The Royal Wives of Windsor, review: a frothy but fun history taking in everyone from Wallis Simpson to Koo Stark
ITV has become a royal superfan of late. The channel aired a highly uninformative Duchess of Cornwall documentary last week, while Sunday evening saw one on royal weddings. There’s still a programme about Prince Harry to follow on Thursday but first came The Royal Wives of Windsor (ITV).
This lively two-parter didn’t feature an appearance from Sir John Falstaff, sadly – Shakespeare’s lovable buffoon was always partial to a married woman – but explored how those who had joined the house of Windsor over the last century have fit into the world’s most famous dynasty and, in turn, helped the monarchy refresh and reinvent itself.
The Windsors’ choice of a suitable bride has moved with the times, the film argued, evolving from aristocrats to commoners and now (clutch pearls in horror!) a mixed-race foreigner. Plentiful comparisons were drawn between American divorcees Wallis Simpson and Meghan Markle, 80 years and several worlds apart. More surprising were parallels with Prince Andrew’s former girlfriend Koo Stark, another US actress who came close to joining the clan.
We saw how life as a princess could be less of a fairytale and more of a salutary one – a gilded cage of isolation, privacy-invasion and close protection.
The calibre of talking heads was high. Not just the usual royal correspondents and biographers but the likes of Jeremy Paxman, acerbic historian Simon Schama (describing with relish the Emanuel wedding dress worn by Diana, Princess of Wales as “that astonishingly overblown animated meringue”), journalist Rachel Johnson (who apologised on-camera for calling Meghan Markle “exotic”) and the ever-entertaining Gyles Brandreth.
The archive material was equally enjoyable, from rare footage of the young Queen Mother to corgis splashing about in Balmoral streams. There were evocative Eighties clips of a shy Diana and Sarah Ferguson (“Such fun, too much fun,” said Brandreth). The royal walk down memory lane ended with the Duchess of Cambridge: David Starkey recalled when she was widely known as “Waity Katie”, which I’d somehow completely forgotten.
This frothy film told us little that we didn’t already know. Instead it repackaged familiar material in a way which was accessibly insightful and faintly gossipy. A rewind through social history, as reflected through the royal prism. Just don’t say “toilet” or “pardon”, Meghan. And pour the tea in before the milk.
