#nicholas and alexandra

[mariocki]

RIP Timothy West (20.10.1934 - 12.11.2024)

"We met when we were cast with small parts in that really boring play, so had both brought the crossword to stop us going mad. We saw each other across the rehearsal room doing it, so decided to sit together. Then we couldn’t record because of the strike one day so we went to the cinema, Pru and I, to see The Grass is Greener with Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr. The show was cancelled, but a bit later Pru sent me a card saying ‘they’re reviving that terrible play, are you in it?’ I wasn’t but we started writing to each other then."

"Humour is vital, and respect for what people do and what people think. Kindness is important, and we’ve always had the same humour, laughed at the same things, been interested in the same things, got cross about the same things. And been in the same business. We have often been away from each other work-wise and therefore we’re always very glad to see each other again."

[catherinesboleyn]

Lynne Frederick as Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna of Russia

Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)

[the-last-tsar]

Romanov movies: {09/??} - Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)

[grogv]

books i’ve read ❥ nicholas and alexandra / robert k. massie

❝ it is one of the supreme ironies of history that the blessed birth of an only son should have proved the mortal blow. even as the saluting cannons boomed and the flags waved, fate had prepared a terrible story. along with the lost battles and sunken ships, the bombs, the revolutionaries and their plots, the strikes and revolts, imperial russia was toppled by a tiny defect in the body of a little boy. ❞

[thenotoriousscuttlecliff]

RIP Michael Jayston.

[burningdreambanana]

Martin Potter

[nitrateglow]

Watching the 1971 flop Nicholas and Alexandra, a movie everyone apparently hates but tbh so far, I think it's interesting. It's clearly a second-rate David Lean wannabe but the acting and story are still engaging.

I just got to the second half though, which apparently everyone says drags down the film, so we'll see if my opinion modifies.

[emvidal]

Illustration of a dinner of Tsar Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, during an official visit to the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1896, with Empress Elisabeth of Austria "Sissi" and Emperor Franz Joseph I as hosts.

[erstwhile-punk-guerito]

[hazel-janes-books-galore]

1967 edition of Nicholas and Alexandra by Robert K. Massie.

[mariocki]

RIP Michael Jayston (29.10.1935 - 5.2.2024)

"Well, I played a lot of interesting people. I was Siegfried Sassoon in ‘Mad Jack’, and played Beethoven and Rochester in Jane Eyre amongst others. When I did Equus in 1976, a critic described my work on television as ‘odd bits of TV’, but these are no small parts for an actor."

[catherinesboleyn]

Ania Marson as Grand Duchess Olga Nikolaevna, Lynne Frederick as Grand Duchess Tatiana Nikolaevna, Candace Glendenning as Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, Fiona Fullerton as Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna

Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)

[lightgaswaterelectricityrent]

Nicholas and Alexandra, dir. Franklin J. Schaffner (1971)

[awdryfan1997]

YO HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOM BAKER

Got some more porn spam in my DMs. I'm seventeen; please leave me alone.

Uh anyways yeah happy 90th! I swear I'll finish reading Scratchman one day

[astonishinglysane]

Movies I’ve Watched - 2023

212/?: Nicholas and Alexandra (1971) - watched 11/28/23

I’m not overly invested in the story of the Romanovs, but it does have a lot of good dramatic meat to it. This movie does a good job of giving an overview of conditions in Russia during this time period. I also liked that it does not make the royals too sympathetic — it unequivocally shows Nicholas as a bad and arrogant ruler. Rasputin (played in exuberant fashion by a pre-Who Tom Baker) is also restored to his proper place in history. He is often given outsized importance in retellings of this story, but he was really just a weird hanger-on who didn’t have that big a role in the downfall of Imperial Russia. Unfortunately the movie is a bit too polite about everything, and occasionally the emphasis is weirdly placed. There are some interesting transitions between scenes, and some suitably epic shots, but it isn’t too imaginatively presented (it seems like a television movie that happened to have an enormous budget). Still, I think this did a serviceable job at distilling a chaotic moment in history.

Nicholas and Alexandra (1971).