Imagine a World Run By a Rather Nice Famous Woman
by Staff | 2015 | Stylist UK
This queen would anoint Monday as “Make an Effort Day.” I’d like to get the week off to a great start. Everyone would have to dress up and have breakfast together in the royal parks, and all musicians would be ordered to form bands and orchestras. Dancing would be encouraged before, during and after breakfast.
My husband [actor Damian Lewis] would be my king but with restricted powers. Anything I overruled him on would have to be obeyed. It would be a reign of terror over him!
My first act would be to leave Buckingham Palace and allow nurses and students to move in. After that, my priority would be the care of the elderly and mentally ill because if they are an afterthought what kind of land would I be ruling?
I would move my seat of office to Brecon Beacons. It’s my favourite part of the UK. I’d stop at the Tower of London on the way and put on all the coronation jewels because the queen should be dressed as a queen. My subjects would call me ‘Ma’am’ and curtsey when addressing me. And I mean a low 17th-century style curtsey, none of this bobbing shit. I’m very old school.
Under my rule everyone would be encouraged to enroll for political services. They’d have to go to the House of Commons to see how the decisions made there really do change our lives and how important they are.
In my school curriculum, children wouldn’t be so reliant on computers. When children are very little, it’s more important that they learn to experience things. You can do fantastic research and amazing things on the internet but you don’t need it when you are a child. Children take time to adapt and to understand themselves and the world around them, and sitting in front of a screen doesn’t necessarily help their development. You end up with kids that don’t know how to talk to you.
During my reign, there would be restricted access to self-service machines. We are losing customer interaction. What happened to the man on the Tube who used to help the blind person onto the escalator to make sure he didn’t fall and hurt himself? Or the lady in the corner shop who old Ms McGinty gets to say “Good morning, isn’t it terrible weather” to? That might be the only person she speaks to all day. The value of human interaction is being lost and it’s making people more lonely and breaking down communities.
I’d be a team player. I’m a great student. I love learning and I like following others. I’ve got a bit of lemming in me, as well as a bit of queen.
Female equality would be a reality. As queen, I might have to pepper the FTSE 100 boards with a dominant female presence to address the balance.
I would be fully behind the new shared parental leave legislation. It’s fantastic and I hope men take up the chance. Men have benefited so much from feminism. They get to know their children and be involved in their wives’ and families’ lives in a way the previous generation didn’t get the chance to do. You see a lot of very jealous granddads now realising their sons are having a great time with their children.
I would revel in being incredibly famous, but just for one day. I would have new stamps and banknotes printed with my face on as a souvenir. The best compliment I have ever received was from the editor of the film Hugo. In it, I played a woman who was much younger than me, and then a woman much older than me. I spent the evening talking to the editor and after 15 minutes she asked me, “What do you do? Are you in the art department?” I had to tell her that I was in the film and she had just been editing me for four months! That wouldn’t be a compliment for some actors but I love transforming into a character.
This queen wouldn’t do much cooking: I’m shocking in the kitchen. I cooked chicken for my first ever boyfriend and set the oven alight. He sat down to eat and then said, “Helen I’m really sorry I’m going to be sick!” The bird was black and charcoaled on the outside and bloody in the middle. Things aren’t much better now. It’s not exactly Little House on the Prairie in our household.