royalty
Prince Harry: Frontline Afghanistan, BBC ThreeTuesday, 29 January 2013The television channels have been making documentaries about our boys, and indeed girls, in Afghanistan for the best part of a decade. We’re used by now to the imagery, which mainly consists of dust, joshing, weaponry and boredom. Prince Harry:... Read more... |
Queen Victoria's Children, BBC TwoWednesday, 02 January 2013![]() They muck one up, one’s ma and pa. Later this year, all being tickety-boo, a royal uterus will be delivered of the third in line to the throne. The media in all its considerable fatuity will ponder the best way to bring up such an infant in the era... Read more... |
Painting the Queen: A Portrait of Her Majesty, BBC FourWednesday, 24 October 2012![]() Has there ever been a successful portrait of the Queen? Not a photograph - there are been plenty of those (with its delicious air of ambivalence, Thomas Struth’s portrait of the Queen with Prince Philip stiffly occupying two ends of a sofa at... Read more... |
Diana The Movie: From the Bunker to Buck HouseWednesday, 04 July 2012![]() Shooting is underway on Diana the movie and, as the producers did with Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady, a snap of the star in full fig and wig has been launched upon the world. Naomi Watts, whose previous love interests have included Laura Harring in... Read more... |
The Queen: Art and Image, National Portrait GallerySunday, 20 May 2012![]() The Queen is the first mass-media monarch, and still probably the most ubiquitously depicted person in history. Her 60 years on the throne is only exceeded by Victoria, and her reign has coincided, of course, with photography, film and... Read more... |
The King's Speech, Wyndham's TheatreWednesday, 28 March 2012![]() Little more than a year since The King’s Speech hit pay dirt at the Oscars, David Seidler’s tale of a prince stuttering between duty and impediment takes to the stage. Rather than a speedy and cynical exploitation of the film’s success, the move... Read more... |
Johan Zoffany: Society Observed, Royal AcademyFriday, 09 March 2012![]() Royal families and royal academies. Aristocrats at ease in exquisitely landscaped gardens or inside in gorgeous drawings rooms. Actors emoting, notably Sir David Garrick and his troupe. Nabobs in India. All are depicted in Johan Zoffany’s rivetingly... Read more... |
The King's Speech: From Screen to StageSaturday, 11 February 2012![]() George VI had been my hero since childhood because I was such a terrible stutterer. We had been evacuated from England to the US and during the war, particularly the latter stages, my parents would encourage me to listen to the King’s speeches on... Read more... |
Queen Elizabeth II by Cecil Beaton: A Diamond Jubilee Celebration, Victoria & Albert MuseumThursday, 09 February 2012![]() The work of the photographer, theatrical designer, narcissist, snob, careerist, and exceptionally talented Cecil Beaton (1904-1980), including 18,000 vintage prints, negatives and transparencies, contact sheets and 45 books of cuttings are at the... Read more... |
The Diamond Queen, BBC OneTuesday, 07 February 2012![]() I can never quite work out Andrew Marr. Serious political journalist? Wannabe arts correspondent? Failed actor? Celebrity superfan? Anyway here he was, following the Queen around the world on a variety of exotic junkets, shouting at the camera... Read more... |
The Madness of George III, Apollo TheatreTuesday, 24 January 2012Alan Bennett’s The Madness of George III has enjoyed something of a royal progress around England over the past year. Touring in Christopher Luscombe’s slick production for the Peter Hall Company, the show has finally arrived in the West End. The... Read more... |
W.E.Thursday, 19 January 2012![]() “I’m not a beautiful woman,” Wallis Simpson once declared. “I’m nothing to look at, so the only thing I can do is dress better than anyone else.” Madonna’s second feature W.E. operates under a similar philosophy – with rather less success. Never... Read more... |
