Margaret Kirby’s Crowning glory
Back on screen this week playing Princess Margaret in The Crown, English actress Vanessa Kirby talks to James Croot.
Although best known for her theatre work, English actress Vanessa Kirby has lit up the screen in everything from the BBC’s 2011 adaptation of Great Expectations, much-admired period drama The Hour and Richard Curtis’ time-travelling rom-com About Time.
Now, she’s back for the second season of Netflix’s lavish royal drama The Crown, with the 1956 to 1963 timeline offering her even an even bigger scene-stealing turn as the vivacious Princess Margaret.
Sunday News caught up with the 30-year-old Wimbledon-born actress while she was in Sydney last week. What’s it like returning to a character like Margaret after a break? It was so wonderful. I’ve never done it before where you build a character and then you get to go deeper with them and get to grow up with them.
If this was a 90-minute movie, Margaret would hardly be in it – she’d be in the background drunk or something.
So it was really lovely that we get to grow up with her and she really becomes a woman in this series and kind of meets her match. It was just a total privilege really. I just had even more fun this season. How much research did you do in order to feel ready to play her? I did so much, because Peter (Morgan, The Crown’s creator) writes from fact, really. His team of researchers are finding out specific facts and then he imagines the conversations, the scenarios and the scenes that join the dots of those facts. So I just tried to research those facts chronologically and also just really tried to get her essence and sort of spirit, as opposed to trying to copy anything. So how much of the shoot then was in chronological order? None of it was chronological. The first season was even harder because we started with some scenes from episode 10. I find it quite challenging really because you’re playing them over time. We’ve shot this over a couple of years, but the series has covered 16 years. I put a timeline up on my wall and I was really meticulous following the dates and where she psychologically she was at too. I also worked closely with Gemma [Hoff], who does my make-up, who was incredible in showing up the ageing process as well as the changing styles. What were the keys to playing her? I just really had to try get in touch with her and her depth of feeling – the range of feelings. She’s the most royal of all of them and yet I feel like she’s charismatic and outspoken.
I suppose I just read as many stories and first-hand accounts as I could to try and get to grips with her force of nature I suppose. I don’t know quite how I did it, but I just tried. What do you think makes Margaret so fascinating? I think it’s not often that you get somebody quite so vivid onscreen. I definitely haven’t played anyone like her before and she’s so vibrant and she’s a very rare kind of person in that everything she does she does at 100 per cent. She doesn’t really have a filter either, so she can’t really hide how she’s feeling.
Playing Margaret required something completely different from what I’m used to and it was hard to trust that I wasn’t being an absolute pantomime ham.
If this was a 90-minute movie, Margaret would hardly be in it – she’d be in the background drunk or something.
Do you feel any added pressure playing a real-life person? It was very daunting to take on and I was really worried that people would remember her and think I was nothing like her. I think the best thing about The Crown is that all of us on set were in the same boat. There was a shared sense of responsibility and fear. But because Peter had done The Audience and The Queen, we felt we couldn’t really be in safer hands. What’s it like working with Peter Morgan? What sets him apart from other writers? It was more like a theatre company, with no hierarchy, which was really lovely. Peter is just a genius. The thing that makes him unique, I think, is that he just writes every single person individually. What Margaret says are so different to any other character.
That means everybody is quite vibrant in their won way and very distinguishable. It’s been amazing to be a part of it really and it’s been the happiest job of my life. Yes, like Claire Foy and Matt Smith, this will be your last season on The Crown. How are you feeling about that? I’m definitely in denial. But we always knew at the beginning that the contracts were only ever for two seasons.
I feel very honoured that I’ve got to play a part of my life and I feel really excited for the next actress because she’s going to have the best, best time. ● Season 2 of The Crown is now streaming on Netflix.