Wednesday, December 27, 2006

The sadness of George III

Many Americans think of George III--if they think of him at all--as the British tyrant colonial Americans had to fight to gain our independence. That simplistic caricature masks a much more interesting person.

A Royal Affair: George III and his Scandalous Siblings by Stella Tillyard apparently (I haven't read the book) tells part of his and his family's story. William Grimes reviews the book in today's New York Times.

Alan Bennett wrote a brilliant play and screenplay about George III that became the film The Madness of King George. (Rumor had it that the film title was changed from The Madness of George III because the producers were worried that American audiences might think they had missed George and a sequel, George II, and would stay away from the third in the wrongly-imagined trilogy.)

As it happens, I also wrote a play--titled George & Charlotte--that I'd planned to debut in New Orleans...when Katrina struck.

Any producers out there interested in a stage comedy requiring minimal staging and three actors with a gift for comedy and plummy British accents? Please get in touch.

--Marshal Zeringue