Wolf Hall - Season 2 - The Mirror & the Light

eazybee

It is not prejudice, it is a desire for accuracy.

This.

Younger people watching would get the impression that this was what Tudor England was like when it would be patently wrong.

Remember Roots? It was fiction based on fact, should it ever be remade should white actors replace black actors? Would we tell viewers not to notice?

Exactly

It is not prejudice, it is a desire for accuracy.

Yes Whitewavemark2 wouldn’t that be nice? But it would still have zilch to do with making the Tudor court aristocracy anything but white, when they were all white as was most of our island nation bar a tiny percentage.
We can and do make light entertainment like Bridgerton where anything goes but Mantel’s books, while a mixture of fact and poetic license are depicting real people and if the Tudor architecture and clothes and so on aim for reality then the aristocracy have to be white.
As others say, would you like to see an actor like say, Jude Law play Martin Luther King?

Just think, sometime in the future, when all this prejudice has been laid to rest, the colour of a human’s skin will be totally unremarkable and the only thing that matters will be the persons ability and skill as an actor. We will have achieved that happy state of not “seeing a person’s totally irrelevant skin colour.

Unfortunately concentrating on skin colour, suggests a persons colour is more important than anything else, which of course is nonsense.

There was always people of different colour on these islands throughout our history. Prejudice was largely centred on faith - catholics, Muslim, Jews, Protestant etc. not on colour, so a persons skin colour was not considered remarkable.

JdotJ

I expect any day now that Benedict Cumberbatch will be announced as playing Nelson Mandela and Kate Winslet as Rosa Parks in 2 new historical series being

And won't there be a kerfuffle when that happens?

I expect any day now that Benedict Cumberbatch will be announced as playing Nelson Mandela and Kate Winslet as Rosa Parks in 2 new historical series being

keepingquiet

Not if their being black wasn't considered an issue.

It would not have been so much an issue as unusual so remarkable.

Millie22

I've just checked and the Duke of Norfolk is supposed to be in his 40's when Anne Boleyn died.

I'm not sure how old Timothy Spall is but he looks much older.

40s was old in those days!

Tim is 67.

Not if their being black wasn't considered an issue.

The, Henry V111.
Black people would have been extremely unusual so much more likely to have been recorded.

Tje only known black man at the court of henry V111 was John Blanke, a trumpeter who played at the funeral of Henry V11 and later for Henry V111.
Tobacco was introduced in England by Francis Drake or John Hawkins in about 1573, although popularly credited to Walter Raleigh, about ten years later

Millie22

I'm now struggling with an image of Henry VIII in jeans. How big would they be 😂

Well, if we're going to ignore historical accuracy and realism, Henry VIII could be skinny and short with black hair ... and wearing jeans.

I'm now struggling with an image of Henry VIII in jeans. How big would they be 😂

I've just checked and the Duke of Norfolk is supposed to be in his 40's when Anne Boleyn died.

I'm not sure how old Timothy Spall is but he looks much older.

If they're not going to aim for historical accuracy, all the actors may as well be wearing jeans!

and be smoking tobacco.

Well, not discovered yet!b
By the time of that Monarch's daughter there would have been tobacco around Court. They used clay pipes or chewed it.

FoghornLeghorn

keepingquiet

I suggest people read some real historical evidence for there being black people in the courts of all the Tudor monarchs.

Try Marina Kauffmann's book 'Black Tudors: The Untold Story for starters.

I do not dispute that there were black Tudors. In fact I have read the book you mention. However, there can be no dispute that Jane Seymour’s mother and sister were white. They’re being black would require an entire fabrication of their lineage. This is a fact. I would not expect to see Mark Rylance playing Nelson Mandela and suspect there would be a very loud outcry from certain quarters should this ever be considered.

For historical accuracy then yes, there would have been some black people at court; a musician, servants and in Tudor times, ambassadors from some countries.

However, However, there can be no dispute that Jane Seymour’s mother and sister were white. They’re being black would require an entire fabrication of their lineage. This is a fact. I would not expect to see Mark Rylance playing Nelson Mandela and suspect there would be a very loud outcry from certain quarters should this ever be considered

and changing any of this to suit today's sensibilities is wrong.

Doodledog

Posted too soon.

I meant to ask why skin colour is so important?

Well, it depends on your point of view. Some posters are saying this is a dramatisation and not a documentary, which of course is correct. This implies that slavish accuracy is unimportant. By that token, the actors could wear Victorian costumes, live in Georgian houses and be smoking tobacco. I expect however that researchers have left no stone unturned when it comes to the minutest detail of Tudor life. The fact then remains that the only black people at court, if any at all, would have been servants. So we have two choices. Either we abandon reality and simply enjoy this, or any other drama, on its own merits or we try to portray history as closely as possible to the information available.

Thanks Sparklefizz😃

Uncle Norfolk in the books and more than likely in real life was a bad tempered uncouth man.

Oreo

I thought all three books were brilliant and was sad when I finished them, I did enjoy the first tv series and am looking forward to this one too.

I agree with all 3 of your latest posts Oreo and I think Hilary Mantel's books are wonderful. I've read all 3 several times. The writing is exquisite.

Someone mentioned the tv programme on iPlayer "Peter Kosminsky Remembers Wolf Hall" which I found very interesting. He is the director of Wolf Hall and talks about how both series were made, and about the main actors and, of course, about Hilary Mantel. You might enjoy it.

luluaugust

In the end I did watch and wasn’t thrown by anybody’s colour yet. How terrifying they all were except perhaps the Duke of Norfolk. They could have actually done with an actor who looked like his portrait.

Timothy Spall was an odd choice I think.

Doodledog

If you say so. I disagree, but it doesn’t matter. I CBA to ‘discuss’ in the face of sighs and accusations of being ‘ignorant’. Gransnet has changed over the past few months - we used to be able to debate without this sort of thing, but now every thread seems to result in insults and personal digs.

Now this is just silly, and you know you weren’t called ignorant.
Your view is that it doesn’t matter on tv or film if real white characters in history are portrayed by non white actors and mine is that truth matters more than art in this sort of case.

In the end I did watch and wasn’t thrown by anybody’s colour yet. How terrifying they all were except perhaps the Duke of Norfolk. They could have actually done with an actor who looked like his portrait.