This is a long awaited — late — video. How historically accurate is the movie "Mary, Queen of Scots"?

Oh boy, do I have feelings.

I made a video a few weeks ago —

two months ago —

about the film "The Favourite" and its treatment Queen Anne,

who was the English and then British queen between 1702 and 1714.

I mentioned at the end of that video to let me know which film you'd like me to review next

and said, I would do "Mary, Queen of Scots" and then

promptly forgot.

But we're here now.

I am ready to get my history geek on.

Ahem.

For the — okay. No, that's, that's. Wow. Ugh.

Jesus, no. No, no glasses. No. Okay.

That was about it.

I actually have glasses with fake glass in and then I can just look suitably history "profeshor-ish" for these videos.

Professor-ish? "Profeshor-ish"...

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It's adorable!

See here.

Much like looking at the life of Queen Anne

— that gorgeous disabled lesbian played by the wonderful Olivia Colman —

the life of Mary, Queen of Scots, seems

quite personal to me?

Because I'm very obsessed with Philippa Gregory's historical novels,

and found the one concerning Mary very interesting.

So.... it....

But it kind of differed from what we've been taught about her in school

and then I start to dig deeper and begin researching into her life and her relationships,

particularly that with Elizabeth I, the Queen of England, who was her second cousin.

But before we get into the film...there's a dog coming to sit on my lap.

Hi!

Before we get into the film, let's begin with a little history lesson.

It's a big history lesson.

If you're English, you've most definitely heard of the Tudors, because all schoolteachers are apparently

obsessed with them!

So much so that you spend years and years learning about this one very specific royal family

to the extent that we know more about their family dramas than we do our own!

The Tudor dynasty — actually, I'm not calling them a dynasty, they don't deserve that.

Don't at me.

The royal family began when a man called Henry Tudor killed the English king,

and decided thanks to his INCREDIBLY tenuous link to the crown.

His grandmother had been the king's wife, but his grandfather was actually a glorified servant who

she ran off with after she was widowed, and his mother descended from an illegitimate grandson

of a former king? So, sure, Henry sure.

Also you DEFINITELY didn't have the poor princess in the tower killed!

Ugh. So over Henry Tudor.

Anyway. He sucked as a person and as the king.

He also forced the rightful but female heir to the throne,

the beautiful granddaughter of my favorite historical figure, Jacquetta of Luxembourg, into marriage

by coercing her into having sex with him until she was pregnant and then didn't even properly crown her

until he was sure that the baby boy was actually going to make it to childhood.

Ugh!

Apparently he told her if she didn't have a baby boy with him,

he was going to try and force her son on her younger sisters who were all children!

Delightful, delightful man!

They had four children:

Arthur, who was great.

Margaret, who was less great.

Henry, who was not at all great,

and Mary, who was cute and I'm never gonna mention again.

Don't write that in your history exam, okay?

This video is not a verified reference document.

Sadly Arthur, who'd have been a great king because he was a refined, courageous young man

and kid who got all the best bits from his mother's side, died as a teenager not long after marrying the Spanish

Princess Catalina of Aragon, also known as Catherine.

Remember that face. She'll be back.

Margaret, the second child is important, too.

At the age of 14, she was married to the king of Scotland, James IV, and sent up north as essentially a

peace treaty of a person. The hope was that she would have many, many babies who would securely tie the

Kingdom of Scotland and England, and thus ensure that the Scottish would stop raiding the north of England

trying to start a war.

I mean, good luck with that.

Sure, you just give him such a more reason to invade England.

Now they ever claimed that for him too, but sure.

Unfortunately, she wasn't the brightest spark and continually angered the Scottish Lords

by making stupid decisions

with men.

Much like we'll see her granddaughter do in a minute.

Margaret and James had by all accounts a very good marriage and produced six children, although only one

actually survived infancy and later became James V at the age of seventeen months

when his father was killed by the English.

Margaret then attempted to act as regent for her son,

the baby king, but faced more than a bit of opposition

from the Scottish Lords, who were, um...

(clicks tongue)

Not best pleased by women having power,

especially an English woman.

Especially them. They were part of an alliance with the French against the English.

See? I told you that who princess peace treaty thing wouldn't work out.

It didn't.

Margaret is considered to have acted calmly and with some degree of political skill.

By July 1540 she'd even managed to reconcile the contending parties and

Scotland along with France concluded peace with England that very same month.

(claps)

Good job, Margaret! Hooray!

Oh, but then she ruined it.

Unfortunately. She was seduced by the Earl of Angus who was

insert-rude-word-here, and according to his own uncle a "young witless fool."

Apparently he was a magnetic presence who swayed Margaret into giving too much to his own family

and thus anger the other Lords, who turned against him, and, wow was that a drama.

Essentially, she started a civil war and then she ran away back to England leaving her children behind.

Well done.

So poor James V was the baby king, and he had to grow up fast!

But hopping back to England quickly.

Okay. With Margaret's older brother Arthur dead,

her younger brother Henry had become King,

King Henry VIII.

To start with he was young, charming, handsome, the dream king!

And he even married his brother's poor widow had been bitterly neglected and abused by their father.

