Another in my sometime quest to more fully review frock flicks we’ve skimmed over in the past, especially my faves being 16th century and all the well-known Queen Elizabeth ones. The Virgin Queen (2005) had the misfortune of premiering in the same year as Elizabeth IÂ — the later starred Helen Mirren and was produced by HBO with a bigger budget than the BBC’s Virgin Queen starring Anne-Marie Duff. But both miniseries have their own virtues which are better appreciated separately 20 years down the line.
The BBC tries to cover all of Elizabeth’s adult life, giving the first of four parts over to her half-sister Mary I‘s five-year reign. Unlike many previous productions, this one does a good job showing how precarious Elizabeth’s life was at that time. Events are compressed, of course, but the episode takes time to introduce a romantic relationship between Elizabeth and Robert Dudley (Tom Hardy).
My biggest quibble, especially in the first episode, is with the costuming, and I can only guess designer Amy Roberts wasn’t given much to work with. Elizabeth wears the same plain dress for all of Mary’s reign. Sure, she was in the Tower of London and then under house arrest, but she was still a princess and wouldn’t be dressed like a pauper.
Also, she leaves her hair down the whole time, ugh! It’s the cliche to show she’s younger than her sister, I guess, but we’re so over that bullshit. Do I really need to point this out again???
At least Mary gets proper headgear, but then she wears anachronistic armor (boob armor even) — nope, she’s not leading troops anywhere, she’s just paranoid and yelling at Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth finds out she’s now queen, she does get a new dress, but I think it’s made of dupioni silk and sari scraps. But her hair’s up.
The men’s costuming, starting with Dudley, is apparently casual and inaccurate on purpose, according to the BBC site for the miniseries, which states that the costume designer: “tried to cut down on the use of ruffs, using them only for the very formal occasions. Where possible the men were given open necklines.” sad trombone
All the men top off their sloppy style with 2000s boy-band hair, with only the occasional nod towards facial hair sometimes.
Elizabeth is dressed appropriately at her coronation (and the loose hair is appropriate for once), but why does Dudley look like he’s wearing khaki Dockers with a boho festival belt?
At her first council meeting as queen, Elizabeth wears this shitty orange dress from The Tudors, and she’ll continue to wear it throughout the miniseries, trying to jazz it up with different collars and headgear.
Dudley is SUPER familiar/flirty/slutty with Elizabeth, in a very modern and inappropriate fashion. Like, dude, keep it in yr pants! And yet this production is one of the few to actually show his first wife Amy Robsart — Dudley gives her lots of excuses for why he has to be at court and not at their country house. She’s rightly suspicious and shown to be sickly. She also has shitty hair and a half-assed costume. shrug
Back at court, Elizabeth and Dudley canoodle, and her lady-in-waiting Lettice Knollys watches and dreams of Dudley. The element of truth in this is that Knollys and Dudley did flirt at court, but she wasn’t exactly pining for him. She was married in 1560 and had five surviving children with her first husband, so kinda busy!
In a random scene of Elizabeth hawking, she wears a lovely red velvet doublet and beautifully trimmed gloves, but it’d be such a hassle to ride and manage a hawk with all that hair worn down, not to mention wearing a crown.
Elizabeth wears another gown recycled from The Tudors, and at least it’s one of the better efforts. At least it would be if her HAIR WAS UP. Oh and Dudley, please fasten up that doublet so we don’t have to look at your modern Versace shirt. I suppose the contractually obligated leather pants and unnecessary boots blend in a little better than the khakis.
They get down and dirty dance in front of the whole court, which Elizabeth’s lady-in-waiting Kat Ashley chides her for. Btw, Kat was about 30 years older than Elizabeth, having started out as the child’s governess, so Tara Fitzgerald here is way too young for the part, as much as I love her as an actor.
Kat gets a decent wardrobe here and there, with nice little accessories.
The middle two episodes cover stuff like Dudley’s wife dying (she’s shown throwing herself down the stairs), the Queen getting smallpox, trying to marry Mary Queen of Scots off to Dudley, then MQoS plotting against Elizabeth, then she’s in prison by Elizabeth, Dudley and Lettice hook up, and Elizabeth toys with the Duke of Anjou.
