Portrait story

Everyone wants to know the story about the Queen. So the story about the Queen is, I’d been told that I was only going to get five minutes, because they were giving all these younger, untried photographers a shot at taking photos of the Queen. And I had said, right from the beginning, could I bring in my own backdrops? And they’d said yes. So I took in the gold sparkly background, which I’d seen in an Ann Summers shop window. And then a friend of mine, Martin Grant, the fashion designer, had suggested the famous Marimekko fabric. We go in, we’ve got a truck, we’ve got all this equipment. And we set up two cameras, two backdrops, one in front of the other. The minder came in and I was given this protocol. I could curtsy when she walked in, but I didn’t have to. I could bow when she walked in, but I didn’t have to. And I should call her ma’am. Spam, ham was how I was to remember ma’am, because I said, ‘No, surely it’s “marm”.’ ‘No, it’s ma’am.’ So I went, okay. And then they said, ‘And you need to talk her through what you’re going to do.’ I went, okay. And I said to him, ‘When are you going to start counting the five minutes?’ ‘When she gets in front of the camera.’ I go, okay.

So she walks in. All of a sudden I see this woman, who’s a lot more petite than I’d imagined, a lot more beautiful than I’d imagined, a lot richer than I’d imagined, looking very glamorous. And all of a sudden I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t remember anything. I went into auto, but the problem was, I’d been given so many options of what that autopilot might look like. And I hadn’t picked, thought any of them through … so I was lost in this sea of choices. And completely overwhelmed that all of a sudden, the Queenie’s there.

I went and shook her hand. I then stepped back. And rather than curtsying, I did what I call the Australian squat, which was, I just bent my knees.
So I looked like a total idiot at this point. I introduced everyone, I got that bit right. And then I went into this, finally when I found my voice, I’m just babbling on. But she was in a hurry, she was late. She had to go and host a lunch ... And I’d been told she doesn’t really like being photographed. So she just wanted to get it over and done with. Well, I talked, and I talked, and I talked, and she’s moving closer to the point of where she needs to be. And she’s in front of the camera, and I’m still talking. And then all of a sudden, the minder calls, ‘Two minutes!’ And I hadn’t taken one roll of film …

So I had three minutes. And then I just went into total panic. Took one roll. The camera was even off kilter, like it was a mess. And at one point I needed her to step to the left, and I couldn’t think of left. So I was down on my hands and knees trying to grab her ankles. Luckily my husband stepped in and said, ‘No, ma’am, Polly means step to the left’, grabbed me, and got me back behind the camera. The whole thing was just a total joke. One roll, and I thought, I better go to the other, he called four minutes or something and I’m like, oh my God.

So then we do the next set up, and then she sees the floral background. She’s fine with the sparkly gold, because it was golden jubilee. And she goes, ‘Ooh’, like that. And also the ring flash was super bright, so by the time she left, she said, ‘Oh, I think you’ve blinded me’. And she walked out the door. Apparently Prince Phillip had been in there the whole time. I didn’t even see him. That’s how disassociated from the experience I was. And it’s a miracle that I got two good photos, miracle.

And that really was the end of my portrait career. Interestingly, even though it was probably the pinnacle, it was almost like, well, I’ve done that, and I don’t really need to keep doing that. So yeah, that’s the story of the Queen. And luckily, I got two pictures out of it.