LITTLE ROCK — For folks who went through a bit of trouble to shed themselves of the ironfisted tyranny of the British crown, Americans sure go nuts over a royal wedding.
Maybe we’ve mellowed over the years. Maybe we all like to channel our inner Disney when it comes to princesses and fairy tales.
Maybe it’s also been long enough since the disappointment that was Charles and Diana that we’re willing to give the fantasy another go.
Whatever the reason, the excitement is building over the pending vows between Britain’s Prince William and Kate Middleton. The couple plan a small, intimate family affair April 29.
No. Seriously, it’ll be “the wedding of the century” in London’s Westminster Abbey with millions watching along on TV. After all, 750 million watched Charles and Diana get hitched. Maybe the royals will get it right this time.
William, 28, is certainly handsome enough for thefairy tale. He’s also a princely and strapping 6-foot-3 (Diana was 5-foot-10). And Kate, 29, is appropriately thin and striking. She’s also no shy, retiring Diana, who was not quite 20 when she married Charles.
And, as far as we can tell, William, unlike his father, doesn’t really love someone else. In other words, Kate’s job is not simply to provide “an heir and a spare,” as was Diana’s.
My main fear is that with only two months to go before the big day, will there be enough time for Anglophiles to get their fill?
The Associated Press reports that a Lifetime movie,a reality program that sends wedding fanatics over to London and a TLC special on hoarders of royal memorabilia are all being planned in addition to the more frenzied coverage the news networks plan as the magic day approaches.
“It’s wedding fever here,” Perry Simon, general manager of BBC Worldwide Americas, told the AP. “All wedding, all the time.”
BBC America has already struck quickly with two specials, William & Kate: Modern Monarchy and Modern Monarchy: Here and There.
They’ll be on the schedule again, as will a half dozen other specials about Princess Diana, William and his brother, Prince Harry, and another on royal lineage.
The AP notes that BBC America is saving its loudest fanfare for Royally Mad, a special hosted by Cat Deeley of So You Think You Can Dance. The two-parter premieres April 12 and features four American royal wedding fanatics who will jet to London to visit places and people associated with the wedding.
“It took us all by surprise,” Simon said of the reaction to Charles and Diana’s wedding. “We thought there would be some interest, but we had no idea how much interest there would be. These kindsof events are once-in-a-generation. The royal family is unique.”
Lifetime is planning a romantic movie, William & Kate, about the lovebirds. It’ll star relative unknowns Nico Evers-Swindell and Camilla Luddington and air sometime in April.
New Zealander Evers-Swindell portrayed “Blond Russian No. 1” in an episode of NCIS: Los Angeles, and Brit Luddington had a bit part in Days of Our Lives.
There’s certain to be more wedding stuff down the road. I’ll keep an eye out and pass along the information as it becomes available.
Bell’s back. Fans of Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars) will be pleased to learn that she has joined the cast of Showtime’s new pilot House of Lies starring Don Cheadle. The halfhour dark comedy will be “a subversive, scathing look at a self-loathing management consultant in a top-tier firm.”
Cheadle plays Marty, theconsultant who does whatever it takes to get his clients the information they want. Bell will play Jeannie Van Der Hooven, a sharp, Ivy-League graduate who works at the firm.
No debut date has been set.
More ’60s. Credit AMC’s Mad Men for inspiring at least three new series set in the early part of the 1960s.
Starz has Magic City set in a flashy Miami hotel about the time Fidel Castro took over Cuba.
ABC is working on Pan Am, about the pilots and stewardesses (they weren’t called “flight attendants” then) working for the legendary and now-defunct airline.
And NBC will bring us Playboy. It follows the adventures of the Playboy bunnies at the original Chicago Playboy Club with politics and social change as a backdrop. The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. E-mail:
Style, Pages 46 on 02/27/2011