He may be our worst king, but John is no pantomime villain, says Anderson
HE IS judged by many historians to have been petty, spiteful and cruel, and widely regarded as one of England’s least popular monarchs.
But one man at least feels sorry for the hapless King John, who was forced by the barons into accepting Magna Carta in 1215.
Which is just as well, because Clive Anderson, the presenter and comic writer, is to play the king in a mock trial of the noblemen who manoeuvred him into sealing the document that lay the foundations of this country’s legal system.
Anderson, 62, said: “In most people’s estimation, King John is probably the worst king this country has ever seen, but I do have some sympathy for him. I don’t want to play him as a pantomime villain.”
Indeed, the trial, to be staged on Friday at Westminster Hall, in the Palace of Westminster – for centuries the home of England’s highest law courts – will be a serious matter. To mark the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, leading figures from the law, politics and academia will defend their historical alter egos against charges of treason.
Anderson, as King John, will be chief among those claiming that the barons should be found guilty, regardless of the charter’s subsequent benefits. His counsel, James Eadie QC, will make the case that they were disloyal to the monarch to whom they had sworn allegiance. Nathalie Lieven QC, for the defence, will argue that they were simply responding to the king’s tyrannical behaviour and that the restrictions on his powers laid down in Magna Carta were in the public interest.
She will be hoping to save the life of Robert FitzWalter, one of the barons’ leaders, played by Prof David Carpenter, of King’s College London.
As a former barrister, Anderson is relishing the prospect of a case of such historical significance – albeit one that will come to a judgment a full eight centuries after the event being tried.
“I imagine he would be pretty abrupt with these people who are questioning his honour and, in his eyes, behaving treasonably,” said the former presenter of Whose Line Is It
Anyway?. “He’d certainly be affronted at having to sign a document like Magna Carta, which I’m sure he would have found rather tiresome.”
Anderson, who was called to the bar at the Middle Temple in 1976, before taking up writing, added: “Magna Carta deserves its place in history, and this mock trial is a dramatic way of showing what was in the charter.”