Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Queen’ On Netflix, Where A Renowned Tailor And Drag Queen In Paris Returns To Poland To Save The Daughter He Left Behind (2024)

Not every drama needs a lot of action or big twists to hold our interest. Well-drawn characters, personal scenes, and an overall warmth can carry a series whose pacing is easygoing and lingers on small moments. You see a lot of those kinds of shows all over streaming, but they used to be found often on shows likeMasterpiece Theatre here in the States.Queen, a Polish-Icelandic production on Netflix, has just such a vibe.

QUEEN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A drag queen is lip synching on stage, but we don’t see her face. Then we cut to an older man shaving in his bathroom; he lives in an impeccable flat, and wears a silken, flowing robe over his pajamas.

The Gist: Silvestre Bork (Andrzej Seweryn) has been a successful tailor of bespoke suits for the past 50 years, after emigrating to Paris from a small mining town in Poland. But he’s ready to retire to a villa on the French Riviera. This also means the last appearance for Loretta, his drag persona, in a drag revue where he’s the headliner. His closest friend, Corentin (Kova Réa), tries to convince him that he’s still got a lot left, but Silvestre thinks it’s time.

But a letter arrives from Poland that gives him pause; it’s from a young woman named Iza Nowak (Julia Chetnicka), who says she is his granddaughter. Her mother, Wiolet (Maria Peszek), is the child that Silvestre left behind when he left Poland, she needs a kidney, and he’s potentially a match. After Corentin convinces him to donate that kidney, Silvestre returns to the town he left and meets Iza.

Iza is the one who found Silvestre, and is ecstatic to see him, but is certainly his opposite; he prefers his bespoke suits, while she wears sweatshirts and leggings. But, charmed by his granddaughter, he agrees to see Wiolet, who doesn’t know that her daughter got in touch. Angry over how he abandoned her and her mom, she doesn’t want anything to do with Silvestre, and when he fumblingly offers Iza some money, Iza tells him to f*ck off.

Sad over the turn of events, Silvestre gets hammered on bad wine and spends the night languishing in drag in his hotel room; he plans on going back to Paris the next day, but the appearance of an ambulance makes him change his plans again.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The pacing ofQueen (Original title:Królowa), along with an ambling classical music score, invokes the feeling of a PBS series produced by the BBC, something you’d see onMasterpiece, likeAll Creatures Great And Small (of course, they’re about two different topics and time periods, but still…).

Our Take: Written by the late Árni Ólafur Ásgeirsson (the show is dedicated to him),Queenhas a warmth that permeates every aspect of the story, from the love Silvestre has for his work to the affection Corentin has for him, which comes through in how he leads the rehearsal for the rest of the drag queens that are in the review. He reminds them that they’re doing it for Loretta, i.e. Silvestre, especially because this is his last show.

The warmth continues as he makes his way to his old hometown. While Iza isn’t what he may have envisioned as his granddaughter — though he wistfully observes that she looks just like her grandmother — the short time they spend together is full of curiosity and discovery. And Silvestre looks to reconnect with an old friend who is in charge of the mine that drives the town’s economy.

What we appreciated is that, despite the first episode’s easygoing pace, there were plenty of moments that got us to sit up and take notice, not the least of which was Seweryn’s bravura performance as Loretta, expertly synching showstoppers like “Holding Out For A Hero.” It’s a story about how Silvestre reconnects with a past he thought he left behind forever, at a point in his life where he thought he’d be spending the rest of his days in blissful retirement.

It’s not obvious in the first episode, but his daughter’s kidney transplant won’t be the only issue that Silvestre deals with, as the mine will also come into play, as will Corentin and the drag revue back in Paris. It’ll be a case where he and his drag persona will come together, and we’re looking forward to how Silvestre decides to change even more of his well-established life in order to help.

Sex and Skin: Besides seeing people in and out of costume around the drag revue, there’s none.

Parting Shot: Silvestre sees Wiolet carried out of her flat and loaded into an ambulance after she lost consciousness. The ambulance doors close as he looks in with extreme concern.

Sleeper Star: Kova Réa is wonderful as Corentin, because we see right away in his performance how dedicated Corentin is to Silvestre, and the love comes through from the minute he first appears onscreen.

Most Pilot-y Line: Antoine (Antoni Porowski), who has worked as Silvestre’s assistant and is interested in buying Silvestre’s business after he retires, tells his investor over the phone, “I’ve tried pleading with him; it’s impossible. He’s worse than my dad.” That feels like a line that could have been cut and nothing about the story would have changed.

Our Call: STREAM IT.Queenis a gentle but powerful drama about a man who thought he was sure of who he is discovering things about himself at a late age, and being the better for it.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.