"The Crown," "The Chosen," and the Challenge of Historical Accuracy

Quick to Listen

Christianity Today

Religion, Christianity, Religion & Spirituality

4.3 • 622 Ratings

🗓️ 9 December 2020

⏱️ 70 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries. Several weeks ago, Netflix dropped the latest season of its highly acclaimed show The Crown. The fourth season tells the story of the British monarchy in the '80s and '90s and depicts the Queen’s relationship with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and features Princess Diana. With so many of the characters depicted still alive and in recent-ish memory for a number of viewers, the show has provoked controversy like never before. While The Crown always creatively depicted the past, this year, this season has drawn criticism from those who claim the show is misleading viewers about the true history of the monarchy. Netflix even recently put out a statement that said it would not issue a disclaimer reminding viewers that the drama was fictional. “We have always presented The Crown as a drama—and we have every confidence our members understand it’s a work of fiction that’s broadly based on historical events. As a result we have no plans, and see no need, to add a disclaimer.” This week on Quick to Listen, we thought we would tackle some of the issues stirred up by this season of the Crown by getting a sense of how they’ve been wrestled with by the creator of The Chosen, a series portraying the life of Jesus through the stories of his followers. Dallas Jenkins is the showrunner of the series The Chosen, which has broken records as the largest crowdfunded media project ever, and has been watched so far by more than 50 million people in 180 countries, and translated into more than 50 languages. Jenkins joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss how the show has wrestled with historical accuracy, the challenge of adding and changing characters, and how watching prestige TV affected his approach to making the show. What is Quick to Listen? Read more Rate Quick to Listen on Apple Podcasts Follow the podcast on Twitter Follow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted Olsen Watch The Chosen Music by Sweeps Quick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt Linder The transcript is edited by Yvonne Su Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode is brought to you in part by The Apologetics Guy Show, the podcast that helps you
0:07.3	find clear answers to tough questions about Christianity. Learn to explain your faith with courage
0:13.0	and compassion. Join Moody Bible Institute professor Dr. Mikkel del Rosario at apologeticsky.com.
0:22.6	Several weeks ago, Netflix dropped the latest season of its highly acclaimed show, The Crown.
0:28.4	The fourth season tells the story of the British monarchy in the 80s and 90s and depicts the
0:32.9	Queen's relationship with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and features Princess Diana.
0:37.5	With so many of the characters depicted still alive and in recent-ish memory for a number of viewers,
0:43.8	the show has provoked controversy like never before.
0:47.1	While the crown always depicted the past, this year the season has dawned Hullablo.
0:52.5	From those who claim the show is misleading viewers about the true history of the monarchy.
0:57.0	Netflix even recently put out a statement that said it would not issue a disclaimer reminding viewers that the drama was fictional.
1:05.0	I'm going to read some of its statement.
1:07.0	We have always presented the crown as a drama, and we have every confidence our members
1:11.4	understand it's a work of fiction that's broadly based on historical events. As a result, we have
1:16.4	no plans and see no need to add a disclaimer. We thought we would tackle some of the issues stirred up
1:22.0	by the season of the crown by getting a sense of how they've been wrestled with in other historical
1:26.2	stories, especially the most important story of all.
1:30.8	Hint, hint, we will be talking about depictions of the life of Christ.
1:39.4	You are listening to Quick to Listen, where we go beyond hashtags and hot takes
1:43.6	to discuss a major
1:44.9	cultural event. I'm Morgan Lee, Global Media Manager at Christianity Today. And I'm Ted
1:50.4	Olson. I'm editorial director at Christianity Today.
	...

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