PRINCE OF WALES   (managing to combine languor with impatience) Oh, God. Come on, Pa. What’s that one, Fred?
He points to a cross nestling among the scores of decorations clustered on the coat of his brother.

DUKE OF YORK   This? The other day I discovered I’m Bishop of Osnabrück. Amazing what one is, really.
The Prince is about to sneak a drink from his flask when he is spotted by his mother.

QUEEN   George!
He takes a defiant swig before passing it to his brother, the Queen’s attention now distracted by the somewhat flustered arrival of the Lord Chancellor, Thurlow.

THURLOW   Majesty.

QUEEN   Ah, Lord Chancellor.

THURLOW   (aside) God, this place is as cold as a greyhound’s nostril.
Greville is bewildered by the fret and bustle of the room. Nobody offers to help; pages brush past him and when Greville tries to buttonhole the haughty senior equerry, Captain Fitzroy, he ignores him too.

GREVILLE   Captain Fitzroy? Excuse me … I wondered if … Could you show me …

INT. WESTMINSTER. ROBING ROOM. DAY.

Meanwhile, behind a curtain His Majesty is being assembled. The Garter is fastened round a white-stockinged leg; orders are pinned to a crowded coat and, at a whispered ‘Crown’ from page Fortnum, page Braun goes in search of the box containing the supreme bauble. Baby Amelia has parked her toy horse just where everyone will fall over it, which Fitzroy would have done had he not kicked it smartly out of the way. Weeping, the King’s little daughter goes in search of her papa, whose adorning is reaching its climax with the putting on of the crown. Taking the priceless and intricate thing out of its battered case, Braun spots a flaw on an otherwise flawless emerald, so spits on it and buffs it with his elbow. He is about to place the crown on the royal head when a little cough and a raised eyebrow from Fitzroy indicate that this is not Braun’s place. Fitzroy takes the crown and does the honours himself. It is at this moment, with the crown on the King’s head and his ermine train fully unfurled, that Amelia peeps through the curtain, sees her papa and runs to him.

AMELIA   Papa, Papa! Papa, Papa! Lift me up.

KING   Hey, hey, what’s this, madam? Hey, hey?
So, though he is crowned and in his robes of state, it is as a family man that we first see George III, the father of his people perhaps, the father of fifteen children certainly, the youngest of which he now picks up and, pointing out a place on his cheek, lets her kiss him. Together they regard themselves in a long pier-glass. A solid, red-faced man in his fifties, he is kindly and good-natured but nervous and abrupt. So, having put Amelia down, he picks up the reins of government, the genial family man banished in favour of his testy, impatient, official self.
Right!

INT. WESTMINSTER. CLOISTERS. DAY.