Everyone in The Romanoffs Has a Serious Royalty Obsession

The first trailer for Matthew Weiner’s upcoming series The Romanoffs doesn’t really tell us more than we knew before. But it is outrageous and decadent and basically a big one-minute name drop. Meet a whole slew of people who think they are related to the slain royal Romanov family – and all of the people who don’t believe them.

Brief refresh from history class. During the Bolshevik revolution, the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas II, and his entire family were murdered. A conspiracy theory cropped up following their deaths in which royalty wannabes claimed lineage. Stoked by reports that daughter Anastasia’s body was not found with the rest of her family, imposters posed as a survivor. Fox Animation Studios even made the delightfully whimsical fantasy film Anastasia about the Grand Duchess reuniting with her family.

The Romanoffs appears to be a much more cynical take on the royal family fever. Born in 1901, Anastasia, even had she survived, would still be deceased by now. Throughout Weiner’s anthology series, eight adult families channel their obsessions in various ways with low success. Everyone seems to be dubious of their claims, but could they somehow intersect?

Some of the characters take the connection more literally than others. Some try to leverage their royal blood while others go full out in formal regal dress. These characters definitely don’t possess the suave sophistication of Mad Men’s Don Draper – although Weiner did reunite several of the actors from his previous hit series. Aaron Eckhart delivers a sincere and hysterically dumb line boasting about his genealogy.

Everyone involved in this show is a big deal, so here’s the full laundry list of names: Aaron Eckhart, Amanda Peet, Andrew Rannells, Annet Mahendru, Christina Hendricks, Clea Duvall, Corey Stoll, Diane Lane, Emily Rudd, Griffin Dunne, Hera Hilmar, Hugh Skinner, Ines Melab, Isabelle Huppert, Jack Huston, Janet Montgomery, Jay R. Ferguson, JJ Field, John Slattery, Juan Pablo Castaneda, Kathryn Hahn, Kerry Bishe, Louise Bourgoin, Marthe Keller, Mike Doyle, Noah Wyle, Paul Reiser, Ron Livingston, and Radha Mitchell.

The Romanoffs launches on Amazon Prime October 12.

Featured Image: The Romanoffs via Amazon Prime