REACTION PAPER: Red, White, and Royal Blue
Name: Danica Pactoranan
Grade & Section: 12-Musk (STEM)
Teacher: Mrs. Joyce Gelio-Vacal
Subject: English for Professional
And Academic Purposes
Everyone deserves privacy, including famous people, politicians, and members of the
royal family. Privacy for public figures and the LGBTQ+ community is their sense of safety and
security, separating their lives from unwanted attention and protecting their loved ones.
Privacy is one thing that a person who is struggling to come to terms with their sexuality would
want to have because of the pressure to keep it hidden just so they can maintain their social
standing and reputation and that’s what the movie, Red, White, and Royal would want to
emphasize to us.
The movie Red, White, and Royal Blue is an American queer movie based on
the best-selling book by Casey McQuiston of the same name that was published on
May 14, 2019. Martin Griffins (Michigan Daily, 2023). It is a queer love story between
the son of the first female president of the United States of America, Alex ClaremontDiaz (played by Taylor Perez), and the prince of England’s British royal family, Henry
Hanover-Stuart Fox (played by Nicholas Galitzine) (New York Times,2023). ). The
movie was released on August 11, 2023, on Amazon Prime Videos and various other
platforms. The movie was directed by Matthew Lopez. The supporting characters are
Nora Holleran (played by Rachel Hilson) and Alex’s best friend, Pres. Ellen ClaremontDiaz (played by Uma Thurman) as Alex’s mother, Princess Beatrice (played by Ellie
Bamber) as Henry’s younger sister, Prince Philip (played by Thomas Flynn) as Henry’s
older brother, and Percy Okonjo (played by Malcolm Atobrah) as Henry’s best friend
(2023).
This movie also talks about how privacy matters, how privacy is a really
important thing for public figures and people who are part of the LGBTQ+ community,
who struggle to keep up with society’s constant discrimination. The movie shows the
realistic pressure of society as a public figure and role model, but at the same time,
realizing that one’s sexual orientation was not really what you thought it was and
developing feelings with the same gender.
The movie is based on a novel of the same name. I watched the movie and
read the novel and in this reaction paper, I will be using the Formalism critical approach
meaning I will focus on the intrinsic part of the movie. As a fan of the book, I cannot
help but compare three things from the book and the movie’s characters, the funny
scenes, and the minor details of the movie that were not in the book.
The first is the character. The movie was the epitome of the live-action of the
novel. The actors did a great job in making the characters live. Taylor Perez and
Nicholas Galitzine did make a great effort they became the epitome of Alex and Henry.
Both conveyed the struggles of being a public figure and a role model in our society
and at the same time came to realize their true feelings for each other. They did not
disappoint me, and the movie made my year; however, some characters were cut off
or were in the book but were nowhere to be seen in the movie, one of them being
June. In the book, June was Alex’s older sister who was a journalist but in the movie,
June was cut off and Nora (Alex’s best friend) had June’s personality.
Second, it is a funny scene. There were many funny scenes in the movie that
made it more amazing to watch so many times. There were so many funny scenes
that I loved the most, such as the scene where they chat with each other even in the
middle of the night, just to annoy each other, or when Alex jokingly criticized Henry’s
clothing style, especially his ties. I love it so much because those scenes show that
people like Alex and Henry can have a silly and sarcastic side and that every person
has a silly side regardless of their status. However, compared to the book, the movie
shortened a particular scene that was my favorite: the Great Turkey Calamity. The
Great Turkey Calamity was when Alex was calling Henry in a panic state because his
mother’s staff put a turkey named Cornbread in his bedroom before the Thanksgiving
Day Ceremony.
I remember reading the book when Alex said that there is a literal dinosaur in
his bedroom and thought that it was really funny, there was a whole chapter dedicated
to that scene and it saddens me that in the movie, the great turkey calamity scene was
only shown for a couple of minutes and not the whole scene
Finally, there were minor details in the movie that were not included in the book.
In the movie, there were a lot of minor and small details that were not in the book, but
I think was genius. Two of my favorite minor details were Alex’s necklace with a key
pendant and Henry’s gold ring, with the letter H engraved on the top. I love that minor
detail because the key necklace and the ring with H were the things that they
exchanged after they reconciled and formally confessed their love for each other. After
that, there were many scenes where Alex can be seen wearing Henry’s ring even in
his speech scene and Henry wearing Alex’s key necklace even when he sleeps, it
shows a very sweet and intimate love affair between them, especially after accepting
that both them of is in love with each other and don’t care if they are both boys.
However, there was a scene in the movie that was not in the book that I did not
particularly like, and it was the scene nearing the end. In that scene, the king of
England talks to both Alex and Henry about whether they are ready to come out in the
world as a couple however, in the book it was the queen who talked to Alex and Henry
while Henry’s mother defended both of them to queen. It was a very powerful moment
in the book and yet, it was changed to the king talking to both of them, and Henry’s
mother was not there and that upset me a bit.
The movies Red, White, and Royal Blue address many struggles that both
public figures and a person who belongs to the LGBTQ+ community experience
especially when talking about privacy. Privacy matters even for public figures and
should be normalized among us. The movie had both bad and good points in terms of
comparisons between the movie and the book, but as an avid fan of queer movies and
series, it was a great movie to watch as it grabs your attention and triggers every sort
of emotion and shows how important privacy is for many people. Every time I watched
it, it still made me anticipate the whole movie and made me love it every moment.
Overall, the movie Red, White, and Royal Blue is one of my highly recommended to
watch if you feel to watch queer movies and when you want to watch something out
of your comfort zone. I will end this reaction paper with the famous line from the movie,”
History huh? Bet we could make some”.