Everyone Knows About The Hand Flex In "Pride & Prejudice" — But I Bet You Didn't Know That Matthew Macfadyen Improved It During Rehearsal

On this day — January 28 — exactly 208 years ago, Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice was published and changed the world FOREVER!

Little did she know — because the idea of film wasn't something Ms. Austen could even fathom —192 years after the publication of her novel, Joe Wright would direct the best adaptation of Pride & Prejudice in cinema.

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Yes, in case you were wondering, this includes the Colin Firth miniseries.

Now, the entire film is a masterpiece, but my favorite moment is the moment after Mr. Darcy helps Elizabeth into her carriage and then physically REACTS to the touch of her skin against his. We on the interwebs have dubbed this the Hand Flex™.

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Yes, in case you were wondering, this is my entire personality.

Like, I. Am. Obsessed.

Well, I thought I knew everything there was to know about this film, but in an interview with NPR, Matthew Macfadyen — who played Mr. Darcy in Pride & Prejudice (2005, dir. Joe Wright) — revealed that he improvised the hand flex during rehearsal!

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Improved! The! Hand! Flex!

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^Live footage of me when I learned this fact.

Our humble king credits Joe Wright with the hand flex making it into the film, but he only did so because he saw Matthew do it!!

"No, it's credit to Joe, because he's — I think, he doesn't miss a trick, and he's so alive to things, and he saw me do it in a rehearsal take and I remember him just going, 'Get that!' So they just did an extra shot on the hand," said Macfadyen.

While my feelings about Tom Wambsgans come and go, my love of Mr. Darcy will live on until the end of times!

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I love Mr. Darcy's hand flex more than Mr. Collins loves both boiled potatoes AND Fordyce's sermons. And that's SAYING SOMETHING!

You can listen to the entire interview here.