Film / Red, White & Royal Blue

Nice socks, fellas.

"History, huh? Bet we could make some."

— Alex Claremont-Diaz

Red, White & Royal Blue is a film adaptation of Casey McQuiston's Queer Romantic Comedy novel of the same name. The directorial debut of Matthew López, it was released on Amazon Prime Video on August 11, 2023.

The story follows Alex Claremont-Diaz (Taylor Zakhar Perez), the son of Ellen Claremont (Uma Thurman), the first female President of the United States. After he gets into a fight with Prince Henry (Nicholas Galitzine) of the United Kingdom, the two must feign a friendship to prevent a media crisis. However, it works a little too well and they start to fall in love. This presents problems, since Alex's mother is in the middle of a re-election campaign and Henry's family wants him to continue their bloodline.

The film's supporting cast includes Clifton Collins Jr. as Alex's father Oscar Diaz, Sarah Shahi as Ellen's deputy chief of staff Zahra Bankston, Rachel Hilson as Alex' best friend and the veep's granddaughter Nora Holleran, Stephen Fry as King James III, and Ellie Bamber as Henry's sister Princess Beatrice.

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This film provides examples of (in addition to many of the source novel's tropes):

• Adaptation Deviation:
  • In the book, the emails are leaked by Richards. In the movie, it's implied Miguel did it.
  • In the movie, Alex already seems to know he's not straight and has hooked up with a high school friend and a journalist before Henry kissed him. In the book, Alex had fooled around with his best friend from high school, but still thought he was straight until Henry kissed him, after which he had a bit of a sexuality crisis.
  • In the book, Alex and Nora join Ellen's campaign in DC a little after New Year's, with Alex later being removed because his romance with Henry could jeopardize it. In the movie, Nora is already a part of it, while Alex joins a couple months after New Year's and is stationed in Texas since it was his idea to campaign there. Ellen keeps him on after learning about Henry because Alex has become the face of the Texas team.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: Henry's eyes are brown in the movie instead of blue like in the book.
• Adaptation Name Change: Henry's last name changes from Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor to Hanover-Stuart-Fox.
• Adapted Out:
  • Alex's older sister June doesn't exist in the movie. This means that the plot about her briefly pretending to date Henry when people are getting suspicious is also cut.
  • In the movie, Alex's parents are still together. In the book, they are divorced and Ellen is now married to Leo, who doesn't exist here.
  • They also cut out Rafael Luna, a gay Latino politician Alex looks up to. In the books, he betrays the Claremont-Diaz family by siding with Richards, which turns out to be a ploy to expose his sex crimes.
  • Henry's mother is mentioned, but never actually shows up during the film. In the books, she actually shows up at the end to stand up for her son after the emails are leaked.
  • Bea's former cocaine addiction is not mentioned in the movie. Henry also doesn't talk about it in the leaked emails here.
  • Liam, Alex's best friend from high school, also didn't appear. Alex does mention fooling around with a high school friend, but does not name him.
• Affectionate Nickname: Alex insists on calling Henry "Your Majesty" despite the latter's numerous attempts to correct him, as his proper royal address is "Your Royal Highness."
• Age Lift: In the novel, Beatrice was the middle child between Phillip and Henry, but in the film, she's the youngest royal sibling.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Ellen is completely accepting when Alex comes out to her... and then starts giving him detailed instructions on how to avoid STIs if he's having anal sex. Including what specifically pertains to him if he's bottoming. Alex is utterly mortified.
• And Starring: The opening credits has "With Stephen Fry and Uma Thurman".
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Alex and Henry, who continue to snipe at each other even after they become a couple, albeit in a more teasing way. During their first hookup, Henry flat-out admits the reason he was so hostile to Alex the first time they met is that he hated "how good [Alex] looked".
• Blessed with Suck: Henry remarks to Alex that, even though he's a British prince, his dating life is a mess. The people he dates don't interest him, and the people who do, he can't date.
• Canon Foreigner:
  • The film introduces a female Prime Minister who was not present in the book.
  • Also the journalist Miguel Ramos is new for the movie, although he serves as a Composite Character to several characters and plotlines from the novel.
