Kristin Scott Thomas, Kristin Scott Thomas will ascend to the throne to portray Elizabeth II on stage in London, sharing the crown with Helen Mirren, who’ll be playing the monarch on Broadway.
‘We’ll have two Queens, on either side of the pond,’ said director Stephen Daldry, who will direct both actresses.
Scott Thomas will star in what Daldry told me will be a ‘re- imagining’ of Peter Morgan’s play The Audience, based on the Queen’s weekly meetings with some of the 12 Prime Ministers of her reign so far.
‘We’re totally thrilled. Not only is Kristin a great stage actress — she’ll bring an extraordinarily different version of Her Majesty,’ Daldry told me exclusively.
‘Kristin has this incredible magnetic power and astonishing charisma. We wouldn’t have done it without her. We’ve got Helen in New York, but if Kristin hadn’t wanted to do it in London, we wouldn’t have gone ahead.’
Daldry merrily cited a cornucopia of reasons for signing Scott Thomas, praising her stage presence and luminosity.
‘People who enjoyed Helen will be absolutely delighted to see another great actress of our age,’ Daldry said of the 54-year-old who starred in The English Patient, Four Weddings And A Funeral and Gosford Park — which also featured Mirren. Scott Thomas is currently leading Sophocles’s Electra at the Old Vic.
‘Helen has been dominating the role of the Queen for so long, and is brilliant in it. But it will be re‑thought and re-imagined with Kristin,’ Daldry added.
During the spring, Mirren told me that there had been a very brief discussion about the possibility of her doing The Audience in London again, but she refused, and urged the producers to look for another actress.
Daldry laughed and added: ‘She’s delighted the mantle has been passed. She has always wanted someone else to play the role.’ He paused, then said: ‘Sharing the crown. That’s the word ... sharing.’
The Audience with Scott Thomas will begin previewing at the Apollo, Shaftesbury Avenue, on April 21 and open officially on May 5 — two days before General Election day.
Meanwhile Mirren, who created the part at the Gielgud 20 months ago, will begin rehearsing in January for the New York production, which begins previews in February. The actress won an Oscar and a Bafta for her portrait of Her Majesty in Stephen Frears’s movie The Queen.
Daldry joked ‘the Royal Family will dominate’ next year. In July, he will begin filming the first series of The Crown, a mammoth television drama being shot by Sony for Netflix.
Early episodes will feature the wedding in 1947 between the then Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip; the death of King George; and the Coronation.
Daldry got a little misty-eyed when our conversation steered back to the sovereign.
‘She has to be the most beloved Queen. She has reigned so long, and we feel like we know her so well — though, of course, we don’t know her at all. But we’ve all grown up with her. And now she has turned into all our grandmothers.
‘For all her struggles over the years, she has come to a beloved place in the nation’s psyche.’
Morgan will re-write The Audience for London and introduce Tony Blair, who wasn’t in the original staging.
Plus, with the General Election looming, the play’s creative team and producers Matthew Byam Shaw, Robert Fox and Andy Harries will keep an eye on Ed Miliband’s progress, in case they have to whip on an actor to portray the Labour Party leader, should he make it to Downing Street.
