(1940s BAND MUSIC)
JO ELLISON: We've seen so many images of the Queen,
what she looked like at different points in time.
Her clothes and her hairstyling are so specific
to whichever decade it is
that you only need those silhouettes to tell you exactly how old she is
and what era it is, which is unbelievably rare.
It makes her kind of the greatest celebrity
of the modern era.
Clothes for the Queen
are very important.
It's a costume.
As she says in the play,
"Isn't that what I am - a tribal leader in an eccentric costume?"
BOB CROWLEY: When she started off,
she's being dressed by English designers, like Norman Hartnell
famously did the Coronation robes
and did a lot of her day clothes as well
and her formal clothes, and Hardy Amies and people like that.
So she was a fashion plate. Herself and Margaret were absolutely beautiful.
They had figures like movie stars.
- HELEN: Yes. - BOB: And looks to match.
We knew that it would be wonderful to see her in one scene as the Queen
that we all remember from the Coronation.
One day, he suddenly said, "Oh, what do you think?
"Do you think we could have you in the full...?"
And I said, "Yes, please!"
He knows me. He knows I like a bit of sparkle.
- She likes a big frock. - I like a big frock!
I've been putting her in big frocks since about 1980.
(LAUGHS) That's true! With sparkles.
JO: So little is actually revealed about the Queen's wardrobe
and the procedures by which she gets dressed or decides what to wear.
But apparently, there are 12 staff
who are kind of assigned to her for dressing.
She has a milliner, she has four dressmakers,
she has a personal dresser.
Oh, so important, shoes. I only have...
I have four pairs of shoes, actually.
Thank you, Queen, for never wearing extremely high-heeled shoes.
I'm very grateful!
This is one of my favourite jobs.
Seriously.
Because my dad was in the Army.
So we used to do this at home.
So I'm in the perfect job. I like ironing
and I like polishing shoes.
ELAINE SOLOMON: Wigs are very important for this production,
because Helen plays the Queen
from in her 20s to present day.
We've got five different wigs. So the first one is very brown
and set how she looked when she first became Queen.
And then we go up to when she's got white hair.
So I think they really help her,
along with the costumes,
play the part.
IRENE BOHAN: I think the silhouette's the important thing.
It was finding the right shape that worked on Helen
to make her look like the Queen.
The shape that she is now, as opposed to the shape she was when she was younger.
It's so instantly recognisable.
HELEN: These brilliantly constructed dresses,
especially the older Queen, really do so much of the work for me, honestly.
The actual textures, the fabrics, the colours, is all Bob.
That minty green colour - brilliant.
BOB: Which is an actual fabric
that the Queen actually has her costume made out of.
- Her costume! Her clothes made out of. - Yes.
- BOB: It's called the Bible. - IRENE: This is the Costume Bible.
So the theory is
that everything about the show,
about the costumes for the show,
go in here.
BOB: Working off the colour palette, you've got one chance to nail it.
It has to ring the right tone, you know, for the scene.
Obviously, I deliberately put her in blue for the Thatcher scene.
- The royal blue. - IRENE: The royal blue.
With the red. That was a very early idea, wasn't it?
BOB: Just put her out there in a strong, regal colour. Don't hold back.
And that, on those yellow chairs,
that just tells you so much about who you're sitting with.
JO: The colour and the tone and the jewellery and any accessories that she has
are incredibly carefully considered.
The weighting of the fabrics - incredibly important.
Nothing must be flyaway.
The length of the sleeve - she has to wear three-quarter-length sleeves
so she doesn't get anything caught.
Her hats have to have a sort of adequately narrow brim
so that people can see her face.
They mustn't be so tall so she can't sit in a car.
All those considerations every day must be absolutely exhausting,
and not to mention the fact that you might have a two-pound tiara on your head
or a kind of 15-pound robe on
to open a state event.
The interesting thing to me is to see what the Queen wears when she dresses herself,
when she's not being dressed.
She's an amazing person to investigate.
You have to be a little forensic with what she wears.
We were thrilled with the pink cardigan,
because we chose that pink cardigan for Balmoral.
- We did. - Just independently.
- She loves her pinks. - And then we saw a picture...
- So do you! - I know - I do!
We saw a picture of her in exactly that... In Balmoral! In exactly that cardigan.
- We were thrilled, weren't we? - True.
(BAGPIPE MUSIC)
BOB: This was a play going backwards and forwards in time,
and that's the most difficult quick change to do,
is the audience watching what you're doing.
You have to keep a kind of sense of decorum...
Yes, absolutely. Yeah.
She couldn't be seen to be in her slip at any point.
- No. That was very important, wasn't it? - Yes.
- That was the real challenge. - Yep.
HELEN: I always felt that those changes were essential,
that they happened like magic, really fast.
And we played around with lots of ideas.
A mirror coming on on rollers
and just sort of moving, and I would go behind the mirror,
and then come out the other side.
All of those things, and nothing really worked.
BOB: Your dressers were all part of that process.
Knowing you wouldn't see your dressers, they'd be backstage...
- No, absolutely. Yes. - They became part of the whole...
Yes. My dressers and my wig person, who...
normally would just be in here getting me dressed.
But they now come on the stage. They're a part of the sort of magic of the moment.
I think one of them...
the most interesting costumes,
and I think I can reveal this secret now we're at the interval...
..is very, very cleverly, in Helen's first change,
how she goes from being in her, I think it's 70s...
Even though, having been in all those rehearsals,
and knowing how it was done in the first place anyway,
still the first time you see it on stage...
And still actually even now when I watch it, I go,
(GASPS) "Oh, look - she's 25!" (LAUGHS)
It's wonderful to hear that... (GASPS) ..you know, sound in the audience
that I get every night on that particular change.
No, I'm not going to tell you how it's done! It's the magic of theatre.
(LAUGHTER)
That...and she's 26.
And there's a wig change, and that is seconds.
- I'm not telling. Are you telling? - No, I'm not telling.
- Only intimate friends! - (LAUGHTER)