• Closet Key: After Henry kisses Alex during the New Year's Eve party, the latter begins to question his sexuality, eventually realizing he's bisexual.
• Composite Character:
  • Miguel Ramos takes the place of three characters from the book: He takes Liam's place as Alex's most significant same-sex ex, Rafael Luna's place as a Hispanic openly LGBT contemporary of Alex's who betrays him (though under different circumstances), and Richards' place as the one who leaked the emails (although Richards also exists independently as well).
  • Nora has taken over most of June's actions like flirting with Percy and acting as Alex's closest confidant.
• Deadly Euphemism: Briefly discussed when the gunshots in the hospital turned out to only be some dumbass kid who brought fireworks for his friend.
  Amy: Threat neutralized. Some kid brought fireworks for his friend.
  Alex: When you say "threat neutralized"...
  Amy: It's a good thing he's already in the hospital.
• Demoted to Extra: Jeffrey Richards, Alex's mother's Republican rival for the presidency, appears only a few times across the film, whereas in the book he's the closest thing to a Big Bad.
• Diagonal Billing: How Taylor Zakhar Perez and Nicholas Galitzine are billed in the opening credits.
• Didn't Think This Through: Miguel's fateful mistake when he leaks Alex and Henry's emails on Reddit and publishes his exposé. Specifically, Miguel is so quick to "break" the story and get all the credit and glory for himself (not to mention getting back at Alex for rejecting his advances) that he neglects to consider one key factor: The window of time between the Reddit leak and his article's publication. Rather than wait just long enough until he could've plausibly read through all 70+ emails and then written his article, Miguel instead published his exposé almost immediately after the Reddit leak. This comes back to bite him later during his interview with Joy Reid (who notices the incongruity, picks it apart, and exposes Miguel's role in the hack on live television).
• Drinking Game: Shown briefly while Nora and some of the campaign staff are watching a debate with Jeffrey Richards (the main contender against Alex's mother in her reelection campaign), when he ends a statement with a loud proclamation of "Prosperity!" the staff watching the TV all boisterously shout "Prosperity!" and take a swig of their beers.
• Eating the Eye Candy:
  • The movie starts off with Nora and Beatrice remarking on how attractive Henry and Alex are, respectively. The latter two, stuck very much on the "belligerent" part of Belligerent Sexual Tension at that point, naturally react negatively to their remarks.
  • Alex while watching Henry at the polo match. Helped by the fact that the camera focuses pretty blatantly on Henry's uh, assets, as he plays the game intercut with Alex staring appreciatively and grinning.
• Eiffel Tower Effect: The first shot of Paris features the Eiffel Tower.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: A non-verbal example that is Played for Laughs when Zahra realizes Alex has hooked up with someone the night before his mother's nomination speech. She's understandably angry, fearing Alex didn't bother with an NDA and has jeopardized campaign security. She furiously searches through the hotel room, expecting to find a half-naked woman in the closet...and instead finds the half-naked Henry. Zahra is at first visibly confused...and then confusion gives way to horrified (albeit still comedic) shock as she processes the scene and realizes the son of the American President and the third in line to the British throne are sleeping with each other.
• Foreshadowing: During the State Dinner, Miguel comes up to Alex to ask him about his Texas campaign memo. A surprised Alex notes that the memo is highly confidential material, whereupon Miguel boasts about his high-level sources. The same sources that, presumably, allow Miguel to hack into and leak Alex and Henry's emails later on in the movie, exposing their relationship to the world.
• The Film of the Book: This film is an adaptation of the novel of the same name.
• First Kiss: Henry kisses Alex for the first time on New Year's under a tree.
• Flirtatious Smack on the Ass: At the White House dinner for the British Prime Minister, Alex briefly grabs Henry's buttock (who lets out a startled yelp) while they're talking to the President and the PM. Alex later tells Henry to come to his bedroom at midnight where he's going to do "very bad things" to him.
• Friends with Benefits: After hooking up for the first time, Alex and Henry agree to keep their relationship casual to prevent the press from finding out about them. It also becomes very obvious early on that the two of them are just fooling themselves and that they were probably already halfway in love with each other before their first hook-up.
