Trailer
Plot summary
Henry VII, dying, mistakes his heir for his late son Arthur Tudor and urges him to marry Arthur's widow, Catherine of Aragon, so that the family line will be secured by a son. Fifteen years later his son is king. Henry VIII still has no son by Catherine, only a daughter, Mary. In Kent, the Boleyns are celebrating Anne's betrothal to Henry Percy, and the Duke of Norfolk tells her father that the king will allow the match. The king's interest in Anne puts an end to that. Determined to have her as his wife and not his mistress, he asks Cardinal Wolsey to find grounds for annulling his marriage, and Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer see a way that would mean a break with the Catholic Church.
Cast
- Sid Mitchellas Young Henry VIII
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Henry VIII (2003)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Short of money, Granada Television's controller of drama Andy Harries approached the American CBS network, whose executives wanted to replace Helena Bonham Carter with Sarah Michelle Gellar and dub all of the actors' voices with American accents. Harries declined CBS's funding and took it from Powercorp, WGBH Boston and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation instead.
- Bleasdale had originally scripted an opening scene that featured Henry confronting the devil in hell. ITV's director of drama commissioning Nick Elliott told Harries, "I'm not having the devil on ITV", adding that he was not paying five million pounds for it. Bleasdale then quit and was replaced by Peter Morgan.
- The serial gave Emily Blunt her first major appearance on screen, casting her as Catherine Howard, the teenager coerced into becoming Henry's fifth queen.
