November 18, 2020
The historical drama TV series about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II called "The Crown" had its first season in 2016. The creator of this series is Peter Morgan, who had previous written "The Queen," the 2006 feature film by Stephen Frears which led lead actress Helen Mirren to a grand slam of Best Actress awards for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II during the events following the death of Princess Diana. It was a very high profile TV series, multi-awarded on both sides of the pond for all three seasons, but I never saw it yet.
However, with the release of its latest season on Netflix this week, I was compelled to go straight in at Season 4. This new season covered that time in Queen Elizabeth II's monarchy that already within my awareness -- the 1980s. The events covered would include the rise of Margaret Thatcher as British Prime Minister and the sensational relationship of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer.
The Margaret Thatcher story line began with her victory at the general election of 1979 and her long 11 years of political service as Prime Minister, constantly maneuvering within her Cabinet and her Parliament to push her uncompromising policies, like her controversial spending cuts or her aggressive stand about the Falklands crisis. Gillian Anderson got that distinctive Thatcher voice, accent, gestures and mannerisms to a perfect T.
The scenes between Anderson and Olivia Colman (as Queen Elizabeth II) were a joy to watch as these two great actresses trade lines and attitude with remarkable skill. This matchless sparring was best seen during those tense scenes of Thatcher going against the Queen about sanctions against apartheid and the fallout that followed. But despite their differences, as the their final scene together showed, the two women did respect and admire each other.
The Charles and Diana story line began when Charles (Josh O'Connor) met Diana (Emma Corrin) when he was visiting her sister Sarah (Isobel Eadie). Despite his confessed love for a very much married Camilla Parker-Bowles (Emerald Fennell), Charles was prevailed upon to marry Diana instead in a ceremony that fascinated the whole world. Despite their public fairy tale, what actually followed was a nightmare of psychological torture that ate both of them up.
Realizing that Prince Charles is still living and is very much in line to be King, this series was very brutal about how he was portrayed here. O'Connor as Charles with that characteristic hunched posture, was veritably the big villain in this whole season; while Corrin as Diana with her sad round eyes and eating disorder, was the very much the victim. Fennell played Camilla with a measure of sympathy, but she knew what her character was up against.
Much had been said about the scene where the cynical Princess Margaret (Helena Bonham-Carter) told an anecdote about former Philippine First Lady Imelda Marcos in Episode 3. However, she was given her own showcase in Episode 7, when Margaret investigated about the psychiatric history of the royal family after her own mental health problems. Bonham-Carter was quite the delightful scene-stealer in everything she's in, and here is no different.
There were several interesting side stories included in the narrative, such as how Thatcher's favorite son Mark got lost in Algeria during an off-road race, how Diana danced onstage to the tune of "Uptown Girl" as a birthday surprise, or how Charles got caught in an avalanche while skiing in Switzerland. There was even an entire episode 5 dedicated to the story of an unemployed man Michael Fagan who snuck into Buckingham Palace into the Queen's bedroom to air his complaints against the system directly to her.
Bringing everything and everyone together is the Queen herself as portrayed with dignity and sense of humor by Olivia Colman. It was no mean feat to portray a living monarch, showing both her good side and that not so good. Her scenes with Thatcher aside, I enjoyed those revelatory individual scenes with each of her children in Episode 3. She can be ruthless (letting a trusted employee take a fall for her) or rude (rebuffing a request to talk to feed her dogs), but as her husband Prince Philip (Tobias Menzies) so eloquently summed it up, the Queen was "the only person that matters." 9/10.
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