Well, at least ONE royal TV drama can tell fact from fiction
The Crown refused – but new Catherine the Great series will include disclaimer
THE creator of a TV drama about the life of Russian empress Catherine the Great has included a disclaimer to warn audiences that some scenes are imagined – and warned of the dangers of not being honest with the public.
Australian dramatist Tony McNamara said of his new series The Great: ‘We’re dramatists, not historians.’
The Channel 4 drama, starring Nicholas Hoult and Elle Fanning, carries a disclaimer at the start to inform viewers that it is ‘an occasionally true story’.
McNamara, who is best known for cowriting Oscar-nominated film The Favourite, told The Times: ‘We don’t always tell Catherine’s story in the right chronology, but we tell it in the right spirit. And I’ve told the audience it’s not completely true. I’ve come clean.’
He said The Great contained ‘a history that is sort of true and facts I thought were useful’, adding: ‘I’m also aware of how history is written and chosen. We’re not that slavish to it because we think it doesn’t tell the story well enough.’
His comments come after a chorus of politicians and Royal experts told The Mail on Sunday that streaming giant Netflix should include a disclaimer before episodes of The Crown.
Critics say some of the scenes in the fourth series – particularly those examining the marriage of Prince Charles
‘I’ve come clean... We’re dramatists, not historians’
and Princess Diana – either never happened or are distortions of the truth.
The Crown’s creator Peter Morgan has resisted the calls, saying: ‘You sometimes have to forsake accuracy, but you must never forsake truth.’
But McNamara said The Crown ran into trouble when viewers could remember the individuals depicted.
‘They had a period where everything they did was seen as truth and now they’ve hit a period where people have lived it,’ he said. ‘The ownership people around the world had on that story – they can’t win.’
The Great, which begins tonight, details the marriage between Catherine, who ruled Russia between 1762 and 1796, and her second cousin, Peter III, whom she overthrew in a coup d’etat.
McNamara said he invented some sections to suit his dramatic purposes. ‘I had a particular story to write about men in power and the original Peter didn’t help me tell that story,’ he said. ‘He was a much weaker character, and childlike in a different way.
‘I created Peter to be a good antagonist to Catherine and to let me talk about men who inherit power and don’t know quite what to do with it. I was interested in how she responded to the fact that she had married the wrong man. Now she has to decide whether to kill him.’
WITH the exception of Masterchef and the Antiques Roadshow, I’ve more or less given up watching the BBC, as it seems to be living in a parallel universe where Frankie Boyle is funny and Alastair Campbell is still running Downing Street.
But like a fool I tuned in anyway on New Year’s Eve, expecting to be vaguely entertained – or to get some useful perspective on what, let’s face it, was one of the biggest moments of national transformation in our history: leaving the EU.
Instead we had Mock The Week, Graham Norton and endless carping about lorry queues (which, in the end, never transpired) on BBC News 24. The only decent thing was Jools Holland on BBC2, which probably means he’ll soon be culled for being old, white and knowing his Ramones from his Rolling Stones.
But otherwise, it was a cultural and intellectual desert. Where was the insight, the debate, the historic perspective? Where were the Laura Kuenssbergs, the Jeremy Paxmans, the Andrew Neils? I mean, fair enough, the BBC hasn’t exactly been the greatest cheerleader for Brexit. Perhaps it was too much to expect it actively to celebrate it. But at least properly acknowledge it, for goodness sake.
AND it wasn’t just the BBC. All of terrestrial telly had pretty much checked out for the night. ITV had Skyfall, followed by a gloomy Rageh Omaar. Channel 4 bunged on Little Fockers, the least funny film in a trilogy that is more than a decade old. As for Channel 5, I’m not even going to waste the newsprint. It was as though they’d all just given up and gone home. Probably to watch Netflix, like everyone else.
Of course, New Year’s Eve is not, traditionally, a big TV night, since usually most people are out partying. But this was no ordinary Hogmanay; this was the end of 2020.
Never before in living memory has the entire country effectively been grounded, stuck at home at the end of weeks and weeks of being… well, stuck at home, desperate for a bit of novelty and entertainment. It was the perfect opportunity for the main terrestrial channels to prove their relevance, to put on a display of talent and prowess, to show those upstarts that it is not all about the kind of production values only a billiondollar budget can buy.
That there is merit, still, in the collective TV experience, that make-adate telly, that moment when the entire nation sits down together united in one purpose, whether it be to find out who killed Dirty Den in EastEnders or to watch the jailing of Deirdre Barlow. But no, they flunked it. The biggest captive audience TV has ever known, on one of the most important nights in recent political history, and what do we get? A few lacklustre celebs, and Alicia Keys singing a song about New York. Out of tune.
Is it any wonder that ratings are at an all-time low? Or that a new poll, revealed yesterday, shows that half of Britons now think the BBC licence fee should be scrapped?
At a time of great change, this feels like a very big shift indeed: 2020, it seems, was the year that terrestrial TV died.
Amazing to think that something that has been with us for decades should be going the way of video recorders or landlines. But there’s no doubt that it is.
And while, given recent performances, it’s hard to have much sympathy for these TV execs whose lack of vision has contributed to the decline, I, for one, shall miss it terribly. Not just for the familiarity of routine, the way that following my favourite shows from week to week used to mark out time. Or for the inevitable water-cooler moments, those shared experiences that transcended class or culture.
But for the solidity and certainty those schedules offered in an everchanging world. My goodness how we could use some of that now.