ROLE REPLAY: Catherine the Great

The Great (9pm, Ch4) is a fictional account of Catherine the Great after her marriage to Peter, Emperor of Russia. Elle Fanning is the latest in a long line of actresses to play her…

Forbidden Paradise (1924) One of the earliest screen biopics was Ernst Lubitsch’s silent film starring Pola Negri. Lubitsch and Otto Preminger remade it in 1945 as A Royal

Scandal, starring Tallulah Bankhead.

The Scarlet Empress

(1934) Marlene Dietrich does a superb job of showing Catherine’s transformation from naive young Princess to formidable leader (above). It was Josef von Sternberg’s fifth American film with Dietrich after discovering her in Berlin in 1929, and making her one of the Hollywood greats. Rent or buy on Amazon. Great Catherine (1968) This British farce, based on a play by George Bernard Shaw, stars French actress Jeanne Moreau as Catherine (right), with Peter O’toole as a British envoy sent to her court – where he must deal with her devious lover, Grigory Potemkin (Zero Mostel). Ekaterina (2014-19) An epic, threeseries docudrama from Russia, starring Marina Aleksandrova. Amazon Prime. Catherine The Great (2019) This fourpart series was a labour of love for star Helen Mirren (centre), who called the Empress ‘superhuman’. Sky/now TV.