the red queen the white queen and the kingmaker's daughter

the red queen the white queen and the kingmaker

Lady Beaufort doesn’t like young Lizzie or her mother. Now that she’s a Dowager Queen whose house has fallen, she has far less power than her rival, the king’s mother Lady Margaret Beaufort (Michelle Fairley). “The White Princess” drips with these temptations, although the venom is less intoxicating that the stuff of FX’s “Feud.” The monarchic conflict is stately and stilted, and much to the viewer’s royal pain, originates not from the queen but her mother and mother-in-law.Įlizabeth of York is still her mother’s daughter - and if “The White Queen” proved anything, it is that Elizabeth Woodville, aka The White Queen (played here by Essie Davis) is a political strategist who could give Cersei Lannister a run for her gold. What historians and monarchy buffs failed to take into account is how much audiences love opulent palace intrigue and high-born bitchery. Any miniseries that attempts to jam more than three decades of history and three novels’ worth of material into 10 hours is galloping on thin ice to begin with, and that’s before the viewer marinated in visions of renaissance faire dresses and various failures to mask modern upgrades to the castles used in the production. Such dismissive attitudes met “The White Queen” when it premiered in the U.K. This is where theory and scoffing and nitpicking comes into play, presuming to stain any esteem the account in question may attract.

The further back we go in time, the murkier the accounts become. Historical accuracy is often sacrificed on the altar of costume drama, especially if the period in question involves the British monarchy of old. And while that version of events is sufficient to gas up the tank for a two-hour movie, it’s probably not enough to keep viewers interested for eight full hours. In contrast, various accounts posit that the union of Henry VII and Lizzie may have begun in a rocky place but eventually became an affectionate one. The reign of Henry the VII and his Lizzie preceded the decidedly sexier times of Henry VIII, the British king Americans associate with gnawing on gigantic turkey legs (which is false, but hilarious) and plowing through multiple marriages (decidedly true). Their marriage was a political palliative to a land shredded by decades of conflict, forged after Henry ended the Wars of the Roses by defeating Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth.

For in the annals of history, King Henry VII (played in the miniseries by Jacob Collins-Levy) and Elizabeth of York (Jodie Comer) were, in modern parlance, pretty basic. on Starz is, ahem, bursting with speculation.

Also, turn off your TV dammit! For the history imparted in that miniseries and “The White Princess,” premiering Sunday at 8 p.m. Note to any high school students watching “The White Queen” while cramming for that world history final: Handrails and zippers did not exist in Lancastrian Britain.

The red queen the white queen and the kingmaker's daughter