Apparently because he actually wanted to marry her and then she said no. 'Cause... no.

Everything was great, except Henry and Catherine really struggled to have children.

Only one, Mary, survived babyhood and after 24 years together,

he divorced her in order to marry her maid-in-waiting, Anne Boleyn.

Please note, we are speeding through history here.

There were many other terrible things that

happened surrounding this marriage breakup and the way Catherine was treated.

Including Henry changing the religion of the entire country just so that he could say

that he was now head of the church and he could marry whomever he wanted.

These Henrys...

Despite the drama and shifting poor Catherine, Henry didn't even keep his interest in Anne up

and when she only gave him a daughter but no sons in three years,

he essentially invented a reason to chop off her head.

Three years! He gave her three years to have a son and then he chopped off her head.

(seethes)

The one daughter they did produce is very important to our story, however,

as she would grow up to be Elizabeth I, Queen of England,

as played by Margot Robbie in the film in question.

But okay. Just to condense history in this Henry dynamic a little more, Henry then married

Anne's lady-in-waiting, Jane Seymour, who died giving birth to that son Henry had wanted so much.

Not that he cared, apparently. He just had a feast

and then didn't even go to see her as she lay dying and asking for him

Ugh!

He then went on to marry three more women: divorced, beheaded and arrested, in that order.

But the last one was fortunately able to survive him, so

go her.

Once Henry had died, the crown then went to his son, who died young,

his oldest daughter, who died without children,

and then finally just Elizabeth. Because she was the only one left.

Oh yeah, and the entire religion of the country changed with every new monarch, which left many people dead

and absolutely everyone confused. Also no one could decide whether Elizabeth was legitimate or not

because maybe Henry had actually illegally divorced his first wife? Then like...

See? I told you. Those Tudors! All they do is ruin things! Ugh!

So Elizabeth I finally has her crown. Excellent!

But what's happening back in Scotland?

Well, you remember that her cousin James V was on the throne, right? Became king at seventeen months old?

Well, firstly, he had a pretty horrible childhood,

since despite being king all of the adults in his life basically just used him as a pawn

including his aforementioned terrible stepfather, who held him prisoner for three years and ruled in his place!

I mean, okay, don't worry then, James eventually escaped and then banished his entire step-family.

Go James!

He married twice, both to French princesses — ish —

and tried to strengthen the ties there as his godfather was the king of France.

France and Scotland kind of had a thing.

It's like largely because they both hated the English.

I mean it was like a revenge coupling, really. You'll see more about that.

His first wife, Madeleine, had been very sickly since birth and her father, the King of France,

was not best pleased at the thought of his frail 16-year-old getting married

but couldn't really say no to James, since there was a treaty that promised him a French princess.

And oh, what do you know? She died six months into marriage.

This is why you pay attention to people's health complaints.

Anyway, less than a year later, he had a new wife, Mary de Guise, who was a widow with two sons already,

so everyone assumed she'd be more robust.

The union produced two sons!

However, both died in infancy.

Scotland's really cold.

Then in 1542, in short succession war broke out with England, Mary gave birth to a baby Mary,

and King James died, meaning — as the only legitimate child of James V — Mary, Queen of Scots, took a throne

at just six days old. Six.

Note, I said legitimate.

He had a lot of illegitimate ones. Nine, in fact.

Three of whom he fathered before he was 20, and one of whom we're gonna hear about more later.

I love how gossipy these videos are! So fun!

Okay, you've probably got this far in and now you're thinking,

"Jessica, when are you actually going to start talking about the damn movie?"

But this is all very important background knowledge, okay? You need it.

Although, let's be honest.

I think you know the answer to the question in the title already.

How historically accurate is "Mary, Queen of Scots?"

(hums skeptically)

No.

Firstly, and this for me was very important, Mary was sent to France at the age of five

because she was engaged to the heir of the French throne. So she lived in the French Court for 13 years.

She was the favorite of the King of France, over his own children even.

But she did not have a Scottish accent!

Now according to contemporary accounts Mary was beautiful, lively, clever,

and spoke French, Italian, Latin, Spanish, Greek, and a bit of Scots, but she did not speak English.

Her limited ability to communicate with the Scottish Lords was probably the root of most of their problems.

That being a woman because misogyny!

As the film portrays, she was indeed very beautiful with auburn hair and quite tall.

Her adult height was 5 foot 11 inches, which is like 1.8 meters which is even taller than me.

Mary was brought up in the knowledge that she was not only the Queen of Scotland,

but was also destined to become the Queen of France and the Queen of England,

as most Catholics believed Elizabeth was not the rightful heir to throne due to being both Protestant and

iffy on the legitimacy thing.

She believed, as the entire French Court did, in the Divine Right of Kings:

that a king was chosen by God and therefore cannot be wrong and isn't even really a human,

but is instead a heavenly presence on Earth, which would have all been fine

except that her husband became king and just up and died.

So she did indeed get to be Queen of France for a bit.

But not much.

Widowed Mary returned to Scotland and claimed the throne she did have,

and struggled to govern her unruly Kingdom, since female monarchs are kind of the devil in their eyes.