“I could see she was a good card to have in my hand,” director Stephen Frears told me when I interviewed him about The Queen, his 2006 film starring Helen Mirren as the monarch, adjusting to the aftermath of Princess Diana’s death. Yet neither he nor the movie’s writer Peter Morgan had reckoned with the success of the movie, which made around £108 million globally on a £13m budget, nor the warmth with which the public responded to Mirren’s austere, muti-award-winning performance.
Instantly recognisable but ultimately unknowable, Queen Elizabeth could be interpreted however creative artists or audiences wanted but the result was almost always fascinating and the response affectionate. A good card for creative types indeed.
