The Crown Season Three Trailer: Olivia Colman Makes Her Debut As Queen Elizabeth
The clip features a changing England, plenty of unhealthy repression, and a glorious Helena Bonham Carter.
The Crown’s season three trailer is finally here. Anticipation for the show’s third season has been building since the announcement that Oscar winner Olivia Colman would be replacing former star Claire Foy as Queen Elizabeth II (all of the show’s roles will continue to be re-cast as the characters, aka the real British royal family, age). Fellow new additions include the iconic Helena Bonham Carter as Princess Margaret, Tobias Menzies as Prince Philip, Josh O’Connor as Prince Charles, Ben Daniels as Margaret’s famed photographer husband Antony Armstrong-Jones (aka Lord Snowdon), Erin Doherty as Princess Anne, and Charles Dance as Lord Mountbatten.
The trailer shows Elizabeth coping with a changing country as she approaches her 1977 Jubilee, the 25th anniversary of her ascension to the throne. The economy is collapsing, miners are striking for fair wages, and the monarchy seems to be on the verge of disaster. Much of the trailer is set to a cover of “The Times They Are A-Changin,'” which feels a little on the nose.
“This country was still great when I came to the throne,” the Queen says in the clip. “All that’s happened on my watch is the place has fallen apart.”
“You cannot flinch,” Margaret replies. “It’s only fallen apart if we say it has. That’s the thing about the monarchy. We paper over the cracks.”
The trailer features Margaret’s trademark wit (she likes the spotlight) and issues with her marriage to Snowdon. It also shows a young Prince Charles chafing against the stifling expectations of his family as he begins a romance with a young Camilla Shand, later Camilla Parker Bowles; season four of the Peter Morgan drama will reportedly have a heavy focus on Princess Diana. When the royal is told to “watch out for his family,” he responds that “they mean well.” He is told assuredly that they don’t.
“We have all made sacrifices and suppressed who we are,” Colman narrates. “It is not a choice. It is a duty.”
The new season of The Crown premieres on Netflix on November 17th. Watch the trailer, below.
Related: Princess Margaret’s Morning Routine Proves She Was Really a Queen
