Between Queen Elizabeth II and the world of pop, the great game of “I love you neither”

“The eccentric is peculiar to the English, especially because they are convinced of their own infallibility, emblem and heritage of the British nation.“, writes Edith Sitwell in her book The Eccentrics published in 1933 – seven years after the birth of Elizabeth Alexandra Mary and two decades before the coronation of Elizabeth II, who form the same and unique person, but we all tend to believe that the Queen has always been queen.

Since a crown was placed on Elizabeth II’s skull in 1953, artists – who share the title of the kingdom’s greatest eccentrics neck and neck with aristocrats – have made the monarch’s very stilted figure a pop, punk or rock’n’roll effigy depending on the style. But the death of the sovereign should not mask one thing, the representations of the Queen were not always intended to become giveaways sold to millions of tourists dragging filthy suitcases in flashy colors through the streets of London.

At a time of global warming, heads of state are regularly accused by environmental activists of turning their broken promises into operations of greenwashing so as not to lose face. More than half a century ago, nobody was talking about the environment and to change its conservative image in a changing world, the British monarchy had the idea of ​​using the Beatles. Since the release of their album Please Please Me by 1963, young guys with long hair had become icons in the UK. The Labor Prime Minister at the time, Harold Wilson, therefore suggested that the Queen decorate the “Fab four”. Thing done in 1965, when Elizabeth II presented the Order of the British Empire to Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, George Harrison and of course John Lennon.

The latter, however, mocked the monarchy quite strongly. “We earned our medals for not killing people”, grated Lennon at the microphone of the journalists who had questioned him about this royal interview, as the newspaper Les Echos recalls. He returned his decoration in 1969 in protest against British involvement in the Biafra war in Nigeria. But for Buckingham Palace the important thing is elsewhere. Throughout her seven decades of reign, the queen has decorated a mess of celebrities, some of whom, like Mick Jagger, have nevertheless displayed values ​​that are the opposite of the old monarchy.

The first to hijack Britain’s national anthem were the Sex Pistols in 1977. Ten days before the Queen’s 25-year Jubilee, they released the single God Save The Queen by relating the monarchy to a fascist regime which has no future, with the famous “no future“. At the time, the punk quartet was the hero of the young English generation who dreamed more of soaking their lips in an alcoholic rock drink than in a lukewarm cup of tea filled with good manners and an agreed life. On Jubilee Day June 7, 1977, the Sex Pistols added a string to the legend by performing the song about a ship sailing the Thames. After a fighteleven people were arrested when the boat arrived in port.

“It was not a voluntary effort to be broadcast and shock everyone”

Paul Cook, Sex Pistols drummer

However, the drummer Paul Cook had not assumed the farce, according to his remarks reported in the book No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs, New Yorkby Johnny Rotten, the singer of the band: “We hadn’t written it specifically for the Queen’s Jubilee. We weren’t aware of it at the time. It wasn’t a deliberate effort to go out and shock everyone. the world”.

In 1985, Andy Warhol signed one of his works the most famous : Reigning Queens. On this serigraph, the artist represents Elizabeth II and three other women installed on the throne: Beatrix Queen of the Netherlands, Queen Margrethe II of Denmark and Queen Ntfombi Twala of Swaziland. The irony of this portrait made from a postage stamp celebrating Elizabeth’s jubilee in 1977? It has become an object of art exhibited at the National Portrait Gallery which some take for a tribute to the Queen. But by plastering high color saturation on Elizabeth II’s face, just as he had done for New York transvestites before, Andy Warhol is mutedly saying that the monarchy only exists in the eyes of its subjects. In any case, this is the interpretation made of it by an art critic in the newspaper The Guardian.

The queen never openly said what she thought of this silkscreen. But in 2012, she bought four of her portraits by Warhol for the royal collection. And the National Portrait Gallery sells T-shirts and mugs in the colors of Reigning Queens. Would the monarch have been trapped by the pop-art star who once said: “I want to be as famous as the Queen of England” ? We imagine Andy Warhol and Elizabeth II playing the game of “I know that you know that I know…”.

It is undoubtedly the artist on this list who was most in tune with Elizabeth II. Elton John was knighted by the Queen in 1998 and has been singing the royal family’s praises ever since. Perhaps because the pop icon with 300 million records passed privately lived a moment when he perceived the humanity of the queen, like a mirror held up to his own torments.

In cure of lovehis autobiography published in 2012, Elton John looked back on the periods of chaos in his life and the long periods when he had sunk into drugs and alcohol abuse. In his last autobiography published in 2019 and entitled Me, he had on the contrary revealed a moment of relaxation of the queen. One day when Elton John was there, Elizabeth II had given a correction to Viscount Linley, son of Princess Margaret. “I know the Queen’s public image isn’t exactly one of wild frivolitywrites Elton John. But, in private, she can be hilarious. I saw her approach Viscount Linley and ask him to watch her sister who had fallen ill and retired to her room. When he tried to push her away several times, the Queen lightly slapped him across the face, saying: ‘Don’t argue – CLACK – not – CLACK – with – CLACK – me – CLACK – I – CLACK – am -CLAC – the Queen !’ As she left, she saw me looking at her, gave me a wink and left.”

In 2012 during the opening ceremony of the London Olympics, a short film by Danny Boyle is projected. We see Daniel Craig, in the role of James Bond, going inside buckingham Palace and climb the stairs four by four to the queen’s office. Elizabeth II then reveals herself in front of the camera and launches a laconic “good evening mr bond”. The rest of the video dilutes the charm of this appearance a little by leaving a false suspense: did the queen take her place in the flesh alongside Daniel Craig in the helicopter which takes off off-camera? of Danny Boyle, before reappearing, real this time, in the sky of the Olympic stadium in London? No, of course, it was a stuntman who jumped in a salmon-colored dress into the London sky.

The queen has known all the James Bond films (the first film dating from 1962). But in Danny Boyle’s short film, she lowers herself to the rank of actress. Did she dream of a more rock’n’roll life like a 007 conquest? In his book The Other Side of The CoinAngela Kelly, the Queen’s personal seamstress, had revealed that Elizabeth II had agreed to break royal protocol to appear in this fiction. “She was very amused by this idea and she immediately accepted”. To put fun in a life too surely regulated like music paper. It is also from this boredom that British eccentricity is born.