Tulip Fever (2017)

Holliday Grainger: Maria

Photos 

Quotes 

• Maria : [narrating]  Stories don't end. They only go their separate ways. We take leave of them. Not knowing what comes after.

• [first lines] 

  Maria : [narration]  Before you were born, Amsterdam was captivated by a flower: the tulip. They came from far away in the East and were so rare and beautiful that people lost their senses in wanting to own them. Rich and poor were spending and borrowing money to join the trade in bulbs, which were going up in price all the time. None more so than the rare striped tulips that were called breakers. A new breaker came from nowhere like an act of God, and it changed people's lives. A white flower with a God-given crimson stripe turned our lives upside down, mine and my mistress Sophia's.

• Maria : [narrating]  Soon after, the government stepped in and banned tulip trading. Overnight, the market crashed. Thousands were left destitute. All this stemmed from a love of beauty, a passion for flowers whose lives are even briefer than our own. But while the blooms had faded, the paintings remained.

• Mrs Overvalt : A woman who's been married three years needs to keep herself... interesting. Or life will become dulled. Do you know who she is?

  Sophia : Of course. She's Danae, being made love to by Zeus.

  Maria : That's Antonia Hocken, the tinsmith's wife. She could tell you a thing or two about him with the brush.