Over-Analyzing the Crown: S3E3 Aberfan
All My Posts on The Crown
S3: 1 & 2: “Olding” & “Margaretology” 3: “Aberfan” 4: “Bubbikins, 5: “Coup” 6: “Tywysog Cymru” 7: “Moondust" 8: “Dangling Man” 9: “Imbroglio” 10: “Cri de Coeur”
S4: 1: “Gold Stick” 2: “The Balmoral Test” 3: “Fairytale” ( + Cinderella References) 4: “Favourites” 5: “Fagan” 6: “Terra Nullius” 7: ”The Hereditary Principle” 8: “48:1” 9: “Avalanche”
The Medals, Sashes, and Tiaras of The Crown; Tiaras/Crowns Overviews: Season 1 ; Season 2
Olivia Colman with the mayor in The Crown, left (Netflix); the Queen with the Aberfan mayor in real life, right (Stan Meagher) (Credit: Evening Standard / Getty).
A really horrible disaster occurred and killed over 100 people, mostly children, in Aberfan, Wales. In accordance with tradition and out of concern of distracting rescue workers, Queen Elizabeth delays visiting the Welsh town until she is forced to by external pressure.
Villagers digging at Aberfan.
Am aerial shot showing the extent of the devastation in the Aberfan disaster, 1966. (unknown)
The start of this episode is intentionally foreboding. It reminds me very much of the pre-accident scenes in HBO’s “Chernobyl.” I had never heard of the Aberfan incident before this episode, but just from the shooting style and content, I could tell that something bad was about to happen to those children. This haunting atmosphere is repeated during the credits, which are shown over film of children playing in their schoolyard.
The singing, incidentally, is a theme that comes back several times in the episode. The mourners at the funeral sing a haunting hymn in perfect harmony and Elizabeth can’t actually cry until she listens to a recording of the hymn at the end of the episode. I’ve included the lyrics to both songs sung at the end of this post.
There’s an absolutely gorgeous shot of a little girl running out into a heavy rainstorm with a red umbrella. It’s shot so that almost all color has been drained from the scene; it looks black and white except for that one red umbrella, with one singing little girl under it. It almost evokes the red balloon from “It.” I doubt that was exactly what they were going for though. Red umbrellas on a black and white background are a surprisingly common motif in a lot of photography and paintings, you can find it all over the place.
On second watch, it became obvious that the green coal tips are visible in almost every outside shot of the pre-accident sequence; they are so huge that they overwhelm and hang over every person and every thing in the whole village. You can see them at the end of the main street, behind the schoolteacher as he talks to his class, and behind the children and the miners as they go to and from their homes.
Interestingly enough, the green from the tips seems to become a theme throughout the entire episode, seen in both the costuming, the lighting, and the scenery. Almost everyone in this episode wears green. I believe this symbolizes the huge impact the disaster had on the entire nation; everyone was impacted and heartbroken over it. The Queen wears numerous green outfits (at least two house robes, a green floral shirt, and a green cardigan, I may have missed one or two as well), the crowd yelling at the politicians and the National Coal Board reps is wearing a LOT of green, Tony wears green as he goes off to Aberfan, Margaret wears a green dress as he kisses her on his way out the door and a green striped shirt at breakfast with her family. In the Buckingham palace scenes, they spend a lot of time in one particular green room. There’s even a green lighting over some of the scenes; the one that stands out most is when Harold Wilson is taking off his coal-dust covered shoes at the end of the day and looking absolutely defeated. The amount of green in this episode is just absolutely bonkers; I was half expecting to hear some proto-environmentalism come up to tie more into the “green.”
Of course, the most devastating use of green comes during the funeral, in the green cloth (?) lining the huge grave, filled with the coffins of 81 children. The crowd at the funeral is still surrounded by those giant green hills all around them (how many of them are coal tips vs hills? It’s so unnerving not to know).There are also lots of brown costumes in this episode. Tony, Margaret, the Queen, and Harold Wilson all prominently wear brown. This may be referring to the brown coffins against those bright green cloth, or may just indicate sadness.
