it’s actually incredible how much a good actress makes a difference to a project/ perception of the historic figure they’re playing……… had anne boleyn been played by anyone besides natalie dormer on tudors, i honestly don’t think anne would be as loved as she is among ~my gen~ or w/e today.

itwasyummy

Did you watch The Tudors as it was coming out? I’m rly curious what your reaction was (assuming you already had some knowledge of Anne/the period), as I didn’t have a lot of in-depth knowledge when I watched & I wonder how that affected the ~experience lol

I did, but I was 13 when it came out lolol…

I had really no knowledge of the era beyond fiction; although it wasn’t the first Tudor era thing I’d watched/read…before this I had watched AOTD, the Lady Jane movie w/ HBC, the made-for-tv version of Red Rose: House of Tudor (that book that was like a young Elizabeth’s diary?), and had read Doomed Queen Anne and the book about young Mary (I) by that same author, and also TOBG (forgive me my trespasses~).

Somehow, I don’t think I totally absorbed that these characters were based on real people? That probably makes me sound dumb shshsh but like…idk I didn’t really grasp that idt, mainly I just found the first season entertaining in a guilty-pleasure kind of way (I would stay up late and watch it when my parents were asleep).

I can’t speak for others, but I think it definitely had a big impact on me…I disliked George and Thomas Boleyn for quite awhile because of it, it made me think Henry VIII had been a reality-show brat since birth, it gave me the impression that the age gap between COA and Henry had been huge…later on it made me think Katherine Howard had actually been guilty of adultery (although this didn’t make me unsympathetic to her– for a lot of fans online it did, apparently!! gross~), that the Flanders mare quote about AOC was real, that Charles Brandon was younger than Henry or the same age, etc.

And it didn’t make me want to research immediately; it was more after I rewatched the series when I was older than I began to see the flaws and inaccuracies for what they were and start doing some indepedent research/reading on the Tudor era and its most prominent figures.

alicehoffmans:

me: haha idk, she had some bangers but i guess i’m kind of like…~over taylor swift–

tswift: and you cALL ME UP AGAIN, JUST TO BREAK ME LIKE A PROMISE, SO CASUALLY CRUEL IN THE NAME OF BEING HONEST,

me:

maharanis said: BIG MOOD

I love Katherine Howard’s blue/gold bird dress from Season 4, Ep 4. I think that’s my favorite of the series. I have to say I did not care for the black dress with the silver Anne wore in a lot of Season 1.

alicehoffmans:

Oh, yeah, the lady-in-waiting ‘uniform’? I didn’t care for it much either, I liked that it had a lot of pearls tho!

I think Mary Tudor, Anne Boleyn, and Katherine Howard had the best costuming on the show overall tbh!!

I like the blue one too!! (If you mean this one, that is):

They also had her wear one of Anne Boleyn’s gowns and headpieces, very clearly, in the scene Katherine says she was “the most happy” so that was…incheresting………

@joshmopolitan

I did not notice that she was wearing Anne’s costume in that scene!

Yeaaah I have to assume that was deliberate because it was like…down to the accessories…and she says it and he just…kinda:

(from this:)

I fell into a post in which you reported the account of a venetian ambassador who found Henry VIII beautiful… And like I understand that les goûts et les couleurs… But it seems it was quite a frequent description (at least in his youth) and yes the guy was tall, athletic and had all the right colorings… But I can’t be the only one noticing that he had a super flat face (la face plate)… Am I missing an historical context about flat face here?

alicehoffmans:

Hm…I don’t particularly notice that, honestly? His most attractive portrait is probably this one.

Idw to sound blunt but also like…portraits weren’t like…photographs? They were likenesses.

Idk about historical context re: flat features; but re: misogyny and beauty standards…Queen Consorts were expected to be models of beauty. When they did not meet that exacting standard, it was commented on rather harshly. Kings, however, were not expected to be so– so when they were handsome, the praise was fulsome and lavish– this was viewed as a bonus; not a requirement. We see this in ‘a great deal handsomer than the King of France’, etc…

The comments COA’s appearance garnered vs. Henry’s are demonstrative of how ambassadors tended to be more critical of the appearance of wives than husbands:

Personal charisma also shouldn’t be discounted here– it certainly has an effect on whether or not we view someone as physically attractive, and in context the same secretary says of Henry:

The ambassador made a fine and skillful oration, to which his Majesty listened to with the utmost attention, standing immoveable under the canopy; with his eyes always fixed on the ambassador’s eyes and countenance, so that he seemed very much delighted with him and fluent discourse.

Quite simply, it seems that Henry was a delightful person to converse with; these were the reports given by several men that were not his subjects, and who were not praising him directly (so have no reason to exaggerate or lie), rather writing to their home country with the goal of writing as accurate and expressive an account as possible:

He is affable and gracious, harms no one, does not covet his neighbour’s goods, and is satisfied with his own dominion, having often said to me, ‘Sir Ambassador, we want all potentates to content themselves with their own territories; we are satisfied with this island of ours.’ He seems extremely desirous of peace.

So…I don’t believe every single person found him to be incredibly handsome as that’s not realistic (everyone has different personal judgement of beauty, and as you said to each their own)– but he seems to have been a person, in his youth, of infectious enthusiasm, energy and laughter…and I think others’ impressions of his personality possibly colored their opinions of his appearance as well.

#had a virgo rising (impeccable manners) and leo mercury (captivating oratory) #astrology says he was charming! hshs

I remember your analysis for that! I loved it.

Honestly it’s so true from what we know…that’s part of the reason I haaate so many scenes with him in popular fiction. When you know how obsessed he was with projecting a certain image, and what his behaviour was usually reported as in the first half of his reign especially, it just beggars belief…

Like you expect me to believe he would just make a complete and utter buffoon of himself in front of a noble family like the Boleyns by forcing a kiss on their daughter in their company (in Anne of the Thousand Days) and not care…you expect me to believe he would just start caressing Jane Seymour’s hair thirty seconds after being introduced to her, again in front of her family at her home (in Tudors)…

Blease!!