• Gender Flip: Henry's grandmother, Queen Mary, is the reigning British monarch in the book. In the film, it's Henry's grandfather. This change was made before Queen Elizabeth II died in September 2022.
• Gilded Cage: His very first line in the movie makes it clear that Henry hates being a prince. In addition to being permanently stuck in the closet because of his position and being unable to affect any real change due to the monarchy's political neutrality, he finds the entire idea of royalty in the twenty-first century to be pointless and frivolous, ironically a similar opinion to one Alex expressed earlier in the film.
  Henry: It's all so silly, isn't it? The idea of royalty in the twenty-first century, it's-it's so... antiquated. Sometimes... I wonder if what we do has any meaningful impact on people's lives.
• Gilligan Cut: At the lakehouse party scene, Henry denies that he'd get into karaoke when he hears about the karaoke machine. The very next scene is him on stage singing "Don't Stop Me Now".
• Gone Horribly Right: Buckingham Palace and the White House force Henry and Alex to pretend to be close friends in order to avert a media crisis. It works so well that it ends up causing a whole different kind of media crisis that would be exponentially worse for both parties.
• Gratuitous Spanish: Miguel peppers his speech with Spanish phrases. Alex and Oscar also speak in Spanish on occasion.
• Hair-Contrast Duo: The raven-haired Alex is an extrovert while his blond boyfriend Henry is an introvert.
• Hard-Work Montage: After he's sent to Texas, a montage is shown of Alex campaigning hard throughout the state to help his mom win her reelection. When the polls finally meet his target, he goes back to his hotel room, so exhausted (but happy) that he throws himself onto the bed and immediately falls asleep.
• Have You Told Anyone Else?: A non-lethal example that is Played for Laughs after Zahra discovers Alex and Henry's relationship; she demands to know if anyone else is aware of their secret and Alex confirms it's only her. Then he adds in the Secret Service. And then Nora and Percy. And then Henry adds in his sister.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Played for Laughs when Zahra discovers the half-naked Henry in Alex's hotel closet and realizes they're sleeping together. Her ensuing meltdown has nothing to do with homophobia and everything to do with the PR nightmare Alex just dropped in her lap on the day of his mother's nomination speech.
  • A more serious example is Henry, after his and Alex's emails are leaked, outing both his sexuality and their relationship to the world against their wills. The montage during Alex's speech shows him depressed and on the verge of tears the entire time and his mood only starts to improve when Alex and him are finally reunited.
• Immoral Journalist: Miguel Ramos is portrayed this way, even before he leaks Alex and Henry's emails, taking advantage of his somewhat friendly relationship with Alex (and their past sexual encounter) to get information and flirting with him while on the record.
• Interrupted Declaration of Love: At the lake, Alex tries to express his love for Henry, but the latter dives into the water before the former can finish what would've been his Love Confession.
  Alex: I've never felt this way about anyone. It's like there's a rope attached to my chest and it keeps pulling me towards you. And it feels so right. What I mean to say is, Henry, I—
• Intertwined Fingers: When making love for the first time in Paris, there's a close up of Alex and Henry's lacing their fingers. After they're publicly outed in the last leg of the movie and no longer have to hide their relationship, they start holding hands more often in an open, if subtle display of affection.
• Karma Houdini: Miguel Ramos faces no consequences whatsoever for leaking Alex and Henry's emails. However, Joy Reid does call him out as the likely culprit on air pretty pointedly, so one would hope that might at least damage his reputation a bit if not lead to some kind of consequences down the line.
• Living Out a Childhood Dream: A downplayed example. As a child Henry's father would frequently bring him to the V&A museum at night so they could look at the statues in private, while the crowds weren't around to bother them. Henry dreamed of doing the same with someone he loved some day and dancing with them amongst all the statues, which as an adult he dismisses as a "daft pubescent fantasy". Immediately after he confesses this to Alex while they're visiting the V&A, Alex takes out his phone, starts playing a Love Theme, then sets it aside to go dance with Henry.
• Longing Look: Henry gives one to Alex while they're dancing at Alex's New Years' Party, emphasized by the slow-mo of the scene make it seem like the two of them are the only two people in the room. To Henry, they might as well have been.
