Vanity Fair, December 2015

 

Фотограф: Чарли Грей.

ENG: There is a long tradition of films—ranging from Roman Holiday to The Prince and Me—about royals going incognito as “normal” civilians as they attempt to break free from their sheltered existences and get a taste of “the real world.” A Royal Night Out—which opened in the U.K. in May and makes its U.S. debut this month—takes that trope and applies it to none other than Queen Elizabeth, back when she was a teenage princess. The action takes place on V-E Night, in 1945, as World War II is coming to a close and the streets of London are packed with revelers. Princess Elizabeth (played by Dracula Untold’s Sarah Gadon) and her more freewheeling sister, Princess Margaret (The Diary of a Teenage Girl’s Bel Powley), get permission from their parents, the King and Queen of England, to join in the fun. Elizabeth and Margaret go off into the night—to encounter, of course, unexpected obstacles, romantic misadventures, and comic shenanigans. (The conceit of the film is loosely based on the actual happenings of that night, though most of the plot here—Elizabeth learns how to ride a bus! Margaret flirts with a naval officer!—is pure historical fiction.)

 The Canadian Gadon—who trained with a dialect coach and took Lindy Hop lessons to prepare for the role—said that the notion of playing a young Elizabeth was “extremely daunting.” Her nerves ended up serving her well, though. “Elizabeth in the film is on the precipice of becoming a queen and leading a nation,” she said. “So having the same kind of anxieties really helped me access that place.”