Martin Bashir’s sit-down 1995 interview with Princess Diana for the BBC program Panorama has become infamous, though probably not the reasons expected at the time. While Diana was extremely candid during her chat with Bashir about the pressure she faced in her marriage to Prince Charles, her mental health struggles, and the scrutiny of the royal family, questions about how the interview itself was obtained—including reports of fake bank statements and other deceptions—led to a damning inquiry into it over the last year.
How much of that backstory will be covered in the next season of The Crown, in which Elizabeth Debicki will take on the role of Princess Diana, is anyone’s guess. But apparently the show will be dedicating a full episode to the interview—and that’s something that Prince William is not pleased about, say sources for the Daily Mail.
William was 13 when the interview aired and reportedly took it quite hard. According to one royal expert, his housemaster at Eton at the time found him slumped over and weeping after the interview aired on the BBC. He’s also been an outspoken supporter of the inquiry into the interview’s methods. Back in May, he slammed the BBC, saying the network contributed “significantly to her fear, paranoia, and isolation.” He continued, “But what saddens me most, is that if the BBC had properly investigated the complaints and concerns first raised in 1995, my mother would have known that she had been deceived. She was failed not just by a rogue reporter, but by leaders at the BBC who looked the other way rather than asking the tough questions.”
So how does Prince William feel about the legacy of that interview? “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 commercialized by the BBC and others,” he said at the time.
While the royals have never publicly denied or confirmed whether they watch The Crown, the Mail says that Prince William is reportedly “frustrated” by the show’s decision to dedicate an episode to the Panorama interview. Though it’s unclear whether the episode is going to show the controversy behind the interview, the fact that the showrunners are dedicating an entire episode to it is revealing about how much of an impact the interview had on the culture of the time.