• Love Epiphany: During the karaoke scene when Alex is watching Henry singing "Don't Stop Me Now", you can see him suddenly realizing that he's not just attracted to Henry; he's in love with him.
• Love Ruins the Realm: The biggest obstacle to Alex and Henry's relationship is the fear of the public backlash it could cause were the two to go public. In addition to potentially sabotaging Ellen's reelection campaign due to the political ramifications of her son dating (and potentially marrying) a foreign head of state, Henry's family believes that having a homosexual heir will cause irreparable damage to the monarchy's already shaky reputation. In the end, it's subverted. Alex's efforts in Texas counters whatever negative backlash might have come of their forced outing and ensure his mother is reelected, while Henry receives a massive outpouring of support from the public, giving him the courage to come out for real and finally be himself.
• Master of the Mixed Message: Henry insists that his relationship with Alex remain casual because of the press. Then he arranges multiple clandestine rendezvous to hook up with Alex and literally asks the other man to make love to him while they're staying together in Paris, the City of Love. Therefore, Henry only has himself to blame for letting Alex assume their relationship is far more serious than Henry originally intended for it to be, eventually leading to Alex falling in love with him for real.
• Mythology Gag:
  • At the lakehouse while he and Henry lie in a hammock, Alex has a paperback copy of Casey McQuiston's One Last Stop in hand.
  • When Alex comes out as bisexual to his mother, Ellen wryly notes that if she'd had more warning, she could've made him a PowerPoint presentation about his situation with Henry. In the book, she actually does.
• Newscaster Cameo: Rachel Maddow and Joy Reid appear as themselves frequently throughout the film in fictional news broadcasts reporting on the events of the plot.
• No Bisexuals: Averted as Alex is bi, but he and his mom discuss this when he comes out to her. She specifically asks him what title he chooses for himself, and after he says "bi", she mentions that the B in LGBTQ+ isn't silent. This is a reference to "the silent B in LGBT" which refers to Real Life bisexual erasure.
• Non-Answer: After Henry temporarily breaks up with Alex, this exchange happens between him and Beatrice:
  Beatrice: Do you love him?
  Henry: (looks down) What difference would it make if I did?
• Oblivious to Love: Alex, who is completely oblivious to how into him Henry is until Henry finally has enough and makes the first move.
  Henry: People I date don't interest me, and the people who interest me, I can't date.
  Alex: Oh my God, Henry, I have no idea what you're talking about.
  Henry: Christ, you're as thick as it gets. (goes to Alex and kisses him)
• The Oner: The election night scene. There is one very subtle cut, but it splits the scene into one nearly-one-minute shot and one minute-and-a-half long shot.
• One True Love: Not explicitly confirmed for Alex and Henry, but Ellen cautions Alex when he tells her about their relationship that before he takes it any further, he needs to figure out whether he "feel[s] 'forever'" about Henry, because "a relationship like [theirs] will define your life." Subsequent events prove out that they do indeed "feel 'forever'" about each other.
• Overly Long Name: Henry reveals his full name to be Henry George Edward James Hanover-Stuart-Fox.
  Alex: And I thought Alexander Gabriel Claremont-Diaz was a mouthful.
  Henry: He is.
• Poor Communication Kills: When Henry finally confronts Alex over why the latter dislikes him so much, Alex reveals that during their first meeting at the Melbourne Climate Conference, Henry looked at him like "[Alex] had head lice", then turned to his equerry and told him to "get [Henry] out of here". An ashamed and apologetic Henry explains to Alex that his rude behavior was due to the fact that he didn't want to be there at the conference at all, as it was right after his father's death. What he actually said was "I need to get out of here", which he insists meant something else entirely. It's later revealed that this is because he had fallen for Alex at first sight and wasn't able to handle those feelings at the time.
• Product Placement: A can of Coke is visible during the plane ride to London when Amy quizzes Alex about Henry's background.
• Rage Breaking Point: Played for Laughs. Alex and Henry are both put on a communication lockdown after the email leak and are unable to contact each other. After listening to Alex moon over Henry "like a cow in labor", Zahra snaps, grabs her emergency line to her boyfriend Shaan, and demands he put Henry on the line so she doesn't have to listen to Alex gush over him any longer.