Costumes slowly start to change from the 1550s silhouette to a more 1570s-80 one with wide sleeves and occasionally wheel farthingale. I appreciate these indications that fashion changes over time! Plus Elizabeth starts to wear wigs, not always, but when she does they’re appropriate to this era. But floating ruff alert.
She wears this same dress a couple ways, including when she poses for a version of the Rainbow Portrait.
Maybe? Kinda sorta like this?
There are some oblique shots of Mary Queen of Scots imprisoned and hanging around with her little dog, just to remind viewers that she’s somehow a threat to Elizabeth.
Elizabeth learns of Dudley’s marriage to Lettice, and she’s PISSED. That much is true, at least. Floating ruff alert again.
Lettice tries to suck up to the queen, which doesn’t work so she chews out Dudley. At least she gets a FABULOUS outfit. Great color, great embroidery, great sleeves, good hair, good hat!
I can vaguely see the inspiration? At least they got the point that she’s wealthy and would show it (they all would, really).
Elizabeth gets word of the Babington Plot — the manufactured plot to kill her not-really-sponsored by Mary Queen of Scots. So MQoS is executed and unlike in other productions, this Elizabeth doesn’t have big feelings about the matter. But she does have a big ruff:
This standing ruff is gorgeous and odd. It’s not quite historically accurate, but this is a beautiful interpretation of historical shapes. The embroidery is fantastic, I’ll give it that.
The last big moment of episode three is the Queen’s Tilbury speech, where she’s shown writing it, being lead by Dudley out to the troops, and then saying the “heart and stomach of a king” line to everyone. This is one of the most complete versions of this historical moment onscreen, so good job there.
England claims victory over the Spanish Armada, Robert Dudley dies, Elizabeth is heart-broken.
Episode four fast-forwards to an elderly queen, saying she’s reigned for 37 years. Anne-Marie Duff gets hardcore aging makeup for this part, and now she’s in full wig, wheel farthingale, ruffs, etc. Impressive that she went for it.
She sees Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and briefly imagines he’s Dudley. But he soon shows how arrogant, pushy, and annoying he really is (also wtf stringy greasy hair???).
At least this production doesn’t go full-on with making Essex some great passionate affair for Elizabeth. She sees him as a pet, a project, maybe a child she can improve. She thinks he’s better than he really is, and she’s disappointed when he reveals what a self-interested loser he really was.
Love this new gown on the queen with some of the lux materials the whole 16th century upper-class was known for!
Lettice has also aged and become even more of a bitch, now she’s pushing her son Essex to suck up to the queen. Here, the textile choice is a bit odd, it looks like orange and brown homespun raggedy woven stuffs (inappropriate for a person of her station), though the shape of the jacket is reasonably period, and the hat is cute.
Essex fucks around and eventually stages his little rebellion against the queen, which gets him executed. We’d hang him for wearing that shitty panne velvet doublet.
Elizabeth gives another speech, has some flashbacks, and dies. This miniseries does cover all the high points of her biography, with a bit more emphasis on the first third than the rest. Given that the Helen Mirren miniseries focuses more on the last two-thirds of Queen Elizabeth’s life, the two in one year gives good coverage!
What do you think of The Virgin Queen?
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Sam Reid is the superior Essex, despite how deeply terrible Anonymous was. That being said, I liked the scope of this miniseries, since we either see young Elizabeth or Elizabeth already as queen, and I thought Anne Marie Duff did a good job so I’m willing to look past the lacklustre costuming.
Having not seen very much of the show when it first aired and having been deeply unimpressed by the aesthetic on display – really, nothing dates a period film more badly than efforts to be ‘contemporary’ in fashion – I was delighted & amused to see Ms Joanne Whalley pop up as Her Late Majesty Queen Mary I of England, Ireland, France etc.
Partly for herself, partly knowing that she went on to play Queen Katherine in WOLF HALL (I look forward to seeing if Ms Romola Garai also manages that double at some point).