Royal Pains: The Crown Season 4

 

I've been watching season 4 of the Crown on Netflix. I wanted to write about Thatcher because I think she is a more interesting person. She's an irritation in the show however and her droning voice makes me queasy. She is too wooden (in the show) and put off by most things related to the monarchy. I know she was tough in real life and made enemies. But her legacy is in cutting inflation and creating opportunities for home ownership. The economic boom came did happen after some slow years and union busting. I think this could have been shown more. Instead we get the sense that Thatcher doesn't care that people are out of work. She'd rather start a small war in the Falklands than have to help her own citizens.

The show is called The Crown though and so the royals get the most press.

Charles and Diana are already done by the late 80’s. They didn’t actually divorce until 1996 but it feels like a mess in the first year. If there is any truth to the characters in the story, and that’s asking a lot, neither come off very well. At first I thought they’d show Charles as a pompous, awkward ass and Diana as a put-upon mother just trying to survive. Thankfully it’s a lot more complicated than that. Charles is incredibly vain and insecure. He thinks of himself and his home, his happiness and his image in the Commonwealth above everything. Diana is also vain but slightly more sympathetic because of her young age and approachability. I don’t actually know if she was approachable but she pulls it off well in the Australia episode. The Australia-New Zealand trip was their first official visit as a couple. The excursion was apparently a smashing success for Diana, less so for Charles who just looks out-of-sorts and constantly moody.

 Diana refuses to put her newborn son up with a midwife and parade around the country waving at crowds and giving speeches. She insists on being with her baby in a secluded place. That endeared her to a lot of people because they understood the difficulty in leaving a baby for 6 weeks. She seemed like a loving, caring mother—not like a royal.

But she loves the adulation a little too much and her newfound celebrity turns her into the central character in her struggling marriage. That isn’t how it’s supposed to work. You don’t upstage a Windsor. It all goes south after their Australia trip but there is an overwhelming sense that these two just don’t work together. It’s more than age or status. They’re just different people with different interests and different goals. Charles wants his mistress (Camila Bowles) but can’t marry her because she is married to someone else. Even if he could, she wouldn’t leave her marriage easily and the Crown wouldn’t support it. But of course it does eventually happen and the Crown, reluctantly supports it.

Diana does some daft things to “prove” how much she loves Charles. She does a dance number at a local opera on his birthday. Charles is mortified. She then enlists a private orchestra and sings some musical numbers for him. He is mortified again.

These aren’t objects of affection for her man; they’re little bits of drama where she gets to play the star. But she acts hurt when he is understandably reviled at her lack of tact. That she didn’t her little performances for what they were proves how selfish she became, matching Charles in the adulation department. Especially when Charles has never expressed any interest in her singing, dancing or theater performances.

Diana was a young impressionable girl in the first episode who probably though marrying a royal was glamorous and exciting. But the dull ceremonial stuff eventually gets in the way and when you’re married to a lump like Charles, it’s splitsville for sure. I think this is likely what happened to her son Harry and his wife Meghan. She thought royalty meant parties with celebrities and fame. Instead it meant ceremonial duties and charities, putting the monarchy first at all costs. She was never cut out for it and I don’t think Harry is either.

There is great scene in the last episode where Prince Philip (Charles father) corners Diana at the Christmas party. The marriage is a shambles and everyone in the family knows it. He recounts his history with the queen and how difficult it was to take a lower position to her. His ego took a hit and they nearly separated a few times. Of course his extramarital affairs contributed quite a lot to it. But they figured out how to manage so the monarchy could survive and the queen maintained her role as central figure. He is really telling Diana that the maintenance of the Crown is the only thing that matters and she needs to realize it. In other words, you have your position, fame and connections because of it. He’s hoping that Charles and Diana can come to an arrangement and carry on, grow up a bit. Instinctively they know that royal divorces make the family look bad and might frustrate attempts from the public to keep supporting them.

With any of these true life stories you have to wonder how much is “true” and how much is fiction. The large events are certainly true, in both the lives of the royal family and the prime minister. But it’s impossible to tell a person’s life in movie form over the course of a season. It’s unfair by definition. So criticism of characters, stories and personalities are baked in with shows like this.

 I think it’s the best thing on Netflix right now.