I am just ecstatic to talk about this year’s hit Broadway Musical Six. It swept the Tonys, and has opened up touring productions across the country, and I JUST GOT TO SEE IT!
This vibrant, clever retelling of Tudor her-story was created by TOBY MARLOW & LUCY MOSS in association with the Chicago Shakespeare Festival. The show is incredibly smart, and creative, and delves into the lives of some fascinating women, re-told as a singing contest with the characters singing their lives for you to judge what it was like being the queen of England and living with the turbulent and fickle Henry VIII.
What really appeals to me in this show is that like Hamilton, the musical takes these six semi-mythical women and tells their story in a way that is fresh and exciting. It bridges the gap between Tudor History and the modern-day by equating being a queen with being a celebrity, with all the drama of ambitious parents, romantic drama, public opinion, and even being exploited and sexualized by a male-dominated society. This comes across in the music, the costumes, the lyrics, and even the lighting!
Why “Six” Slaps
The costumes are brilliant and iconic. Catherine Of Aragon is like a cross between Beyonce, a saint, and a medieval knight. The lighting is incredible! You could tell the whole story using the lighting design as it pulsates, dances, changes into different colors, turns into different shapes, and finally flashes the name of the show in triumphant gold letters.
One particularly brilliant way the music works in “Six” is the fact that it uses the song “Greensleeves” as a motif both musically and thematically. One big theme of the show is how, unlike Henry VIII, most of the history of his six queens is lost and replaced by legends and even songs. The first line of the show is the famous rhyme about their fates: “Divorced. Beheaded. Died. Divorced. Beheaded. Survived.” As the video above helps illustrate, Marlowe and Moss know that most people only know the rhyme about their deaths and the myth that Henry wrote a song about one of them; that their lives are overshadowed by their deaths and the misconceptions that people have written over the years. Howard Ho points out how the song musically forces itself into the first number, “Ex Wives,” but by the end of the show, the six queens break free from these musical bars! You can hear the change of key and notes during this performance at the Tonys, which puts the opening number and closing reprise together.
The Cast of “Six” perform live at the 2021 Tony Awards.
But how do the queens go from “one word in a stupid rhyme,” to a group of powerful, individual queens singing in harmony, without the man who made them famous? That’s what the solo numbers in “Six” do so incredibly well- tell each queen’s solo stories as rocking ballads, hilarious dis-tracks, soulful love songs, and… well stay tuned.
Part II: The Women and Their Queenspirations
1. Catherine of Aragon
Catherine of Aragon was Henry’s first wife and is still universally beloved, even though Henry decided to divorce her. As the epitome of a stand-alone power queen, it makes sense that Six modeled her character, costume, and songs after Beyonce, with a Shakira-inspired Spanish beat for good measure:
My favorite thing about her solo, “No Way” is how the writers paraphrase her real-life speech during the divorce trial in 1529. Below are the lyrics and the real speech:
Alas, Sir, where have I offended you? Or what occasion have you of displeasure, that you intend to put me from you? I take God and all the world to witness that I have been to you a true, humble and obedient wife, ever conformable to your will and pleasure. This twenty years and more I have been your true wife, and whether it be true or no, I put it to your conscience.
— Katherine of Aragon, 1529
2. Anne Boleyn
In some ways, the version of Anne Boleyn in “Six” is less a pop version of the real queen and more of a commentary on the nature of celebrity. If you watch the video, you can see how in life she was admired for her beauty and fashion but hated for her comments on Queen Katherine, her scandalous love affairs, and her brash nature. This explains the spiky pop-punk princess look they gave her, (which evidently resonates with many audiences since I saw at least two girls cosplaying as Anne in the audience). Sort of like a celebrity who gets canceled on Twitter or Princess Diana, Anne shows how a person can be undone when they dare challenge an established order, especially the Royal Family.
After the show, I found it a bit weird that they portrayed Anne Boleyn as a jetsetting airhead, but then again she is one of the best-known queens in history, so they can get away with it. In reality, Anne Boleyn was highly educated and a member of an ambitious and social climbing family who basically pushed her to woo Henry. As you can see in this clip from “Anne Of A Thousand Days,” Henry and Anne’s family bullied her constantly to become the King’s mistress after HE ALREADY GOT HER SISTER PREGNANT, so Anne knew that the only way to keep Henry from ruining her life was to convince him to divorce Katherine of Aragon and marry her.
Of course, this strategy didn’t save Anne in the end, which says more about how cruel Henry VIII was, chewing up women and spitting them out in his ravenous quest for a son. So is this an accurate portrayal of Anne’s life? No. Is it fun, ABSOLUTELY!
III. Jane Seymore
I’m more than I seem, or am I?
“Six” The Musical.
This version of Jane Seymore was inspired by Adele, so appropriately, she has a heart-wrenching power ballad about her turbulent relationship with Henry. Sadly, we don’t know much about Jane’s real life, so the song takes some liberties. If you go to the Hampton Court Website, you can actually vote as to whether Jane was a devoted wife or a social climbing gold-digger. Probably the real woman was something even more complicated, though we’ll never know for sure.
IV. Anne of Cleaves
Anne of Cleaves is the funniest part of the show! Many of us have heard the story that Henry divorced Anne after he found her ‘ugly.’ What “Six The Musical” does is amend the story, by pointing out that after he divorced her, Henry gave her a castle and a huge retainer, allowing her to live like a queen, without being married to a king! Accordingly, her song is a Rhianna-style dis track that shows off her awesome lifestyle, and spits in Henry’s stupid face!
