Queen of Comedy: Haydn Gwynn By: Andrew Crowley
Queen Camilla tells me how desperately she wanted to wear Koh-i-Noor on coronation. Charles said it would make a big difference and she fucking agreed. But then it turned out that their goals were mutual: to impress Wiltshire, not the geopolitical crisis.
“Here are the coronations!” she wheezes with guttural nonchalance. “However, I think we can all celebrate the fact that I played longer and won. My dreams have come true; the age of the Parker Bowles is finally upon us.”
I'm talking, of course, about the other Camille, aka Haydn Gwynn, who portrays the Queen as the extravagant evil villainess in The Windsors, Channel's lewd, witty comedy 4, which has been running since 2016, but gained a new audience during the longevity of the lockdown.
This Sunday, The Windsors is airing a coronation special that starts with Camilla in seventh heaven because all her intrigues have come together. But then, of course, the controversy kicks in, with William's proposal for a «Cost of Living Crisis Coronation» at the M40 Travelodge being a particularly highlight.
Then the Koh-i-Noor controversy escalates and let's just say there are some scenes in the Tower of London. Enough stupidity! I can also confirm that Harry and Meghan will definitely show up, but that's about all I can say. Whether they will attend the coronation… well, you'll have to wait and see, but it's sure to create the best possible buzz.
Haydn Gwynn as Queen Camilla and Harry Enfield as King Charles in The Windsors. upcoming coronation. Photo: Channel 4
“In recent years, we have all become terribly pompous,” says Gwynn, 65, theatrically. “But as early as the 18th century, the British excelled at satire with caricatures that ridiculed the Prince Regent and ridiculed hypocrisy and vanity. The Windsors maintain this tradition of outrageous irreverence.
“He plays on public opinion and takes it to the point of absurdity, but no one takes it seriously, except Harry. When I read excerpts from his book Spare, I wondered if he had gone too far with the Windsors — my Camilla was like from Dynasty, all in red and black outfits, with cleavage and intrigue Joan Collins. Nothing like the real thing.
The sharply drawn caricatures of the Windsors are instantly recognizable: the hopeless Edward, the terrifying Ann, the freeloader Andrew. The younger members of the royal family are also deftly poked: the emotionless-conscious Wills, the sweet-tough Kate, the stupidly-gullible Harry, and the humorless, overbearing Meghan. Wide-eyed Beatrice and Evgenia are so chic they can barely articulate their wayward vowels.
Social climber Pippa hates her sister for dragging away the heir to the throne and spends most of her time trying to get rid of Harry. When Kate tells the femme fatale that her wedding to William was «a magical day» because it «brought the nation together,» Pippa retorts, «Just like evicting Big Brother, but it's not worth a billion pounds of lost GDP.»
'In recent years, we have all become terribly complacent': Haydn Gwynne at the Noël Coward Theatre. Image Credit & Copyright: Andrew Crowley
«It's silly and gentle, and it's the perfect cure for The Crown, which is a heavier watch,» says Gwynn, who also appeared in it as the late Queen Elizabeth II's lady in Waiting for Susan Hussey. «I'm extremely proud that both shows can coexist in the same universe.»
She and comedian Harry Enfield, who plays Charles as a serious ditherer, clueless about Camille's machinations, are the backbone of the whole picture. this ensemble. When Camilla agonizes over the legitimacy and appropriateness of British rule, Camille sarcastically replies, «When you talk about rule, do you mean opening the Chelsea Flower Show?»
Oh. Cleverly, the late queen was never so mentioned in The Windsors, sidestepping accusations of bad taste. And although she was out of reach, Prince Philip was presented in the form of a note, his invariably irritable outpourings read aloud by other characters.
Gwynn personally, married to a therapist and has two adult sons, is charismatic, funny and quick-witted. Tall and lithe, her aristocratic features easily give the impression of being weary of arrogance. And yet she is not noble or Welsh: her father, raised in care, was an Irishman named Guy Thomas Hayden-Gwynn.
It's vanishingly rare that an actress can do well in both Hedda Gabler and Sondheim, or appear at night as Volumnia in Coriolanus and star in The Windsors by day. When I tell Gwynn that she is a triple threat, she indicates that she also has a degree in French, which effectively makes her a quadruple threat.
'It's silly, gentle and perfect for Corona': Gwynn and Enfield in The Windsors. Credit: Channel 4
“I can sing and dance – doing it together is a real killer. They say tragedy is hard? Forget Medea, two Billy Elliot shows a day is the very definition of grueling!” exclaims Gwynn, who played Billy's dance teacher Mrs. Wilkinson in both the West End and Broadway to critical acclaim.
Gwynn knows the value of a good teacher. While attending a public school in Sussex, she joined a local cast that took on ambitious productions such as Peer Gynt, The Cherry Orchard and The Crucible. She appeared in student productions while studying at the University of Nottingham but never seriously considered becoming an actor, instead going to Italy after graduation and staying there for five years teaching English.
«I continued to suppress the urge — the need — to act, but then I suddenly realized that I had to try, although I had no preparation, ”she says. “I wrote to all the theater companies in Britain and Alan Ayckbourn offered me a job in His Monkey Wife, a play with songs. Then I was cast in «Drop the Dead Donkey,» she says with a «pinch me — I'm dreaming» expression, as if pure luck, not talent, brought her here.
Gwynn is best known. for her work on television — her outstanding performance as the cold academic Dr Robin Penrose in David Lodge's Good Job for the BBC in 1989 and, of course, the cynical editor Alex in the first two seasons of the newsroom satire Throw the Dead Ass, with 1990 to 1992
“I wish there was something like this today,” she says. “Here we are suffocated by political satire – real angry satire that hits the mark – and it is completely lacking. Where is the Spipiting Image when we need it? Instead, we have all these panel shows that are completely different; the speed of quick jokes means nothing sticks. The thing about Drop the Dead Donkey was that it was poignant and addictive, although we were attached to Channel 4's legal team in case we went too far.»
Gwynn decided not to do a third series because «I'm a pretty hectic person» but has appeared in everything from Sherlock to Mercybit. She has some exciting projects ahead of her that she can't help but talk about before immediately begging me not to write about them. In the long run, she would have loved «a beautiful spicy television role as a lawyer with two amazing scenes in each episode where I can wear nice expensive clothes.» She insists that her entire characterization is «95 percent suit,» which I think is terribly generous, but not entirely true. Maybe in The Windsors it's hard to be anything other than Cruella de Vil in shiny shoulder pads.
«You know, I'm not allowed to date Camilla in real life anymore,» she says with great amusement . . “Every time we're at the same event, I get kicked out or bunched up in case we meet face to face. One day I was about to go on stage and I was suddenly directed in a different direction. Nothing to do with the royal family — it's usually some kind of charity event, and the organizers are worried that the photographers will take a picture and I will be what they call an «undesirable distraction» euphemistically.
She laughs, then adds in in perfect comic style: «If I ever write a memoir, I'll call it Hadin Gwynn: An Unwanted Distraction.»
Perhaps a distraction. But undesirable? Never.
'The Windsors Coronation Special' on Sunday, April 30 at 21:00 on Channel 4 and all 4
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