Jodie Turner-Smith as Anne Boleyn

[Bitchysideisouttoplay]

www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-9071763/Director-TV-drama-Anne-Boleyn-says-best-person-role.html#article-9071763
Not and AIBU really but what does everyone think if this?
Personally I think if you are making a historical drama/film etc surely you should cast a person as close in looks to the historical figure.
Before anyone says I'm.being racist I'm not I had massive issues with the casting in the Tudors due to Johnathan Rhys Meyers being cast as Henry, he is short, not ginger and really does not look anything like Henry in portraits 🙄🙄

Normally, I would say that most roles can be played by either a black or white actor. James Bond springs to mind. A black Dr Who would work fine. However, when it comes to a historical figure like Anne Boleyn, we know she was not black. Also, if she had been, Henry would never have married her which would, of course, have changed history. By all accounts though, Jodie Turner- Smith is great in the role. After all, did Jonathan Rhys Meyers look like Henry the Eighth in the Tudors? No he did not. Nothing at all like him.

Interesting thread.

I love this period but I am also amused when people try and claim that eg there weren't black people in Tudor England - there were and there should definitely be far more representation of non whites in all drama not just period drama and not just on camera either I was reading the article in the radio times with Steve McQueen and he was saying about the lack of diversity behind the camera too.

I would really like it if they started making more stuff from Black history and folklore rather than this.

totally agree. I'm looking forward to watching ma Rainey's black bottom starring the sublime viola Davis (who also revealed on Graham Norton she's soon to be playing Michele Obama!) and jingle jangle which I hear is great fun

But I agree I think a major historical figure should be portrayed accurately as possible

But re JRM playing Henry viii, looks wise he wasn't too dissimilar to a young Henry viii which was mostly the period portrayed. The weirdest part was an Irishman playing a monarch who basically started hundreds of years of turmoil for them!

But even though I love the period Henry viii and Anne Boleyn have been done to death anyway!

I'd also like to see more Scots/Irish/welsh history being dramatised (but mainly kept accurate) and played on mainstream channels and services.

I can't recall a recent drama on eg James v or the highland clearances!

Mommabear20

In fictional films, series etc I have no problem with any race being cast, (Lee Jordan being changed from a white boy in the Harry Potter book to a black girl in the film for example)

Totally missing the point of the thread but Lee Jordan is a boy in the films
And I'm not sure his race is mentioned in the book (although I haven't read it in a while)

We don't know what Anne Boleyn looked like
Well there's a portrait of her which gives us a fair idea, and which casting seems to be usually based on. Anyway I think we can safely say it was nothing like this actress. It would have been mentioned at the time.

The problem is some people will watch inaccurate programmes & genuinely think Anne Boleyn was black.

If I see a film about Queen Anne I’d rather she wasn’t played by a 6 foot slim woman with all her kids surviving to adulthood.

With historical figures I think they should stick as closely to facts as possible. Appreciate it’s drama but they tend to loosely be based on facts (see The Crown). They wouldn’t cast Queeny as a black woman because she isn’t black so not sure why Anne Boleyn should be any different just because she was Queen 500 years ago.

Don’t care about fictional characters such as Bond or Dr Who, cast whoever you wish.

I love this period but I am also amused when people try and claim that eg there weren't black people in Tudor England

Of course there were, but none of them would have got near to becoming the wife of the reigning monarch! If Tudor society had been such where this would/could have happened, it would have been a completely different society to that which is presumably being depicted in this drama.

And I agree it would be great to do a drama featuring the black people who lived in Tudor England.

i don't expect a costume drama to be a documentary, but I do expect it to authentic enough to give me that "Ooh, I've stepped out of a time machine!" feeling. A pleasant disorientation that you get when you find yourself in another world. Small differences don't matter, but radical changes that misrepresent the "feel" of the era (such as suggesting that unreconstructed Tudor folk were beautifully race blind) just feel jarring and stupid and take the enjoyment away.

@Passmeabottlemrjones

I love this period but I am also amused when people try and claim that eg there weren't black people in Tudor England

Of course there were, but none of them would have got near to becoming the wife of the reigning monarch! If Tudor society had been such where this would/could have happened, it would have been a completely different society to that which is presumably being depicted in this drama.

Exactly.

There were exceedingly few black people in Tudor England, and most of those were men. The overwhelming majority of English people at that time - including the movers and shakers at Henry's court - would never have seen a black person in their lives. There were zero black people among the upper class families that Ann Boleyn came from.

As someone said above, the idea that people who were extremely racist, sexist, bigoted and homophobic by any modern standards would think nothing of a black woman marrying the king of England is ludicrous. Why bother setting a drama in that time period if you're not going to respect the historical realities at all?

They would have been pretty awful towards the lower classes let alone anyone from another culture