Netflix’s Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story has been praised for its portrayal of the intricacies of love, duty, and mental illness in the marriage of Queen Charlotte (India Amarteifio) and King George (Corey Mylchreest) in 18th-century England. This fictionalized account of royal life largely departs from the perception of Charlotte’s husband as “Mad King George,” the monarch whose actions infamously pushed the colonies to declare independence from Britain. Rather, the show demonstrates how King George’s painful descent into mental illness, and complicated reputation in both England and the United States, has eclipsed the story of Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz –– a minor German princess who entered into their arranged marriage with no idea of the difficulties soon to afflict her partner.
Luckily, despite its expected romantic excesses, the show has something intelligent to say about Charlotte’s role as wife, mother, and queen in King George’s court. The spinoff in fact highlights the considerable pressure that Charlotte is under to produce an heir to the English throne. As Charlotte is subjected to scrutiny by her mother-in-law, ladies-in-waiting, servants, and even her husband about her judgments as the mother of the future king of England, viewers come to understand how restrictive her role within the court is.
Motherhood Is Often Used as Leverage
In order for Charlotte to acquire status, she must produce an heir to the throne, but the pressure that this creates, and the court’s open curiosity about her sex life with George, prevents her from getting to know her husband or acclimating to English culture. Worse, any child that she bears will not merely be her son or her daughter, but the property of the English crown, which is subject to centuries of conflicting traditions and a volatile Parliament. This creates further tension between Charlotte and her misguided mother-in-law, Augusta (Michelle Fairley), and leaves her with only the most precarious status at court.
Since her sole means of acquiring any leverage within the royal household is by becoming pregnant, Charlotte’s future success depends on factors mostly beyond her control. Thus, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story is rightly preoccupied with Charlotte’s body as both a royal and political entity. The very public policing of the status of her womb reflects the utilitarian quality of marriage, sex, and reproduction within the English court.
The Royal Bloodline Is a Precarious Thing
The damage that this pattern creates can be seen in other television shows and films –– fictionalized, of course, to varying degrees –– about the English royal family. In the BBC’s Wolf Hall, Anne Boleyn (Claire Foy), wife of Henry VIII (Damian Lewis), is executed for, among other things, her inability to quickly produce a son to inherit the British throne. In both 1998’s Elizabeth and 2007’s Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Queen Elizabeth (Cate Blanchett), Anne Boleyn’s long-orphaned daughter, refused to sacrifice her freedom through marriage, perhaps foreseeing a blighted future like her mother’s. While the first film addresses Elizabeth’s choice to remain single, thereby rejecting the constant policing of her body as a pathway to royal power, the second film examines the lasting effects of this decision. Her refusal to compromise her power –– whether through a politically advantageous marriage or a forfeiture of England’s military supremacy –– is enraging to her suitors, advisors, and the foreign adversaries crowding the British court. Although the English defeat of the Spanish Armada solidified England’s influence in Europe and the Americas, Elizabeth’s position as an unmarried and childless female monarch remained precarious and embattled to the end of her reign.
In Netflix’s The Crown, arguably the most popular and controversial screen portrayal of the English monarchy in years, Princess Diana (Emma Corrin) herself not much more than a child while pregnant with William, finds herself utterly isolated in a loveless marriage to Prince Charles ( Josh O’Connor). Although she ensures the continuation of the royal bloodline by giving birth to William and Harry, she is still treated like an outsider by the royal family, and the couple’s eventual decision to divorce permanently diminishes her status among her ex-husband’s relatives and in the Windsor court as a whole.
Although these portrayals of England’s princesses and queens should be taken with a grain of salt –– fictionalization is central to the creative process, and what works on screen is quite different from what happens in real life –– the story of Queen Charlotte is only the latest example of how royal power is inherently, and damagingly, linked to fertility. Despite its lightheartedness, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story gets at an unpleasant truth about royal womanhood.
