Jodie Turner-Smith flashes fire and fury in Channel 5’s oh-so-serious Tudor drama, complete with a silly surplus of metaphors – and a weirdly wimpy Henry VIII. Wolf Hall it is not
If it’s pigs heads on platters, it must be Tudors. And so it is. 1536, to be precise. Opening captions for the new Channel 5 drama Anne Boleyn, stripped across three nights, inform us that Anne has been queen for two and half years, has provided Henry VIII with one daughter, had two miscarriages and is now pregnant again. She is the most powerful woman in England, and she has just five months to live. Dum-dum-DAH!
I added the dum-dum-DAH! Anne Boleyn (the drama) takes itself too seriously for that. This is not The Tudors, this is Proper History and it delivers on all the basics. The caprice of Henry (Mark Stanley). The claustrophobia of court. The power of a misplaced word or a deliberate strike. The power struggles between Cromwell (Barry Ward) and Anne (Jodie Turner-Smith). The quiet progress of the “little mouse” Jane Seymour (Lola Petticrew). The importance of an heir. The horse-trading between countries to secure alliances, and the seven-dimensional chess being played behind the scenes.
