A Potpourri of Vestiges Review
Almost
500 years after her death, Anne Boleyn remains a highly divisive figure in
history. Some see her as a power-hungry woman who seduced King Henry VIII,
forcing the ‘pious’ king to annul his first marriage to Katherine of Aragon.
Others see her as a humanitarian and a reformer who was devoted to protecting
the rights of the weak and the poor. Anne was the Queen of England from 1533 to
1536 as the second wife of King Henry VIII. In order to secure the passage of
his marriage with her, Henry had to break with the Roman Catholic Church in
1533. In other words, the Pope and general councils of the church no longer
enjoyed the final authority in doctrinal and legal disputes which now rested
with the monarch. But, only 3 years later, the same Henry, who took on the
papacy and triggered the English Reformation in order to marry Anne, puts her
on a trial for treason, which leads to her beheading. A three-part British
miniseries titled ‘Anne Boleyn’ which is currently streaming on SonyLIV revisits
the age-old tale of Anne’s fall from grace, giving it some interesting twists
and turns.
Now, the miniseries has been
completely written off by the critics. But the criticism actually has little to
do with the show’s merit. One of the major reasons why ‘Anne Boleyn’ has been
panned by the critics has to do with the casting of Jodie Turner-Smith in the
titular role. How can a Black actress portray the white Tudor queen? This
underlying argument seems to have occluded their judgment. So, here’s my
counter-argument: If the American actress Linda Hunt can go on to win an
Academy Award essaying the part of a Chinese-Australian man in Peter Weir’s The
Year of Living Dangerously (1982) then why can’t a Black actress play the part
of Queen Anne Boleyn?
The fact of the matter is
that the story of Anne Boleyn has been done to death. Some titles that come to
mind are Anne of the Thousand Days (1969), The Other Boleyn Girl (2008), Wolf
Hall (TV Miniseries 2015), and The Tudors (TV Series 2007-2010). More often
than not, Anne is portrayed as a scheming temptress or a manipulative woman
desperate to climb the social ladder. So when the writer-director duo of Eve
Hedderwick Turner and Lynsey Miller dare to break the stereotypes by casting a gifted
performer like Jodie Turner-Smith in the role of a strong queen like Anne
Boleyn, I just don’t understand why it’s not getting celebrated? It’s a case of identity-conscious casting that
theatre productions use all the time for historical plays. So it’s actually a
positive sign to see that film and television are finally catching up with
theatre in a bid to open up literary texts to fresh interpretations.
Consider the 2018 BBC series
Les Misérables which stars a David Oyelowo in the role of a police chief named
Javert. For the uninitiated, Victor Hugo’s novel Les Misérables on which the
series is based is set in 19th century France. Now, anyone can pose
the all important question to the makers: How can a Black man be a police chief
in the 19th century France? Clearly, BBC wanted its series to follow
a rather non-literal approach. Similarly, the makers of ‘Anne Boleyn’ want it
to rise above the shadows of history. Mark Stanley, who essays the part of
Henry VIII in the miniseries, sums it up perfectly: “Jodie has a lot in common
with Anne Boleyn. She’s a strong, opinionated, scarily intelligent person. She
was also bringing up a young child at the time that we were on set, and she’s
quite awe-inspiring really… It was all about this being the right person for
the job, rather than what we as a society might perceive as the ‘right look’
for the job. Anne Boleyn was beautiful, witty, vibrant, intelligent and Jodie
is all of those things. She brought our Anne to life in a way another actress
couldn’t.” The casting is also in sync
with the feelings of otherness and disparity that Anne would have felt in the
Tudor court.
Now, Jodie’s Queen Anne is
no pushover; she is brave and tenacious but is not without flaws. Her passions
often run wild and she can be most peremptory when she wants. But no one can
question her intelligence as well as devotion for King Henry. She most
certainly is smarter than any man around her and has a strong vision for her
country and its people. The hitherto hated figure of Anne Boleyn became venerated
as a martyr and the face of the English Reformation after her daughter with
Henry VIII, Elizabeth I, was crowned as the Queen of England in 1558. It would
have been ideal had ‘Anne Boleyn’ not ended with the queen’s execution and also
covered events leading to Elizabeth’s coronation which paved the way for Anne’s
rise as a revered historical figure as that would have provided a perfect
closure to her tale. But, in its present form, the story, despite its daring,
feels rather incomplete.
A version of this review was first published in The Daily Guardian.
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