My Lady Jane: Mind-blowing detail behind bold new series

It’s an explosive new take on a well-known story – and when it came to one production detail, the crew threw the rule book out the window.

“Never work with animals or children”, as the old Hollywood golden rule goes.

When it comes to the bold, loosely historically-based new series My Lady Jane, that advice was roundly ignored.

The eight-part Prime Video series tells the “what if?” story of actual Tudor-era figure, Lady Jane Grey, who was famously Queen for just nine days following the death of King Henry VIII’s son, King Edward, and – very stylistically – explores what could have happened if she’d survived.

It’s billed as an “epic tale of true love and high adventure set in an alt-universe of action, history, fantasy, comedy, romance and rompy-pompy”, and as the showrunners themselves explain it: “Think of A Knight’s Tale, think Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, think The Princess Bride.”

Emily Bader as the historically ill-fated Lady Jane Grey. Picture: Prime Video

Along with the humans, it features a massive cast of animals – and after what felt like the peak of CGI (computer-generated imagery)’s popularity in the early to mid-2000s – My Lady Jane’s beasts are almost all the real thing.

“There’s a lot of CGI on screen right now and often I find myself going, ‘Wow, that’s good CGI’,” showrunner Gemma Burgess told news.com.au, adding they’d wanted their show to feel “as natural as possible”.

Bader alongside Robyn Betteridge as Margaret Grey, Isabella Brownson as Katherine Grey and Anna Chancellor as Frances Grey. Picture: Prime Video

Actress Emily Bader, who takes on the titular role, admitted that while she thoroughly enjoyed having plenty of animals on set, it was clearly taking its toll on the crew at times.

“I think [for the producers] it was a tad stressful, but I loved it – I was like, ‘more animals!’” she told news.com.au.

However, as co-star Edward Bluemel (male lead Lord Guildford Dudley) added, not all of them made it into the final edit.

“We had a diva pig who was sadly let go from the production, which I think reminded us all that no actor is indispensable – there’s no room for complacency on the set,” he joked.

“[The pig] let down the entire pig community that day.”

Edward Bluemel as Lord Guildford Dudley. Picture: Prime Video

My Lady Jane is inspired by the best-selling novel from Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton and Jodi Meadow, which is in itself vaguely inspired by the actual Lady Jane Grey.

According to its showrunners, Burgess and Meredith Glynn, the fact it possesses only a loose connection to historical events made it all the more fun to bring to life.

“Because we’re such nerds – not experts, nerds – who’ve read a lot, we could kind of throw anything we wanted into the story, and if it works historically, that’s great, and if it doesn’t, well … it’s not a history show, that’s fine,” Burgess told news.com.au.

Even so, they kept three historical advisers on-board to help guide them where necessary.

“They were always there to tell us if something was anachronistic, and they told us a lot and they were wonderful,” Glynn said.

“But we were really free to then throw out the history book.”

At its core, the series leans heavily into giving a tragic historical heroine a voice – but it also features plenty of twists and turns – and genuinely gasp-inducing moments.

“Jane’s always our North Star and she’s the emotional heart of the show, but we also want to keep the audience on their toes, we want to keep them guessing, we want to keep them laughing,” Glynn explained.

Burgess added: “In every single scene we try and subvert the tropes, do something surprising, come at it a little bit differently.

“It’s almost a rule with us. If you can do it and something that’s unexpected – do it.”

My Lady Jane premieres on Prime Video on Thursday, June 27.

Originally published as My Lady Jane: Mind-blowing detail behind bold new series