I’d like to note that this is the second time in the series that junior secretary Martin Charteris is shown expressing an opinion that, while not in keeping with palace tradition, accurately predicts the reaction of the people and the press. When senior private secretary Michael Adeane doesn’t take Martin’s advice in the season 2 episode “Marionettes,” the Queen ends up giving a very tone-deaf, patronizing speech which opens her to a ton of criticism. When the queen and Michael don’t listen to Martin’s timid suggestion that she visit Aberfan herself, it opens her up to criticism about not caring about her people. This all just indicates that Martin is the real down to earth secretary with actual insight here and definitely should have been made senior secretary as Elizabeth wanted in the season 1 episode “Scientia Potentia Est,” tradition be damned.
Continuity Note: It looks like Michael Adeane got to grow back his mustache after a while. Elizabeth asked him to shave it off in the Season 2 episode “Lisbon” to satisfy Prince Philip, who was complaining about all the “mustaches” ordering him around. This seems fair, since the events of “Aberfan” take place in 1966 and the events of “Lisbon” take place in 1957. You can’t ban a man’s facial hair for years at a time!
Jason Watkins as Prime Minister Harold Wilson in The Crown (Netflix)
Ben Daniels as Tony Armstrong Jones in The Crown (Netflix)
There’s a horribly sad contrast in the two scenes in the episode in which someone yells for those around him to be quiet. This first happens as the accident is just beginning, when a worker at the mine yells for the others to be quiet, as he can hear the tip start to collapse and race toward the village. The second happens in the post-accident cleanup while Harold Wilson is visiting; everyone becomes quiet to try to hear the sound of any child who might still be buried. This scene became even more eerie when I read about the accident and learned that there were no survivors found after 11 am (the accident itself occurred at 9:15).
The shots of villagers desperately digging with their hands, their helmets, anything nearby to try to rescue their children, is absolutely heartbreaking and haunting. They don’t draw too many direct comparisons to the children seen at the beginning of the episode (at least not that I noticed, please tell me if I’m wrong!), but at one point, a man did pick up a copy of the “All Things Bright and Beautiful” songbook that all the children were using as they practiced.
One of the most interesting things about this series is how its portrayals of events from decades in the past evoke more recent happenings. When Harold Wilson urged the Queen to visit Aberfan, I could not help but think of Tony Blair urging the Queen to say something about the death of Princess Diana.
Tobias Menzies in The Crown. The mayor with his chain of office can be seen on the right.
There’s a shot of the Queen writing in her journal while listening to a newscast announcing her message of sympathy to Aberfan that intentionally blurs her for a bit. This indicates that this whole situation isn’t about her or her feelings about the proper role for the queen; this is a horrible incident which is hurting her people and her distance from it isn’t helping.
There’s an interesting juxtaposition between the line of female grocery workers in white behind Harold Wilson at the beginning of the episode and the line of female nurses in white at the end of the episode when the Queen visits Aberfan. Haven’t figured out a meaning there, it just stood out to me.
In case you were wondering about that giant gold chain that one man wears in some of the Aberfan scenes, that’s the mayor wearing his chain of office. Most British and Irish mayors wear a collar/chain of office, and new ones are still designed for new municipalities. These are worn over normal clothes when on official duties.
The little girl who gives the queens flowers “from the remaining children of Aberfan” (my heart broke into a million pieces at that) is wearing a light blue outfit with a notable collar that looks very much like Elizabeth’s own outfits as a child.
Line of coffins of victims (Credit: Popperfoto / Getty).
The memorial in Aberfan, Wales, today (Credit: Steve Parsons / PA).
All Things Bright and Beautiful
All things bright and beautiful,
all creatures great and small,
all things wise and wonderful,
the lord God made them all.
Each little flower that opens,
each little bird that sings,
he made their glowing colours,
he made their little wings.
The purpleheaded mountain,
the river running by,
the sunset and the morning,
that brightens up the sky.
Jesus, Lover of My Soul
Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to Thy bosom fly,
While the nearer waters roll,
While the tempest still is high:
Hide me, O my Savior, hide,
Till the storm of life is past;
Safe into the haven guide;
O receive my soul at last.
Other refuge have I none,
Hangs my helpless soul on Thee;
Leave, oh, leave me not alone,
Still support and comfort me.
All my trust on Thee is stayed,
All my help from Thee I bring;
Cover my defenseless head
With the shadow of Thy wing