There wasn’t much all-family appointment television during my ’70s childhood, but two low-budget BBC miniseries shown by “Masterpiece Theater” always brought everyone to the living room: “The Six Wives of Henry VIII” and “Elizabeth R.” Shot on video and directed with undeniable staginess, these shows were nevertheless crammed with excellent actors, particularly the incandescent Glenda Jackson as Elizabeth I. (You can stream “Elizabeth R” on Hulu. It holds up.) This was “quality television” in the most old-fashioned, PBS sense of the term. Our parents considered it educational, and our teachers scheduled their Shakespeare segments to coincide with the broadcasts.
It’s hard to imagine any classroom endorsing “The Tudors,” a glossy, softcore Showtime production featuring Jonathan Rhys Meyers as Henry VIII, leering at a series of lingerie models as their linen smocks slide sensuously to the flagstones. Then there’s the CW’s stupendously moronic “Reign,” very, very loosely based on the early adult life of Mary, Queen of Scots — a Stuart, granted, but still a major player in the Tudor story. That show is chiefly an occasion for minor-league starlets to stand around in fancy dresses, simpering at cute guys and speaking without contractions. The royal dynasty whose doings were once the subject of prestige television has, in our time, become a vehicle for thinly veiled trash.
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