3.20 PM Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great, Smithfield, London. One of the pivotal moments in the film is being shot today in this beautiful 12th century church – the execution by beheading of Mary Queen of Scots.
Category: Golden Age Diary
Tuesday 2nd May, 2006
10 AM Hatfield House. Out on location at Hatfield House but today however we’re using this as the home of Mary Queen of Scots and Hatfield House has become Chartley Hall to introduce her to the story.
Friday 5th May, 2006
6 PM Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great, Smithfield, London. Finishing off coverage of the execution scene then down to the crypt for a scene from nearly four months previously, as Mary confronts her accusers at her trial at Fotheringhay.
Tuesday 9th May, 2006
11 AM Hatfield House, Hertfordshire. We’re using the Long Gallery here as rooms in Walsingham’s house. In today’s scenes Sir Francis entertain his brother. This is one of those scenes that people will write to me about as there are a number of key differences from ‘history’.
Monday 8th May, 2006
1 PM Hatfield House, Hertfordshire. First scene with Elizabeth and Francis Walsingham today and, as is the nature of filming, this is Walsingham’s last scene in the movie.
Saturday 6th May, 2006
11 AM Hatfield House, Hertfordshire. The last three scenes today with Mary Queen of Scots (Samantha Morton). In the first Paulet appears in Mary’s rooms to tell her that she is to be executed on the following morning.
A Director’s Prayer 2
At the end of week 2
Hanging on,
to the slim thread of instinct
which is lost so easily
if cut by arrogance
Wednesday 3rd May, 2006
For Mary one of the cruellest aspects of her confinement was her isolation from the outside world caused by the increasing restrictions placed on her correspondence.
Monday 1st May, 2006
10 AM ‘J’ Stage – Shepperton Studios. Back to day shooting – this time scenes with the Babington conspirators. The Babington Plot arose from a series of other conspiracies against Elizabeth which followed on from the publication by Pope Pius V of the 1570 bull Regnans in Excelsis in which he declared Elizabeth a heretic and all her followers excommunicated.
Elizabeth is Blue, Phillip is Red
Friday, 28th April. 1 AM at ‘J’ Stage, Shepperton Studios. Another night shoot but now back in studio in King Philip’s private quarters in the Escorial – or more properly the Royal Monastery of San Lorenzo de El Escorial. The palace was commissioned by Philip as a mausoleum for his family and a center for the study of the Counter Reformation – the Catholic attempt to turn back the wave of Lutheran and Protestant reform sweeping across Europe. It was (and is) a huge structure – a monastery, museum, art gallery, library and, of course one of Philip’s homes.