The Crown - series 3

[southeastdweller]

I'm so looking forward to seeing this when it returns next Sunday!

Matthew Goode was excellent though, as a younger Tony

@diddl The bit about Snowdon rushing there is true but apparently the DoE didn't attend the funeral but visited with the Queen when she did. He may have gone there a few days prior to her visit too.

I think the whole thing was tragic/horrific/emotional enough without them having to make up bits!

I just finished series 3 last night after plowing through series 1 and 2 over the last few weeks. I'm late to the party it would appear!

Loved Jason Watkins as Harold Wilson, I've loved him in everything I've seen him in (being human, psychoville etc) to be honest. He's very good.

Ben Daniels is a big favourite of mine (anyone else remember cutting it? I loved that show, it went downhill after he left) I've not long since finished watching him in The Exorcist series.

I liked Olivia Colman and Tobias Menzies and I think the actor they got to play Charles was really good, I felt so sad for him in the second to last episode. And Derek Jacobi was a surprise turn! I always like him.

I can't wait to see what Gillian Anderson does with Thatcher in series 4.

Just binged it all. Jason Watkins was brilliant and he apparently found the Aberfan scenes particularly difficult because of the death of his own young daughter. Amazing actor.

I remember Cutting It.

Started off ok but soon quite ridiculous iirc

The first series of Cutting it was brilliant.
The last one however...

Gosh I'd forgotten he was in Cutting It. I loved it.

Apparently Snowdon did go straight to Aberfan when he heard because he felt it was a Welsh tragedy so (as a Welshman) he should go. I wondered if it was partly his photographer's instincts but apparently he didn't take any photos at all. He just spoke to people and made them tea. The DofE went down quite quickly too and he was advised that the Queen shouldn't come because they wanted to focus on the rescue effort. He then went back again when the Queen went later.

I only knew Ben Daniels from Cutting It but I didn't realise he was an acclaimed stage actor too, with an Olivier award and a Tony nomination under his belt.

I enjoyed the investiture one as I was a student at a Welsh university (not Aber) at the time. We had summer jobs doing stuff for the tourism around the investiture so saw some of the action. I would be surprised if he didn't have friends though. There was a lot of Welsh nationalist and Welsh activism at the time in my university, but a lot of English students too.

I read that he struggled at university, having sadly previously struggled at school. He did EXTREMELY badly at A Level and was still awarded a Cambridge place. This bred resentment.

That's interesting, I read years ago he got 2 E's and other students used to shout two E's at him, but I Went to check his Wiki says B and C still not good enough for Cambridge, perhaps rumour went round that his grades were low and that's what came out at the end of it.

I mean financially and in terms of material comfort, he's had it easy, but I think he's had quite a hard life in very many respects.

I felt really sorry for Princess Margaret at her birthday dinner. Tony was so awful to her and her family just seemed to take his side.

Overall not as good as previous series and think it will get worse as it stops being such a period piece of drama.

I've watched 4 so far and I'm enjoying more than I thought I would. I like OC but I ways thinkshe is always OC in things iyswim? I'm enjoying her as the Queen though. I do think the should have aged the original cast for a while though. HBC is too old to be PM at the moment.
Re the Aberfan one, did anyone notice the children were nearly always filmed from behind?

I love Ben Daniels. He is a good actor and was great in Law and Order UK as part of the Crown Prosecution Service and in Larkrise to Candleford (or was it Larkfield to Candlerise? I often forget). He is a real dish but.....wouldn't be interested in me.

From what I remember (I went to uni in '68), at the time there were still a lot of unconditional offers at Oxbridge and I don't think B, C was unusual. The trendy places to go were the new universities, Sussex, East Anglia etc. I don't remember resentment at Charles going to Cambridge - a bit of eye-rolling maybe. There were still plenty of people getting in there because of who they knew, umpteen generations of the family had been there, public school links to colleges etc.
Lots of us at university were busy protesting about all sorts of things, but I don't remember Prince Charles as one of them. 😀

I wish I could remember where I read it, potentially it was the Kitty Kelly book

Yes missclimpson, you're right about the unconditional offers from Oxbridge so Prince Charles wouldn't have been the only one. University was a lonely time for him, at least some of the time, he wasn't 'allowed' to join or 'do' a lot of things.

The next generations were not pushed into Oxford or Cambridge and seem to be generally 'healthier' as a result. However Charles has managed to accomplish quite a few things since then and is now far more relaxed in his (relatively) old age.

The one about Princess Alice was really interesting.

What a life!

I can't help but wonder if the makers of this really don't like Philip.

He comes across terribly.

I went to a very academic school in the 80’s. Oxbridge unconditional offers were received from friends. My offers from regular universities, not Durham ilk, were C, D,E & that wasn’t unusual. (Did better though). My friends & I laugh that we never would get in now! It’s all relative I suppose.

But consider Phillips own upbringing. Counselling just wasn't done then.

I remember watching him being interviewed by Katie Derham, I found him really interesting, he really had no time for what were quite ill thought out questions

Such as

Your childhood was very hard wouldn't you say?

Answer : No

Instead of "Tell us what it was like when you were a child"

Or "The Duke Of Edinburgh's Award is the thing your most proud of isn't it?

Answer : No

Instead of "What are you most proud of"

He was 90, very sharp, and gave her patronising questions the short shrift they deserved.

Speaking of royals being accepted into prestigious unis despite unremarkable (I'm being generous) A levels; apparantly Philip's reaction to the news that his 3rd son had been accepted by Jesus College, Cambridge, was to remark "What a friend we have in Jesus!"

Perhaps my favourite Philip-sim.

I actually quite like Philip. I think he's very motivated by his family losing their thrones/kingdoms; then the losses of his DSIS, etc and everything else follows from that. He has a real survivalist mentality that doesn't leave a lot of room for sentiment.

Charles must be so frustrated. It must be difficult to spend your entire life training for a job that your DM won't let you have. She should have abdicated.

Is anyone else watching and seeing parallels with the current younger Royals ie who is the dull one; who is the dazzling but irresponsible one? who longs to rule but won't? and who will rule but would rather not?

I felt really sorry for Princess Margaret at her birthday dinner.

I wouldn't worry, @ mrscampbellblackagain it didn't happen, or at least not at her birthday dinner. At the beginning of the scene, the Queen was talking about the election that had just resulted in a minority government - that was in February. Margaret's birthday was 21st August.