The Favourite (film)

Development

In September 2015, it was announced that Yorgos Lanthimos would direct the film, from a screenplay by Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara, which was described as "a bawdy, acerbic tale of royal intrigue, passion, envy, and betrayal."^[8] Ceci Dempsey, Ed Guiney, Lee Magiday, and Andrew Lowe served as producers under their Scarlet Films and Element Pictures banners, respectively.^[9] This is the first film in which neither Lanthimos nor his frequent collaborator Efthymis Filippou serve as screenwriters, but Lanthimos was nonetheless attracted to Davis' and McNamara's script, and "became acquainted with the three female characters who happened to be real people. I felt that it was an interesting story in its own right, but you also have the opportunity to create three complex female characters which is something you rarely see."^[10]

In regards to the film's plot, specifically the lesbian-centric love triangle, Lanthimos stated that "My instinct from the beginning was that I didn't want this to become an issue in the film, for us, like we're trying to make a point out of it [...] I didn't even want the characters in the film to be making an issue of it. I just wanted to deal with these three women as human beings. It didn't matter that there were relationships of the same gender. I stopped thinking about that very early on in the process."^[11] Lanthimos also elaborated on the "positive" effect the Me Too movement had on the film: "Because of the prevalent male gaze in cinema, women are portrayed as housewives, girlfriends… Our small contribution is we're just trying to show them as complex and wonderful and horrific as they are, like other human beings."^[10]

Casting

In September 2015, it was announced that Emma Stone, Olivia Colman and Kate Winslet had been cast in the film, portraying Abigail Masham, Queen Anne, and Sarah Churchill, respectively.^[9] By October 2015, Rachel Weisz joined the cast of the film, replacing Winslet.^[12] This comes as the second collaboration between Lanthimos, Colman, and Weisz, all of whom previously worked together on Lanthimos' The Lobster (2015).^[13] In February 2017, Nicholas Hoult joined the cast of the film.^[14] In March 2017, Joe Alwyn joined, too.^[15] On 8 August 2018, James Smith and Jenny Rainsford were announced as additional members of the cast.^[16] In an interview for IndieWire, Weisz described the film as a comedy, comparing it to a "funnier, sex driven" All About Eve.^[17] Colman stated that playing the Queen was "a joy because she sort of feels everything,” and when asked if the character was nothing more than a petulant child, she stated that, “She's just a woman who is underconfident and doesn't know if anyone genuinely loves her. She has too much power, too much time on her hands."^[10] Stone revealed that her greatest concern with her role was mastering her accent: "It's 1705, which was about 300 years before any period I had ever done. It was pretty daunting on a few levels — having to be British and not stick out like a sore thumb [...]"^[18]

Filming

Majority of the film's principal photography took place at the Hatfield House, Hertfordshire.

Filming was expected to begin in the spring of 2016, but was pushed back a year, during which time Lanthimos directed The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017).^[19] Principal photography began in March 2017 at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire^[20][21] and concluded in May 2017.^[8] Lanthimos stated that a major reason for filming at the Hatfield House was because "From the beginning, I had this image of these lonely characters in huge spaces."

Production designer Fiona Crombie drew inspiration from the chequered black-and-white marble floor in the Great Hall for the film's colour palette, noting that "a character will walk into a room and you get this incredible wide-shot – we're talking seeing from the floors to the ceilings to the corners. You see everything." Several alterations were made to various rooms in the house, particularly for the Queen's room, which included removing paintings, furniture, and other decorations, in order to "put our own language into it." As with most of Lanthimos' works, the film implements natural lighting as opposed to artificial lighting, which proved to be somewhat challenging for the night time scenes, which were candle-lit: "as you imagine, there are very strict protocols about managing candles [...] we had to use an enormous number of wax catchers. But the people who manage Hatfield were very supportive and we negotiated and negotiated, and we would be able to do a vast majority of what we wanted to do."^[22]

Music

The soundtrack includes pieces by classical composers such as Handel, Bach, Purcell and Vivaldi, as well as modern composers like Olivier Messiaen, Luc Ferrari and Anna Meredith.^[23]

Critical response

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 94% based on 35 reviews with an average rating of 8.6/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The Favourite sees Yorgos Lanthimos balancing a period setting against rich, timely subtext - and getting roundly stellar performances from his well-chosen stars."^[30] Metacritic gives the film a weighted average score of 91 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".^[31]

Accolades