Trailer
Plot summary
Edward II takes the throne of England and calls Piers Gaveston back from exile, granting him gifts, titles and his love. Gaveston punishes the Bishop of Winchester, who had him banished, by torturing him, and Edward's brother Kent is the first to object. Lord Mortimer, who commands the kingdom's soldiers, joins the discontent, and the court grows angry as the king lets the business of state slide. Queen Isabella tries to draw her husband back and is turned away; Gaveston whispers to her and then mocks her response. The nobles band together and threaten Edward with dethronement and exile unless he sends his lover away.
Cast
Show all 15 cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Edward II (1991)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- While filming Edward II at Bray Studios, members of the gay rights group OutRage!, hired as extras, interrupted a Cliff Richard recording session elsewhere in the building as part of an attempt to publicly "out" him. The incident drew tabloid coverage and briefly raised fears that legal action could halt production.
- Derek Jarman declined a special Evening Standard award for cinematic achievement, citing what he regarded as the newspaper's homophobia. OutRage! members staged a protest outside the ceremony, and costume designer Sandy Powell echoed their criticisms while accepting her own award on stage for Edward II.
- Because Derek Jarman's health had deteriorated from HIV/AIDS-related illness, producer Ken Butler was prepared to take over directing on days when Jarman was too ill to work.
- Jarman came to adapt Marlowe's Edward II after writer Edmund White suggested it in a review of his earlier film Caravaggio. He had first developed a different project, Sod 'Em, a dystopian satire set in a near-future Britain where homosexuality has been recriminalised and discussion of it is banned.
- Annie Lennox appears in Edward II performing Cole Porter's "Every Time We Say Goodbye". Jarman had originally intended to direct a music video for Lennox's recording for the AIDS charity album Red Hot + Blue, but ill health prevented the project from going ahead.
- At approximately £750,000, Edward II had the largest budget of Derek Jarman's career, financed by the BBC, British Screen and Japanese backer Takashi Asai.
- Alexander Walker's Evening Standard review, which criticized both the film and Jarman's public discussion of his HIV status, made Edward II the subject of controversy. After Jarman's medical adviser Tony Pinching defended the director in a published letter, Walker responded by criticizing Jarman's discussion of safer sex in Modern Nature.
- Production designer Christopher Hobbs based the film's austere visual style partly on Jarman's recent visit to the Cloisters museum in New York, while costume designer Sandy Powell deliberately mixed medieval and contemporary clothing to create its anachronistic look.
