Off with her (sister's) head

In Anne Boleyn-related news, the Guardian reports that there's to be a film version of Philippa Gregory's The Other Boleyn Girl, with Scarlett Johansson as Mary Boleyn, Natalie Portman (Natalie Portman?!) as Anne, and supposedly Rue McLanahan (Rue McLanahan?!?!) as Lady Jane Rochford.  There is a defensive comment about the little matter of a 2003 miniseries based on the novel, plus this worrisome gem: "He said The Other Boleyn Girl was 'a piece of British history that has never been told in this way before'."  Er, well, given the miniseries, one presumes that this "piece of British history" has, in fact, been told this way before.  Oh, you mean the novel told this "piece of British history" in a new way? But Gregory borrowed the most spectacuscandalicious elements of her novel straight from Retha Warnicke's controversial study of Anne, which suggests that, in fact, the history has been told that way before.  Or something. 

Comments

[John Thomas McGuire]

Of course, let us not forget the 1969 film, "Anne of the Thousand Days," based on Maxwell Anderson`s 1948 play. I saw the film on video a few years ago after seeing it many years beforehand, and was surprised to see how good it was. Richard Burton avoided his usual scenery-chewing (although he lost the Oscar to John Wayne) and Genevieve Bujold was surprisingly effective as the title character (she also lost the Oscar to Glenda Jackson.) The film was also nominated, but lost to "Midnight Cowboy."

This was one of the last films produced by Hal Wallis, who helmed a wide range of films from "Casablanca" to "Becket" to most of Elvis`s godawful flicks.