invited to a medieval country house that appeals to her most lurid fantasies, she forms a close friendship with the younger son on the estate, Henry Tilney (JJ Feild, “The Secret Life of Mrs. Beeton”), but their budding romance is mysteriously cut short.

Persuasion
Sunday, February 21 at 9:00 p.m. on WPBT2
Sally Hawkins ("Little Britain") appears as Anne Elliot, destined for spinsterhood at age 27 after being persuaded eight years earlier to refuse the proposal of dashing Captain Wentworth (Rupert Penry-Jones, "Casanova"). Then chance brings them together again. While her better days are past, his are definitely ahead as he's now rich and free to play the field among eligible young beauties. Anthony Head ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer") co-stars as Anne’s spendthrift father.

The 39 Steps
Sunday, February 28 at 9:00 p.m. on WPBT2
Secret agent Richard Hannay battles German spies on the eve of World War I in a riveting and romantic new version of the classic thriller by John Buchan, made famous in Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 movie. MASTERPIECE favorite Rupert Penry-Jones (“Persuasion”) stars as Hannay, with Lydia Leonard (“Jericho”) as suffragette Victoria Sinclair, his unlikely accomplice in a quest to expose German plans to destroy the British navy and invade the country.

Visit the website at www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/classic.