Madonna has cast The Tudors’ Natalie Dormer as Queen Elizabeth in her upcoming film, W.E., the pop star’s directorial follow-up to last year’s Filth & Wisdom. “[England] tends to remember the Queen Mother as a rather wrinkly 97 year-old, but I am playing her when she was quite an enchanting, engaging twenty and thirtysomething,†Dormer said. “She was quite a savage and savvy game player.†James Fox (Sherlock Holmes) will play King George V, and Fox’s actual son, Laurence Fox, will play heir-to-the-throne Bertie. That sounds fun, but the rest of the premise is shaky, juxtaposing the love affair between King Edward VIII and American divorcée Wallis Simpson with a 1998 romance between a woman in a loveless marriage (Abbie Cornish) and a Russian security guard. Vera Farmiga, Ewan McGregor, and Margo Stilley have all dropped out of the project. Of writer-director Madonna, Stilley said: “She is really something.†[Telegraph UK via Playlist, Deadline]