One thing I regretted when we moved from London to New York two and a half years ago was that my then seven-year-old daughter was just starting to learn about Tudor kings and queens. We had visited the Tower of London to look at the spot where Anne Boleyn was executed.

The move across the Atlantic meant that she instead got to learn about American Indian tribes. Without any disrespect to Native Americans, this struck me as being a poor substitute in terms of wealth and intrigue.

Now the US seems to be catching up on the Tudors. The other day, I went to a premiere in Manhattan for The Other Boleyn Girl, the Sony Pictures film based on the Phillipa Kennedy novel about Anne and Mary Boleyn and Henry VIII.

Then, on the subway, I saw the poster for season two of The Tudors, the cable television romp about Henry 8 (as, like a rap star, he is styled), starring Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. “King takes Queen” is the tag-line by a picture of Henry 8 with his arms around Anne Boleyn, who is suggestively spilling wine from her goblet.

At the bottom of the poster, it says: “To enter the Tudor King Me Sweepstakes, text Crown to 74688.” I think I might just do that.

Costume dramas are not confined to British kings and queens, of course. Mad Men, the brilliant AMC series about Madison Avenue in 1960 has just hit the UK and is wowing critics with its precise depiction of the period.

But the Tudors are on a roll in the US. Which will become the star of a television programme or film next, I wonder? Helpfully, Showtime, the cable channel that produced The Tudors has a spot on its series website where producers and others can “check out the family trees of everyone from Henry to Anne Boleyn.”

March 12th, 2008 in Media | Permalink