Palace sheds light on Queen Anne’s intimate friendships
SHE has been largely forgotten, despite being on the throne at the creation of the United Kingdom and having one of the most fascinating, and tragic, personal lives of any Queen of England.
But now Queen Anne is to take centre stage once again as her intimate relationships with two of her female aides are explored in a film and a royal exhibition.
The Favourite, which opens in cinemas on New Year’s Day and is already the winner of several film awards, details Queen Anne’s friendships with the Duchess of Marlborough, Sarah Churchill, and Abigail Hill, Sarah’s cousin, and the bitter rivalry that would consume their court.
The film, starring Olivia Coleman, Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz, was filmed partly on location at Hampton Court. Now Kensington Palace is to host a new exhibition showcasing costumes from the film and promising to tell the Queen’s real story. Matthew Storey, curator at Historic Royal Pal- aces, said it would resist giving modern values to Queen Anne’s relationships, saying labels including LGBT would have been viewed very differently in the 18th century. “She does write incredibly passionate letters to Sarah… There was a really close and important relationship there, but whether it was physical or not we’ll never know,” he said. Mr Storey added: “We’ve been doing a lot of research into how we can tell diverse stories, especially LGBT stories, and Queen Anne is a key person for that.”
The exhibition runs until Feb 8.