The Lead Role – 7

An aspiring actor is incredibly lucky to land a minor but very important role—the Grand Duke George Alexandrovich Romanov—in a TV series about Nicholas II’s youth. The last evening in his hometown was supposed to be the beginning of a new life—life as a screen star of all-Russian scale—but the universe had other plans: our hero wakes up on the cruiser “Pamyat Azova” in the middle of the Eastward journey of Tsarevich Nicholas. He wakes up in the body of the man he was supposed to play in the series. Talk about “getting into the role” in the literal sense!

P.S. You won’t find authentic speeches from the end of the 19th century here, but I try to give the dialogue a sense of color.