By Netflix’s The Crown to defy Prince William’s wishes in new series
Netflix’s popular drama The Crown is set to defy the express wishes of Prince William and air a dramatisation of Princess Diana’s infamous Panorama interview.
The interview is set to be the centre point of an entire episode in the upcoming series 5, despite Prince William saying that the interview “established a false narrative” and should “never be aired again”.
The interview, in which Diana told Martin Bashir “there were three of us in this marriage” has been condemned by the Royal family and was the subject of a BBC investigation earlier this year.
In May, the BBC admitted that there were serious faults leading up to the interview, including Mr Bashir faking bank statements in order to obtain the interview.
Speaking of the 1995 interview the Duke of Cambridge said, “It is my firm view that this Panorama programme holds no legitimacy and should never be aired again.
“It effectively established a false narrative which, for over a quarter of a century, has been commercialised by the BBC and others.
“This settled narrative now needs to be addressed by the BBC and anyone else who has written or intends to write about these events.”
This could create tenuous legal problems for Netflix as the BBC owns the copyright over the content and transcript of the interview.
A spokesman for the BBC said on Tuesday night, “The BBC has said it has no intention of showing the interview again. We have had no interaction on this specific issue with Netflix.”
The series, which stars Elizabeth Debicki as Princess Diana, is expected to use the infamous “three of us in this marriage” line, but paraphrase a lot of the content to avoid a legal battle.
Prince Harry, who signed a multi-year deal with Netflix earlier this year, has also condemned the interview saying, “Our mother lost her life because of this, and nothing has changed.”
But the Duke of Sussex does not hold strong opinions against the depiction of his family in the series, saying he is “way more comfortable with The Crown than I am seeing the stories written about my family in the tabloids”.
This isn’t the first time The Crown has upset the Royal Family, as The Queen was upset with how it depicted Prince Phillip’s relationship with Prince Charles.
She has expressed concerns that people take the fictionalised narrative as truth.
