Meet a very different Queen
Olivia Colman and co-stars of The Crown on stepping into some very big (and sensible shoes) for Season 3
The last Time Olivia Colman played a queen, she won an Oscar. Of course, that was less an exercise in serene majesty and more one of screaming, stuffing her face with cake and getting giddy over the sight of Rachel Weisz in leather breeches (quite understandable).
so were there any similarities between playing Queen anne in The Favourite and stepping into the sensible heels of Queen elizabeth ii in The Crown? “They were both called Queen?!” Colman hoots. “i couldn’t think of two more different people.”
With a £50 million budget per season, a trophy cabinet stuffed with awards and a vast (although undisclosed) audience, The Crown is the epic jewel in Netflix’s original programming. The first two series, which spanned 1947 to 1964, were triumphs of detail, period set-pieces and compelling performances that humanised inscrutable characters: the British royal family.
after her star-making year, any new Colman project would be highly anticipated, but the idea of a hit show navigating a complete cast overhaul is what makes The Crown’s third season so appealing. Colman, taking over the twin-sets and pearls from Claire Foy, is accompanied by Tobias menzies, who replaces matt smith as Prince Philip, and helena Bonham Carter picks up Princess margaret’s martini glass from Vanessa Kirby. The newcomer in the core cast is Josh O’connor as Prince Charles — although the 29-year-old is familiar from the ITV miniseries The Durrells, and as the star of the acclaimed British film God’s Own Country.
The casting facelift, which menzies refers to as “the strangest, most regal relay race” means that just as legacy weighs on their characters, the cast have one formidable act to follow. “Vanessa won a fucking BAFTA,” says Bonham Carter. “so there was a bit of intimidation going on. like, how do we top [that]? We can only go down. it’s such a hit; now we’re going to come and fuck it up.”
and although Colman snatched the role once offered — “i got the call and went, ‘Yes please!’ Very uncool” — she initially despaired at how “fucking amazing” Foy was as a younger elizabeth. “it probably would have been better for me not to have seen seasons 1 and 2,” she says. “all i could think of was what Claire had done, because she was so brilliant. But at some point you have to let that go and do what you do.”