Take a look at showbiz royalty playing members of the Royal Family in the funny, poignant and celebratory new play By Royal Appointment, which comes to Mayflower Theatre next month.

Anne Reid, Caroline Quentin, James Dreyfus and James Wilby star in the show about the kind of power that only a Queen can wield.

She charms the world through coats and admonishes her family through a carefully chosen hat, but Queen Elizabeth II herself is uninterested in fashion.

(Image: Nobby Clark Photographer) READ MORE: Theatre review: Pride & Prejudice (sort of), Mayflower Theatre, Southampton

Her look is managed by her designer, her milliner and most powerful of all, her dresser who was a working-class girl who goes from advising the Queen on the colour of her lipsticks to the real power behind the throne. But the dresser, like all royal favourites, is living on borrowed time.

By Royal Appointment is a behind the scenes peek into the world of our most popular monarch and the image she presented to the world, starring national treasure Anne Reid as The Queen, doyen of stage and screen Caroline Quentin as The Dresser, with Olivier award-winning James Dreyfus as The milliner and Poldark legendary James Wilby as the designer.

(Image: Nobby Clark Photographer) The new play is written by Daisy Goodwin, who created the hit ITV series Victoria, and directed by former Artistic Director of Shakespeare’s Globe, Dominic Dromgoole.

It runs from July 9 to 12.

Tickets from mayflower.org.uk

(Image: Nobby Clark Photographer)