I’ve been spending my evenings in the last several days watching The Tudors, and am done with the first season and half-way in the second. More remarks on the series.:)
The package came with a sticker with a review quote on the front – that The Tudors is comparable to The Sopranos, my all-time favorite TV drama series. In a nutshell, while some elements are similar – specifically the intertwined story lines, season-long plot arcs and a huge cast – little else is.
Casting is a mixed bag for starters. Sam Neill’s Cardinal Wolsey fares the best: his performance is nuanced, and he has the most complex character arc: from the King’s most trusted adviser to getting shunned and finally his suicide. Jeremy Northam as Thomas More portrays a humanistic scholar turned reluctant adviser to the King, and possibly the sole voice of sanity in the circus of loonies that was King Henry VIII’s court. Peter O’ Toole shows up in the second season as Pope Paul III, and he never does a part wrong. ’nuff said.
As for the women: Maria Doyle Kennedy plays Queen Catherine who was rejected by King Henry after he got the hots for Anne Boleyn. Historically, she was very much on the suffering end of Henry’s adulterous affairs, but tolerated them nonetheless. Her character is written sympathetically in this series, and her performance will draw viewers to empathize with her.
Natalie Dormer (pictured right) whom I remember from her supporting role in Casanova plays the critical role of Anne Boleyn, mother of the famed Queen Elizabeth I. Dormer has a sort of impish look and is very easy on the eyes. The script writes her as a schemer and seducer, but Dormer does well in her role here and not overact in a role that nudges viewers to hasten for her downfall.
The rest of the very large cast I had mixed feelings of. Joe Van Moyland’s Thomas Tallis is excruciatingly painful to watch, and even worse were the gay scenes involving him. The guy can’t act. The actors for Thomas Boleyn (Nick Dunning) and Charles Brandon (Henry Cavill) aren’t written satisfactorily: all they do is plot and scheme sneakily in the shadows, or serve as the King’s spoil and person to yell at respectively.
By far though, the biggest casting problem I had was the choice of Henry VIII: Jonathan Rhys Meyers. I really liked Meyers in Woody Allen’s Match Point, and he had a smaller role also in Mission: Impossible III. Unfortunately, he’s miscast here as Henry VIII to which the series revolves around. Meyers cuts an athletic and almost slender figure but with little physical girth. Especially jarring when the Henry VIII during this period of time was in his middle age, and an obese boar with a huge tummy.
I could forgo the physical incongruity of the actor with his historical counterpart, were it not for that Meyers completely overacts as the king. Meyers’ Henry VIII has no subtlety, no nuance, and absolutely no restraint. He scowls, stares, and yells every every line he has. If Meyers was a more physically imposing actor, his vocal thundering in every scene wouldn’t had been jarring. As it is, it really looks like a mouse screeching at an elephant in each scene. If there’s any one thing The Tudors could have imported from The Other Bolyen Girl, it’d be Eric Bana’s Henry VIII. At least Bana looked the part.
Continued in the next post.:)
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