Gillian Anderson and female icon Lady Mountbatten
Posted at 2:48 PM (PST) on Wednesday, February 15, 2017

By Radhika Sanghani
Telegraph.co.uk: 10 February 2017

Gurinder Chadha’s new film, Viceroy’s House, may be centred around the last Viceroy of India and his attempts to deliver India its independence, but perhaps the real star is his wife: Lady Edwina Mountbatten. Her boldness, progressive politics and strength are impossible to ignore against a backdrop of male dominance and subservient women.

While Hugh Bonneville is gripping as Lord Mountbatten, agonising over the Partition of India, it is Gillian Anderson’s Lady Mountbatten who captivates the audience.

Just like her on-screen character, Anderson is a woman who breaks from the status quo. Her career took off at the age of 24, when she auditioned for the role of Scully in The X-Files – a role she wanted because “for the first time in a long time, the script involved a strong, independent, intelligent woman as a lead character”.

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