• Rags to Riches: When Henry asks Alex about who he would be if he was just an anonymous person in the world, Alex tells Henry that before his mom became President, he was anonymous as he came from a working class family.
• Running Gag: Alex rarely misses an opportunity to deny that Henry is 6'2".
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: The soft-spoken and thoughtful Henry is the sensitive to the outspoken and spontaneous Alex's manly.
• Sexy Discretion Shot: Most of the sex scenes in the movie cut away to the next scene before anything truly explicit is shown. The sole exception is Alex and Henry's first time in Paris, where the scene is shown in full, albeit with most of the... ahem, naughty bits hidden.
• Shaped Like Itself: Early in the film when Alex is booted across the Atlantic for the cake fiasco, Shaan doesn't give a clear answer as to what defines an equerry.
• Shirtless Scene: The main romantic leads, Alex and Henry, are seen shirtless whenever they get intimate and when swimming on the lake.
• Shout-Out:
  • During a phone call with Alex, Henry mentions that he's watching Bake Off.
  • Henry named his pet dog David after David Bowie.
  • In the Mood for Love is Henry's favourite film and he considers it to be the "swoon-iest" movie of all time.
  • When Henry suggests to Alex they "make love" for the first time in Paris, a nervous Alex asks him if they are going to listen to Lana Del Rey while they do it.
• "Shut Up" Kiss: When Alex finally gets Henry to talk to him after their kiss on New Year's, Henry starts babbling out an apology until Alex says "Shut up. Stop talking," and kisses him.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: Alex and Henry. Constantly. Even after they start dating.
• Snow Means Love: There's light snowfall when Henry and Alex share their First Kiss on New Year's.
• Something Else Also Rises: During Alex and Henry's second makeout as the latter undoes the former's belt, the scene cuts to a moonlit shot of the Washington Monument.
• Spotting the Thread: This is how Miguel gets busted by Joy Reid on live television after he publishes Alex and Henry's emails. Reid notices that Miguel's exposé was published almost immediately after the emails were originally leaked on Reddit. As she then realizes and points out on the air, there's no way that Miguel could've read through all 70+ emails and written his exposé in such a brief window of time. The obvious inference, of course, is that Miguel must have had access to the emails before they leaked — meaning he was either behind the hack, or at the least was an accessory.
• Their First Time: Alex and Henry's first time having anal sex in Paris is treated as this. While neither of them are virgins and they've already had oral sex at least twice at this point, it's nonetheless a big step in their relationship, especially since it's the first time Alex has been with a man in such a fashion. Henry describing the act as "making love" only emphasizes it. Alex is initially very awkward and nervous due to his inexperience, causing Henry to promise he'll properly guide him through it.
• Token Minority Couple: Nora (explicitly African-American in the film) and Percy (Nigerian British) date in the movie.
• Unknowingly in Love: It is not until he's forced to put up a friendly front with Alex after the Cakegate Incident that Henry is willing to acknowledge that he's in love with Alex, and probably has been since the day they first met. Similarly, Alex is both oblivious to Henry's feelings and his own feelings for Henry until their kiss at New Year's. The self-deception runs so deep that even after they finally confirm their attraction toward each other, they try to keep their relationship as Friends with Benefits, even though they both know their feelings for each other run much deeper than that.
• Uptight Loves Wild: Proper, reserved British royal Henry and extroverted, fun-loving Alex fall head-over-heels in love with each other. Somewhat subverted in that, when he's with people he truly trusts, Henry is significantly less proper than he first appears, with a witty sense of humour and a writer's sensitivity and gift with words. Meanwhile, seemingly-frivolous Alex is also incredibly driven and intelligent, with an ambition to hold political office one day and change the world for the better.
• Wrongfully Attributed: While chatting in front of the wedding cake, Alex misidentifies the composer of the classical piece that's playing in the background.
  Alex: Who doesn't love a little Mozart?
  Henry: Actually, it's Schubert.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Henry reacts in complete disbelief upon learning the source of all of Alex's hostility toward him is because Henry acted like an ass to him during their first meeting at the Melbourne Climate Conference a couple years ago — and literally nothing else.

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