NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Entertainment

Off with her head

By Dionne Christian
NZ Herald·
8 Jun, 2013 03:14 AM5 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

Andrew Grainger, left, Anna Jullienne and Simon Prast are starring in the Auckland Theatre Company production of Anne Boleyn. Photo / Natalie Slade

Andrew Grainger, left, Anna Jullienne and Simon Prast are starring in the Auckland Theatre Company production of Anne Boleyn. Photo / Natalie Slade

Anne Boleyn examines the story of Henry VIII's second wife, through the eyes of various key players in the king's court. Dionne Christian talks to its writer, English dramatist Howard Brenton.

Every nation has a founding story, says English playwright and screenwriter Howard Brenton. He believes that for many years Arthurian legends captured English imaginations before stories of Winston Churchill and World War II formed the scaffolding on which to write more contemporary identity myths.

Now he reckons Britons are again looking to the more distant past for clues as to who and why they are and the Tudor period - with its intoxicating mix of power and passion, politics and religion - is under interrogation.

The signs of this renewed interest are apparent in Hilary Mantel's multi award-winning books, Wolf Hall and i, the success of the outrageously frothy TV series The Tudors and, possibly more significantly, a new wave of scholarship which re-casts key players in a new light.

Brenton himself has contributed to the resurgence via his play Anne Boleyn, which comes to Q Theatre this month courtesy of Auckland Theatre Company, and stars Anna Jullienne as the controversial second wife of King Henry VIII (Andrew Grainger).

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

ATC says the play deals in mortal dangers and shifting allegiances to expose the life and legacy of the woman dubbed "the whore who changed Britain". It gets off to a rollicking start with Anne talking bluntly about her beheading, a monstrous act which ensured even those with scant interest in history would remember who she was.

But rather than portraying Anne as she is so frequently depicted - a wicked woman who schemed and manipulated her way into the King's bed - Brenton is more benevolent to the much-maligned and ultimately tragic queen. He suggests she was an intelligent, thoughtful and devout woman, albeit foul-mouthed at times, motivated by her Protestant faith and desire for religious reform.

Working closely with Henry's chief minister Thomas Cromwell (played by Simon Prast), himself a closet Protestant, the duo subtly persuaded the King to break with the Catholic Church, dissolve the monasteries and transfer their power and money to the royal court, thus setting in motion the move to a secular and more centralised parliamentary system.

Talking from his home in England, Brenton says Anne should be viewed as a great reform leader. He believes the vile things said about her at the time were part of a propaganda campaign designed not so much to stop Henry from divorcing Catherine of Aragon, but to limit Anne's influence at court.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"That she kept herself intact is a miracle to me but I think it was because of her faith and this is an aspect of her personality which has, until recently, not had the attention it deserves."

Brenton has long been intrigued by Tudor history, partly the result of a religious upbringing (his father was a Methodist minister) but also because of the conflicts in the nature of Tudor society itself - and conflict makes for good drama.

"The royal court was such a dangerous and perilous place to be and yet at the same time it's difficult for us to get our heads around the fact that they were so religious. It imbued every aspect of their world and worldview."

However, good drama is something Brenton cheerfully admits took him a while to find when Dominic Dromgoole, artistic director of Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, commissioned him to write a play about the development of the King James Bible. It was to be performed alongside performances of Shakespeare's history plays, but Brenton was perplexed.

Discover more

Entertainment

A giant leap for Giselle

07 Jun 10:14 PM
Entertainment

The street where you live

07 Jun 10:23 PM
Entertainment

Stephen Fry to make Broadway debut

08 Jun 01:19 AM
Entertainment

Theatre review: F*ck Love, The Basement

12 Jun 05:30 PM

"I thought it would be too dry and to find the drama in the translation of the Bible - and to be able to bring that to the stage - would be extremely difficult so I thought about what James I was up to when he decided to have an English translation of the Bible for the Church of England.

"Then I remembered I had read somewhere that Anne Boleyn had a copy of [religious reformer] William Tyndale's translation of the New Testament and a copy of his The Obedience of a Christian Man. These were extremely controversial books; the type of literature which could, at the time, send you to the Tower because it attacked the Catholic Church and argued that God speaks to us through scripture, not through the church or the pope."

The story goes that Anne gave a copy of the books to a lady-in-waiting who, by accident or design, had them confiscated by Cardinal Wolsey, Henry's leading church officer. Anne protested to Henry who, in thrall to her, forced Wolsey to return the books but, curious about their content, questioned Anne further about them and agreed to read sections she chose specifically for him.

This discovery meant Brenton had found the way to write a humorous and spirited piece. In Anne Boleyn, after the queen teases the audience about seeing her severed head, the action flits forward to James I (Stephen Lovatt) arriving in London and having a merry old time going through an old trunk he discovers packed with Anne's possessions, including her Bible.

The play travels back and forth in time, with historical figures, including Wolsey (Paul Minifie, making a long-awaited return to the stage), each telling the story as they saw it. There are moments of pure invention on Brenton's part. In the play, Anne conspires with exiled heretic William Tyndale (Peter Daube) to make England Protestant when, in reality, the two never met.

Brenton is entirely comfortable with that artistic licence, citing what playwrights call the "schiller manoeuvre" to imagine what might have happened if events had gone another way: "I think you can take certain liberties because, after all, theatre is the art of telling lies to get at a truth."

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Anne Boleyn also features Claire Dougan, Jordan Mooney, Mikassa Cornwall, Lauren Gibson, George Henare, Raymond Hawthorne, Ken Blackburn and Hera Dunleavy.

Performance

What: Anne Boleyn

Where & when: Q Theatre, June 13-July 7

Save

    Share this article

Latest from Entertainment

Premium
Entertainment

Meet the Kiwi teen with all the moves as the killer robot in M3gan 2.0

12 Jul 10:00 PM
Entertainment

'Move it or lose it': Adine Wilson and Irene van Dyk on their TV return to the court

12 Jul 09:00 PM
Entertainment

Shortland Street and Outrageous Fortune star Claire Chitham reflects on career and life lessons

12 Jul 05:00 PM

Get your kids involved in your reno

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Entertainment

Premium
Meet the Kiwi teen with all the moves as the killer robot in M3gan 2.0

Meet the Kiwi teen with all the moves as the killer robot in M3gan 2.0

12 Jul 10:00 PM

New York Times: The sunny Kiwi dancer-turned-actor returns in role as a deadly AI doll.

'Move it or lose it': Adine Wilson and Irene van Dyk on their TV return to the court

'Move it or lose it': Adine Wilson and Irene van Dyk on their TV return to the court

12 Jul 09:00 PM
Shortland Street and Outrageous Fortune star Claire Chitham reflects on career and life lessons

Shortland Street and Outrageous Fortune star Claire Chitham reflects on career and life lessons

12 Jul 05:00 PM
Barnie Duncan shares his favourite spots in Auckland

Barnie Duncan shares his favourite spots in Auckland

12 Jul 05:00 PM
Sponsored: Why heat pumps make winter cheaper
sponsored

Sponsored: Why heat pumps make winter cheaper

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP