Theatre

 

It is illegal to produce a drama about Queen Elizabeth. This state rule was also a creative limitation rule if you were William Shakespeare, or his contemporary dramatist friends. Any depiction of the reigning Queen on stage, or in any medium, might lead to social conflict and instability. Subjects could get the wrong idea. Staging a play called ‘The Crown’ with Elizabeth and other state actors (as we say today) in lead roles would have put Shakespeare outside the purple circle, inside a gaol. This was never his goal. If major figures had words and actions attributed to them falsely, it was a threat to the monarchy, seditious and even treasonable. Shakespeare’s solution to making contemporary political theatre was to retell stories based on monarchs who were safely out of the way. Hence ‘Richard the Third’ is a propaganda exercise about lineage aimed at the Tudors’ archrivals, the Plantagenets. Queen Elizabeth could sleep soundly at night, especially while she and her successor King James VI and I had Shakespeare on their side. ‘Macbeth’ is famously a screen for the chaos in London after the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Setting it somewhere remote, like Scotland, adds to the romance. This week’s call from the retro outfit the Australian Monarchist League reminds us of the wisdom of this quaint law. The law being, royals had to be well dead before writers dipped the poison pen that finished them off. Elizabeth’s father, King Henry VIII, was the last monarch dealt with by Shakespeare, though she and James are everywhere in his plays, once you know where to look. Really, the League is beleaguered that calls for bans, boycotts, and disclaimers on ‘The Crown’ that depicts Charles influencing John Major to force Elizabeth to abdicate in the heir’s favour. It’s not like that in the real world. Dame Judi Dench’s appeals for historical accuracy raise eyebrows amongst those who have watched her perform the inaccuracies of Shakespeare over a lifetime. Richard the Third wasn’t all bad. The real Macbeth was a nice person. King Charles is a work-in-progress (exclamation mark), which is another way of saying he is still alive. To plot against his mother is the stuff of Jacobean drama, very bad propaganda for the House of Windsor, and of a certainty untrue. But, it’s great theatre! Pity that our present day Shakespeares cannot contrive a dramatic trigger that not only is right but feels right. Amongst numerous other reasons why royals (and many of their subjects) must long for a return of the ‘well dead’ rule are those trashy royal magazines designed to take the sparkle out of Markle; the magazines where Kate and Camilla hurl crockery at one another on a daily basis and it all ends up in tears. It’s a wonder there is any Spode left.