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Journalism of Courage
Queens are meant to be looked at, not touched. Early in the film, Elizabeth: The Golden Age in theatres now, England8217;s Elizabeth I, played by Cate Blanchett, is bored by a bad date in public. Her suitor, a stuttering Continental royal, is clearly terrified by the mob. Ever gracious, the queen offers some advice. Her secret is to pretend she lives behind 8220;a pane of glass8230; You should try it.8221;
Watching Elizabeth, viewers8217; minds may drift to Hillary Clinton, quite possibly the next president of the United States, a woman who often seems to live behind her own plate of glass.
Elizabeth8217;s sad woman warrior8212;triumphant and tragic, honoured but never tenderly loved8212;is a familiar type. We remember the Margaret Thatcher who told George H.W. Bush in the lead-up to the first Gulf War that it was 8220;no time to go wobbly8221;. We revere, in retrospect, the second Queen Elizabeth who, in the wake of Princess Diana8217;s death, stood behind her palace walls, the last Briton with a stiff upper lip. And we watch Clinton, a shrewd politician, always careful to keep her emotions hidden.
Elizabeth reminds us how hard it might be for Clinton to show her emotions. Certainly, we permit her less emotional range than was granted Elizabeth. The Virgin Queen could marry herself 8220;to England8221;, be her country8217;s mother and wife. But in a democracy, Clinton could never so assuredly shower queenly love. She is still haunted by 8220;Saint Hillary8221;, the First Lady who turned off Americans by acting as if she knew best.
Neither can Clinton harness rage, Elizabeth8217;s most powerful tool. In the film, Elizabeth is never so much The Queen as when she warns the Spanish ambassador, an agent of her enemy, King Philip, that she is not to be trifled with. 8220;I, too, can command the wind, sir,8221; she warns. Clinton is equally quick to show her toughness8212;remember the way she chided Barack Obama in a debate when he suggested he would negotiate directly with dictators? But she is dogged by the conservative caricature of her, the Angry Woman who throws lamps and seeks to destroy men and is careful never to appear too wrathful.
Clinton might do well to more freely use one of the Virgin Queen8217;s weapons: flirtation. Blanchett8217;s Elizabeth infuses all acts of governance with sexual electricity. But Clinton8217;s experience in her husband8217;s White House proved politicians can risk everything by showing too much of their sexual side. Still, Clinton certainly has it in her. Recently she joked that Republican attacks were flattering because 8220;when you get to be our age, it8217;s kind of nice to have all these men obsessed with you.8221;
The film, and the Clintons, are reminders of how public glory robs men and women of a private life. At the end of Elizabeth, the queen has defeated the Spanish Armada and governs over a golden age of prosperity. Blanchett appears as a living statue in white body paint. Behind her pane of glass, a queen is victorious, ferocious8212;and utterly alone.
-Jonathan Darman Newsweek
