Actress Helen Mirren, who portrays Queen Elizabeth II during the week of Princess Diana’s tragic death in the film, is herself a frontrunner to take home an award on Oscar night. That slowly agreed upon “fact” hasn’t changed her perspective of pleasant surprise regarding the film’s reception, however.

“When the idea of making ‘The Queen’ was first mooted,” she said in a statement following the nominations announcement, “we had no idea that the result would have quite the impact it has had. It is astounding the way that audiences have responded by taking the film to their hearts.”

Tasked with portraying one of the most elusive public figures of the modern era, Mirren’s Oscar nomianted performance didn’t come without its challenges.

“It is one of the hardest roles to play not just a living person but one who is part of our everyday lives in Britain,” her statement continues. “Whilst her presence is with us from her image on the letters that come through our door and on the money we spend, we know so little of the woman behind the image. I hope that my performance has conveyed a sense of Elizabeth the woman as well as the Queen.”

The actress also made it a point to convey how indebted she was to the work of screenwriter Peter Morgan. Morgan put a lot into the investigative research that ultimately yielded an inside look at the English monarchy, speaking to a number of individuals with ties to the Royal Family. Like any good writer or journalist, he isn’t about to discuss who his sources were. Suffice it to say, they included former employees as well as people from different palaces – and therefore, different slants of rhetoric.

“There are three different palaces,” Morgan told me in an interview at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, “St. James’s palace, which is Charles’s court, Kensington Palace which is Diana and Buckingham Palace which is the Queen. They each have their own sets of employees, and they all spin like crazy against the other guys. So you have to be pretty rigorous to see people from each, otherwise you end up with a very partisan view.”

“The Queen” actually exists as the second part of a potential trilogy involving British Prime Minister Tony Blair; Frears directed Morgan’s Blair-centric screenplay “The Deal,” which aired on television in 2004. Actor Michael Sheen portrays Blair in each and, should the final chapter come to fruition, will surely step into the role once more.

During the process of making “The Deal,” Morgan found himself facing a lot of walls in his research. But when the film finally hit the small screen, he felt that people must have been quite shocked by it tonally, having taken Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown seriously as adults. He crafted the tale as a sort of Cain and Abel story and explored that relationship appealingly enough that it granted artistic capital his way when he went about piecing together “The Queen.” Things were much easier the second time around, and perhaps sources saw it as a chance for their own voices to be heard through the work of the filmmakers.

Of course, Morgan paints Blair in the good guy position in “The Queen,” only to potentially send him, too, to the dog house in a third installment that will have Blair supporting an unpopular war far longer than anticipated. He hopes to have that conversation with Frears back home before commenting on the final film further, but even though he has received letters of encouragement from Blair, he understands things could be much different should he and Frears embark on the closing chapter.

“I think he’d be less than thrilled with part three,” he said with a smile. But, as Frears puts it, “People like me are very disappointed (in Blair). It was a real opportunity to make changes.”

Neither Frears nor Morgan is altogether familiar with the interpretation of “The Queen” as a very current, in some ways American piece of filmmaking. When asked about the parallels that could certainly be drawn to a leader out of touch with his OWN people here in the States, Frears claims he “can’t pretend it was primary.” Morgan, meanwhile, asserts that his intention was the “polar opposite.” He thought maybe curiosity would beget an international audience – a look into the heart of British government for voyeur’s sake. But the widespread appeal it has generated leaves him at a bit of a loss.

That doesn’t deter him, however, from drawing yet another parallel to current political climate when speaking about the film’s themes.

“It is about two leaders peering through blinds at a country out in the streets,” he said, “and them thinking ‘What the fuck to we do now?’ Ultimately all leaders are in the survival business, and if this film shows anything, it shows they will change – if enough of us are screaming for them to change.”

“Our leaders. Ourselves.” One can only hope.

Previously:
“E Pluribus Unum” (“Little Miss Sunshine”)