Variety: Whether it’s the BBC’s “Blue Planet II” wowing TV viewers in Beijing or Paddington Bear’s new movie making kids squeal in Bulgaria or the latest West End hit thrilling theater buffs on Broadway, Britain’s cultural offerings have conquered consumers the world over. Like the U.K.’s diplomatic prowess and its military might, the local entertainment industry boasts a reach and impact disproportionate to the nation’s size.
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My initial takeaways from this article are that if you play a British politician you are destined to win an Academy Award, and that the United States film and television industry has a bad habit of recreating British works and then boisterously claiming how much better our version is. The list of people who played British historical figures and also won Oscars is extensive, including greats such as Colin Firth as King George VI and Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher. Notably, Meryl Streep is not even British, therefore there is something to be said about the quality of storytelling provided by British history. The author even included a preview of the turbulent politics in Britain right now, which will probably be made into movies in the future, dawning even more Academy Award winners (not that part of that assumption has not already been done). Meryl Streep, an American, playing a British woman parallels with the ways in which the United States takes British works such as The Office and recreates them with an American cast and characters. I know that this article states that British film and TV is growing in popularity, but I think that we need to give their industry even more credit for the stories and productions it gives the world.
Okay let me just start out by saying that I am in love with British television and movies. I think that Americans as a whole have a bit of an anglophile problem. It is notable the crossover that happens (or at least is starting to happen) between British and American entertainment. In American entertainment - film, especially - a European actor often draws a sort of novelty element or an exoticism to a piece. Especially given the rich history of Great Britain and her monarchy, the “reality” of historical dramas seems to draw much more interest from audiences. There is definitely something to be said, though, about the United Kingdom’s current political turbulence and how that translates to the entertainment it is putting out. There is definitely content in the whole Brexit situation, but Britain’s exit from the European Union is likely to cause more harm than anything else given the nature of Britain’s exports industry.
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