She is not known for histrionics, but Queen Elizabeth II would surely struggle to maintain her famous poise if she knew the actress playing her on The Crown earned less than the man portraying her husband.
Producers on Tuesday said that Matt Smith, Prince Philip on the Netflix drama, negotiated a better deal than Claire Foy because of his perceived higher profile.
They did not reveal either salary — Foy’s was put at US$40,000 an episode by Variety last year — but told a panel event in Jerusalem that Smith’s 2010 to 2013 starring role on the BBC’s Doctor Who had been the decisive factor.
Photo: Reuters
The explanation has not appeased critics who argued that the discrepancy should only have shown up in the first series, before Foy was garlanded with awards and acclaim.
Foy, 33, was already making a name for herself in British drama, with roles in Upstairs Downstairs and Wolf Hall, when she was tapped to play the queen.
The part has earned her a host of award season nominations, including at the BAFTAs, Golden Globes, Emmys and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) awards. She has won two SAGs and a Globe.
Suzanne Mackie, one of the show’s producers, told the Jerusalem audience about the discrepancy and that The Crown, which costs US$7 million an episode to produce, is replacing its leads for the start of filming in July, with Olivia Colman stepping in as the queen and an actor to replace Smith not yet announced.
Helena Bonham-Carter is to replace Vanessa Kirby as Elizabeth’s sister, the late Princess Margaret.
The series comes from the pen of Peter Morgan, who first lifted the veil on the private world of Elizabeth II in The Queen, which was directed by Stephen Frears and earned Helen Mirren an Oscar award in the title role.
NO EXCUSES: Marcos said his administration was acting on voters’ demands, but an academic said the move was emotionally motivated after a poor midterm showing Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday sought the resignation of all his Cabinet secretaries, in a move seen as an attempt to reset the political agenda and assert his authority over the second half of his single six-year term. The order came after the president’s allies failed to win a majority of Senate seats contested in the 12 polls on Monday last week, leaving Marcos facing a divided political and legislative landscape that could thwart his attempts to have an ally succeed him in 2028. “He’s talking to the people, trying to salvage whatever political capital he has left. I think it’s
Polish presidential candidates offered different visions of Poland and its relations with Ukraine in a televised debate ahead of next week’s run-off, which remains on a knife-edge. During a head-to-head debate lasting two hours, centrist Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, from Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s governing pro-European coalition, faced the Eurosceptic historian Karol Nawrocki, backed by the right-wing populist Law and Justice party (PiS). The two candidates, who qualified for the second round after coming in the top two places in the first vote on Sunday last week, clashed over Poland’s relations with Ukraine, EU policy and the track records of their
UNSCHEDULED VISIT: ‘It’s a very bulky new neighbor, but it will soon go away,’ said Johan Helberg of the 135m container ship that run aground near his house A man in Norway awoke early on Thursday to discover a huge container ship had run aground a stone’s throw from his fjord-side house — and he had slept through the commotion. For an as-yet unknown reason, the 135m NCL Salten sailed up onto shore just meters from Johan Helberg’s house in a fjord near Trondheim in central Norway. Helberg only discovered the unexpected visitor when a panicked neighbor who had rung his doorbell repeatedly to no avail gave up and called him on the phone. “The doorbell rang at a time of day when I don’t like to open,” Helberg told television
A team of doctors and vets in Pakistan has developed a novel treatment for a pair of elephants with tuberculosis (TB) that involves feeding them at least 400 pills a day. The jumbo effort at the Karachi Safari Park involves administering the tablets — the same as those used to treat TB in humans — hidden inside food ranging from apples and bananas, to Pakistani sweets. The amount of medication is adjusted to account for the weight of the 4,000kg elephants. However, it has taken Madhubala and Malika several weeks to settle into the treatment after spitting out the first few doses they
RSS