User reviews

Honestly, criticising Lucy Worsley and her history programmes for a minor speech defect is rather harsh. Do you have Lucy's knowledge and intellectual ability? Lucy Worsley is an historian and her programmes are very accessible, very well researched and well presented in an entertaining way. She lives and breathes history in her job, in her writing and in her TV programmes. Please don't criticise her or anyone else for superficial things such as speech. I thought we had all gone beyond that these days. I have watched all of her programmes that I'm able to see in Australia and my husband and I love her shows. Thanks Lucy.

I'm a history buff and for quite a few years, I enjoyed Lucy Worsley's tv programs. She has the credentials and experience to be a serious and respected historian, and she used to be exactly that. Her speech impediment that some people so churlishly mention never detracted from her presentations, and she is easy to understand. Somewhere along the line however, she decided to go Hollywood and started taking part in the history enactments she presents, dressing up in all sorts of fun costumes and participating in the enactments while breaking the fourth wall and talking to the viewer. It not only makes her look silly but it is also distracting, and the more often she insists upon doing it in any one program, the more off-putting it becomes. She certainly is getting the limelight she obviously craves, although it may not be the kind of attention she hoped for. She would be wise to go back simply to presenting history through voice overs and interviews with other historians and letting the actors do the acting.

I usually enjoy Lucy Worsley's documentaries but this one left me ... bored. It seemed that much of it was filler to have something to put on the program. How many times does she have to repeat the (supposed) speech by Elizabeth I? There were interesting facts about the Spanish Armada - as Lucy always presents in her shows. But so many of her re-enactments have begun to get old. Anyone interested in this has already seen great actresses doing The Speech so watching a historian do it over and over is ... boring. I started watching the Queen Anne segment and just couldn't; didn't bother with Marie Antoinette. Shame.