In historian William B. Robinson’s assessment of The Tudors (2007-2010), he stated that the series “is a genuine cultural phenomenon, one that historians of early modern England can hardly afford to ignore.” Tudor historians and indeed most historians are increasingly confronted with the fact that visual representations of history, be it film, television, or video games, have come to be the primary way in which the public engages with the past. According to the American Historical Association, sixty-six percent of respondents from its 2019 survey, “Where Do People Get Their History?” put fictional films and television as their main contact for historical information. While some historians choose to ignore historical fiction in its many forms, brushing it off as purely fictitious, inaccurate, and not worth the historian’s scholarly attention, others in the vein of Robert Rosenstone have argued that film, like written historical narratives, is another form of historical interpretation that historians must contend with as we move increasingly into a post-literate age.
Nowhere is this more relevant than to historians of the Tudors. The Tudors have long been a topic of fascination for novelists, screenwriters, and filmmakers. Since the early twentieth century, the Tudors and its cast of characters have been featured on the big screen. The most familiar to Tudor enthusiasts and historians alike include The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), A Man for All Seasons (1966), Anne of the Thousand Days (1969), Elizabeth R (1971), Lady Jane (1986), and the most infamous of all Tudor films, Shekhar Kapur’s 1998, Elizabeth. The small screen too has had its fair number of Tudor representations, including The Tudors (2007-2010), Wolf Hall (2015-2024), and several adaptations of Philippa Gregory’s best-selling novels.
More recently, two very different television portrayals, Becoming Elizabeth (2022) and My Lady Jane (2024),n demonstrate just how far the genre of Tudor historical fiction has expanded, and how the line between historical interpretation and imaginative reinvention continues to blur in the public imagination.
Becoming Elizabeth (2022) and My Lady Jane (2024) both depict the same historical moment: the reign of Edward VI and the succession crisis that followed. But the two depictions could not be farther apart. Becoming Elizabeth is a revisionist historical drama, that attempts to take the historical record seriously. Anya Reiss, the director of the series, emphasises that she wanted to make the show “truthful and historically accurate” and that the scenes from the series were taken from “historically true facts.” Reiss does also state that that when writing a drama you have to answer the questions that arise from the “gaps between the facts,” and this is where creative licence takes place. In My Lady Jane, the creative licence goes far beyond that. The series is based on a YA novel and is set in an alternate universe where humans can shapeshift into animals.
Becoming Elizabeth offers a serious, historically grounded portrayal of Mary I and Lady Jane Grey. Mary is depicted as principled and politically savvy, far from the usual “Bloody Mary” stereotype, while Jane appears as a thoughtful, tragic figure caught in others’ ambitions. In contrast, My Lady Jane turns history into fantasy: Jane becomes a sword-wielding heroine who rewrites her fate and gets the guy, while Mary is reduced to a villainous caricature, reinfrocing the “Bloody Mary” image.
What is interesting about these historical protryals is their perception by the public. A quick glance through IMDb reviews provides interesting reading for the historian. In the past it has been difficult to try and gauge an audience’s response to a historical film as it would have required the creation of surveys, research subjects, etc, however, in our current digital age, one just has to open a social media app or website like IMDb, to explore the public reception. Consider the following IMDb ratings of Becoming Elizabeth by viewers,
As someone who devours a lot of historical fiction (both in book form and on film & TV) this drama is far far superior to lots of other similar types of period projects.
One of the best historical representations. Of course, there is some dramatic license in places, but the narrative captures the characters and their era. It is a cut above other dramas about the period.
I’m usually wary of these historical dramas due to their anachronistic nature and tendency to present simplistic scenarios. But I’ve found this series rather compelling. Production values are very high. Historically convincing settings, lit by candles and roaring fires. An intelligent script which doesn’t try to sound like cod Shakespeare but not so modern it grates.
Or as the open quote to this paper states, The fact that it’s based on reality not fantasy makes it even more compelling.
See here ratings of My Lady Jane,
So much better than Bridgerton. There is substance to the silly fantasy… strong female characters at every turn…while they change history, they remain true to many details about the time period and source material.
The main characters are enticing and charismatic. The casting is well done, and you’ll find yourself wanting the villain to be desperately killed by the end of it. And I think that always make a great villain.
I have a rule about representation of a material, and typically I prefer it to be closer to the source, but sometimes the source is needing help. The real story of Lady Jane is a tragedy, and this interpretation is superior.
…one of the best historical fiction shows ever. I truly enjoy the creative liberties taken and the chance to get to know the 9-day queen who deserved so much better. You know what also deserves better: this show. It has so much potential. Both the real Lady Jane Grey and us, the viewers deserve more.
While only a sample of the hundreds of reviews of the two series, these types of opinions about authenticity, distance, and perceptions of fantasy and fact were dominant. What is interesting for the historian in these reviews is the perception of historical truth, and how viewers appear to come to similar conclusions despite the clear differences in these series – Becoming Elizabeth aligning with current revisionist scholarship and My Lady Jane embracing fantastic elements, historical myths, and anachronism.
This suggests that public perceptions of “truth” in historical fiction are less about accuracy and more about relatability. As one reviewer put it, My Lady Jane lets us “get to know the 9-day queen who deserved so much better.” The real Lady Jane, devout, politically used, and ultimately executed, is hard to identify with for audiences no longer grounded in religion or early modern values. But a witty, empowered, fantasy-heroine Jane? That Jane resonates.
In short, historians should engage with these texts not just to critique, but to understand what kinds of history are being told, how they’re being received, and why they matter, especially to a new generation of viewers.
Bibliography
American Historical Association. “Where Do People Get Their: History?” https://www.historians.org/teaching-learning/current-events-in-historical-context/history-the-past-and-public-culture-results-from-a-national-survey/3-where-do-people-get-their-history/.
Burgess, Gemma. Becoming Elizabeth. 2023; Amazon Prime Video. Prime Video.
Creamer, Ella . “A genre of swords and soulmates: the rise and rise of ‘romantasy’ novels.” The Guardian. February 2nd, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/feb/02/romantasy-literary-genre-booktok.
Pew Research Center. “The Age Gap in Religion Around the World,.” June 13, 2018, https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2018/06/13/young-adults-around-the-world-are-less-religious-by-several-measures/.
Robison, William Baxter. History, Fiction, and the Tudors : Sex, Politics, Power, and Artistic License in the Showtime Television Series. Edited by Robison, William Baxter. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.
Rosenstone, Robert A. Visions of the Past: The Challenge of Film to Our Idea of History. Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard Univeristy Press, 1995.
Reiss, Anya. Becoming Elizabeth. 2022; Starz. Prime Video.
Reeks, John. “My Lady Jane: A New anti-history of the Tudor Period that Doesn’t Want to be Taken Seriously.” The Conversation. July 9th, 2024. https://theconversation.com/my-lady-jane-a-new-anti-history-of-the-tudor-period-that-doesnt-want-to-be-taken-seriously-234204#:~:text=My%20Lady%20Jane%20does%20not,fiction%20or%20even%20historical%20fantasy.
Toplin, Robert Brent. “Cinematic History: Where Do We Go From Here?” The Public Historian 25, no. 3 (2003): https://doi.org/10.1525/tph.2003.25.3.79.
Toplin, Robert Brent and Jason Eud. “The Historian Encounters Film: A Historiography.” OAH Magazine of History. Volume 16, no. 4 (2002):http://www.jstor.org/stable/25163542.
Whitelock, Anne. “Historian Anna Whitelock on BBC’s New Drama Henry VII.” The Guardian. October 4, 2007. https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2007/oct/05/features11.
Amelia Corneil 