WHAT HER HIGHNESS DID NEXT

As one of few female leads in sci-fi hit Doctor Who, the “perpetually pregnant” queen of England in period drama Victoria, or the mother of a missing baby in new psych-thriller series The Cry, Jenna Coleman leads with aplomb – but admits she still has c

SWOTTING UP TO PLAY ON QUEEN VICTORIA

“[Queen Victoria’s] diaries are all online – she wrote pretty much daily, over 62 million words. What’s quite amazing is that I can read her diaries along the same period of time as we’re filming. On my way to work or while I’m in makeup I can look up the dates we’re about to shoot, say ‘April 1848’, and get everything. We’ve just filmed the French Revolution, when King Louis-phillippe was kicked out of France and went to stay with [the British Royal Family], and I could read in her diaries what the king said to her on his arrival. In terms of research it’s amazing. She’s very unexpected, and is completely not what her portraits and her public image, in all her straight-laced collars, would suggest. She is incredibly frank and really, really funny with a complete lack of patience. If she likes you she is loyal to you forever, but if she doesn’t like you she’s horrible.”

VICTORIA’S

ON MATERNAL INSTINCT

“Victoria is not thought to have been a very affectionate mother – she would tell her children they spoilt her honeymoon and the first years of her marriage [with Prince Albert]. I think she had this ambivalence toward them because she was somebody who had fought for her independence, only to [marry at the age of 20 and become pregnant the following month]. Obviously there were no contraceptives, and that often meant being pregnant without choosing to be – in Victoria’s case, nine times over, with no pain relief during labour. To have nine children and also be queen of an empire is unbelievable to get your head around. As someone who wanted to go out and see the world, but had to live her life in a different way than expected, really took a toll. At the same time, almost every other sentence in her diaries is about her children, and [she and Albert] spent a lot more time with them than what was usual within their court. She seemed torn between resentment for having to give up her independence and also her love for them.”

ON THE CRY

“Filming was an emotional marathon; I had to really manage my mental endurance because it was incredibly dark in places. [The series centres around the kidnapping of a child in a small Australian town.] I kept trying to think about my character’s [separation from] her child on a physical level, as though it was a physical thing that was happening to her, like losing her arm. I gave myself a bit of a hard time at first – I spent the first couple of weeks of filming thinking I had been grossly miscast because I am not a mum, and I kept thinking there was something I wouldn’t be able to understand, because of what everybody says about that bond being so primal. But then I thought that I also don’t know what it is like to be Queen Victoria, and that’s my job.”

ON WHAT’S UP NEXT

“I choose roles on a script-by-script basis and often it’s led by a project feeling like a departure to what I’ve just finished. After Doctor Who, Victoria was the perfect antidote and then after

Victoria, The Cry felt very different. I’d love to do some theatre, it’s just a matter of finding the right play, and obviously the right timing. I’ve basically been looking every single night at the minute. But I finished filming The Cry on a Saturday and began Victoria on the Monday, so for now I’m potentially going to take a holiday!” E