As fun as this, rags-to-riches story is, the truth is less fun- Anne was the sister of a German duke, so Henry’s lord Chancellor Thomas Cromwell probably forced Henry to marry her for diplomatic reasons (source: Hampton Court: “Anne of Cleaves”). Naturally, Henry didn’t like being told what to do- I suspect he resented Anne before even meeting her because he didn’t get to pick her himself.
As for whether Anne was actually ugly, the truth is really surprising- Henry actually disguised himself as a peasant during a masked ball when he first courted Anne, and she foundhim repulsive. At the time, Henry was 49 years old, and in very poor health. As such, he was intermittently impotent and blamed his inability to conceive a child with her on her supposed ugliness to save face.
Even though Anne in the show hates Henry, in reality, once the marriage was annulled, Anne and Henry remained good friends for years! She attended his next wedding to Katherine Howard, and, just like in the show, Henry treated her much better after the divorce:
‘YOU SHALL FIND US A PERFECT FRIEND, CONTENT TO REPUTE YOU AS OUR DEAREST SISTER. WE SHALL, WITHIN FIVE OR SIX DAYS …DETERMINE YOUR STATE MINDING TO ENDOW YOU WITH £4000 OF YEARLY REVENUE…YOUR LOVING BROTHER AND FRIEND.’
Henry VIII, 1548, six months after their wedding, when the annullment went through.
V. Katherine Howard
Without question, Katherine Howard is portrayed as the most tragic of Henry’s six wives and her song is a huge sucker punch. The writers never let you forget that Katherine’s first affair was when she was 13, and she died at age 19. Like Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymore, Henry picked Katherine for his queen among his ladies in waiting and her song “All You Wanna Do” satirizes his and many other men’s lustful appetites. The song begins as a raunchy, sexy pop ballad in the vein of Britney Spears’ “Toxic” and “Womanizer” about Katherine Howard’s love affairs, but then devolves into a cry for help, as Katherine confesses how she was abused, used, and manipulated by the men in her life, (including her own cousin Thomas Culpepper) until she was beheaded in 1542. It masterfully satires both Henry’s cruelty and the hypersexualization of teenage pop stars which certainly took its toll on Britney Spears and Ariana Grande, Katherine’s major ‘Queenspirations.’
VI. Katherine Parr
Historically, Katherine Parr had to turn away her fiancee Thomas Seymore (just like Anne Boleyn was previously engaged to Henry Percy) once the king set his eyes on her for his wife, so her song is a sad, soulful Alicia Keys-inspired bittersweet song where she tearfully says goodbye to Thomas to spare his feelings and probably his life.
Not only does this song once again show how Henry’s selfishness and his lust ruined the lives of the women he married, (as well as the men who already wanted to marry them), but it also sets up the main idea of the show:
His-Story overthrown
In the final number, the wives turn the tables on Henry- they have spent centuries being defined by him, but in reality, he is just as much defined by them! Going forward, history should not define these great women as just, “The Six Wives of Henry the Eighth,” but to celebrate their individual lives and contributions to history. Katherine Parr mentions this when she points out that in life, she fought to allow women to be educated, she wrote books, and was a scholar of theology. Historically, Henry and Katherine would argue about religion and he nearly executed her after she disagreed on points of theology, but Katherine kept her life by claiming she was “Not disagreeing with [him], but simply learning from [him].”
I Don’t Need Your Love is sung by Catherine Parr in SIX: The Musical. The first part of the song refers to her love of Thomas Seymour, whom she probably wanted to marry rather than Henry (and did marry after Henry’s death). However, the song also protests at the fact that women are often defined by their relationship with men, rather than as people in their own right. Catherine wants to be remembered for what she did, rather than the men she married or loved.
Katherine Parr, Six.
The final number completes the idea of the ‘historemix’ by having the Six queens/pop stars come up with a re-imagined happy ending for themselves, one that doesn’t include the pain that Henry inflicted on them: Katherine A becomes a singing nun, (like Whoopi Goldberg in Sister Act), while Anne Boleyn starts writing lyrics for Shakespeare (which is a fun idea since he does mention “Greensleeves” twice). Jane Seymore forms a band with her many surviving children, Katherine Howard goes solo, and Katherine Parr joins the other queens in a supergroup. It’s not at all historical, but it is a fun and sweet way to put an epilogue on these (mostly) tragic lives.
It’s odd, however, that the show invents an epilogue instead of talking about the six queen’s greatest legacy- Queens Elizabeth and MaryI. For a show that wants to highlight the often-forgotten legacy of these queens, it is an odd oversight. Remember Catherine and Anne gave birth to queens who eventually ruled England without a king. Jane Seymore gave birth to a king, and Catherine Parr helped raise them and restored them to the line of succession- She’s the reason her stepdaughters were able to become queens in the first place.
My issues with the epilogue aside, it is great to see history be recontextualized and shared in such an accessible way. We all know that European history is dominated by the names of white guys- king whoever, duke what’s-his name. To see important women in history be given a voice by a multi-ethnic cast is a great way to make it resonate, and using the metaphor of pop stars works extremely well in this context- these women mostly didn’t choose stardom, but they deserve it for what they went through.
Brava.
Educational links related to the six wives of Henry VIII:
The Shakespearean Student 
Really enjoyed your review. Now I want to see the show!
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