It has been days...nay weeks...nay, perhaps a month since I last wrote, and I do sincerely say sorry. Although, let's be honest, the people who are reading this blog probably consist of my family, a handful of friends back home, some procrastinating classmates, and a sprinkling of strangers in odd lands whose blog-finding abilities astound me. I tip my feather hat to you, stranger-people-in-Russia.
Why, you may ask, has my diction morphed into that of a member of a royal English court of the 15th century? Well, I shall indulge you kind peoples: I have been watching The Tudors - yes, The Tudors. You know, the Showtime series dramatizing the realm of King Henry VIII of England - the guy who pissed off the Pope, had a pretty nasty ulcer on his leg, and *really* liked changing his mind regarding his children's inheritance rights, his views on religion, and...wives.
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| Foreshadowing at its finest. |
It was the court of this Henry (of many English King Henry's) that first cultivated my fascination with British culture and history when I made my initial island visit at the wee age of six. I bought every children's guide-book I could find depicting the horrible history of the Tower of London and the English crown, read them cover to cover, and then proceeded to drag my parents through all of the historical sites, collecting even more books and correcting angry 20-something-year-old-history-majors-turned-tour-guides along the way. It was probably weird that a six-year-old American girl was so fascinated with the subject, but whatever, I thought it was cool - and way before Jonathan Rhys Meyers put on some pantaloons and ripped off his tunic every five minutes to show off his six pack (which is TOTALLY historically inaccurate, by the way - Henry VIII was fat, c'mon).
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| what Henry VIII actually (supposedly) looked like |
ANYWHO, coolness aside and critique continuing, I just finished the entire series on LOVEFILM.com (yes, that's right, LoveFilm - it's an Amazon.com company, Google it I dare you). And although my friend Alexa is right in calling it historical "soft porn," it has its moments.
For example, don't you remember the good ol' days when men wore a myriad of doilies around their neck and an entire fox around their body to prove that they had money?! No? Well, The Tudors do. What about that time Henry Cavill (aka the newest Superman) resembled a cocker spaniel?
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| Sir Superman - doilies on neck, fur on shoulders, spaniel in hairstyle. |
And when Joss Stone - the sultry British singer of the early thousands - was cast as "the ugly queen" who "looked like a horse" (aka Anne of Cleves), and thus was the first "Lady Edith" of historical British TV drama?
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| "Fell in Love With A Boy"...but probably the wrong boy |
And how about how the casting directors couldn't find a real ginger child to play the young Queen Elizabeth, so they cast a kid whose hair was unfortunately dyed and whose facial characteristics failed to resemble those of either Jonathan Rhys Meyers (if we're taking artistic license with the unrealistic casting of the King, at least keep the unrealistic casting of the entire family consistent...) OR the actress who played her mother, the ill-fated Anne Boleyn, whose constant nasal flares and lip quivering really made me less sad to say "off with her head!"
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| No resemblance whatsoever. Quiver your lips and flare your nostrils all the way to the block, Boleyn. |
Oh, and Lady Mary - poor Lady Mary - with her incessant crying: "I'll never be kissed, let alone married! Why can't I make everyone catholic?! Why am I secretly in love with an 80-year-old Spaniard with gout?! WHY?! WHY?! WHY?! Ugh, fine, I'll just kill everyone in 20 years."
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| Attractive Henry Cavill says "Cheer up, Lady Mary! My character has been a secret Catholic all along!" |
And why the hell did baby Prince Edward have an American accent?!
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| The cast really can't be bothered to answer that last one; they've already gone back to enjoying modern-day-marvels, like cigarettes, coffee and SUVs. |
Perhaps we should all just concentrate on one of the more hilarious moments of the show, a conversation between Rhys Meyers and Cavill (see "Previously On..." at the beginning of Season 4, Episode 7), where Rhys Meyers exclaims (in his best Marlon Brando impression, which apparently his acting coach told him would instantly make him sound aged):
I bet Marlon Brando didn't have to wear this ridiculous hat...
"Do you really want to fight again?"
"Yes."
"Take another wife?!"
"YEEESSSS. Am I still not able...to have a wife?! To have more children - TO BE MYSELF?!"
Yes, Henry-Brando-Rhys Meyers - you are able to be yourself. You were (historically) yourself, down to the very last beheading. When your marriage history can be summarized as: divorce (Catherine of Aragon), beheading (Anne Boleyn), unfortunate childbirth death (Jane Seymour), divorce (Anne of Cleves), beheading (Catherine Howard), and finally marriage by force (Catherine Parr), you're kind of used to "being yourself"...even if that means you got to kill your wives and best friends along the way (see "friends": Thomas Wolsey, Sir Thomas More, and Thomas Cromwell, just to name a few...apparently he didn't really like people named Thomas).
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| seven of you are going to die :( |
But we'll let it all slide in TV-land, because let's be honest: nobody in the real court of Henry VIII was remotely as attractive as the actors on The Tudors (gawd-damn those boys are handsome). Nor was it possible to actually have as much sex as is suggested (and shown) on the show. Because in all honesty, nobody really brushed their teeth, and their common diseases were named things like "the bloody flux" (so not sexy). And showers...nobody showered. So, we'll take Spaniel Cavill and Quivering Boleyn and Marlon Rhys Meyers. But we'll still contest the vivid and disturbing "quartering" (DON'T Google it, I dare you) of the actor who would later play the beloved underdog chauffeur Tom Branson on Downton Abbey (just to bring it full circle). Kill your wives, Henry, but how dare you kill Branson-to-be - Lady Sybil was already more than we could handle (don't even get me started on Matthew...).
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| *Dysentery never looked this good* |
OK, back to reading "real" history books...*sigh*
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