‘What’s more important, money or defending his mum?’ Royal experts demand Prince Harry axes his £112million Netflix deal over The Crown’s portrayal of Diana – saying ‘it’s astonishing he can’t find his voice on this’ after Jemima Khan walked away
- Royal experts have said Prince Harry should ‘tear up’ Netflix deal and ‘make a stand’ for his mother
- Jemima Khan, 47, a close friend of Princess Diana’s, has pulled out of The Crown
- Khan has said the script was not as ‘compassionate’ as she hoped it would be
Royal experts are demanding Prince Harry tears up his £112million Netflix deal and makes a stand over The Crown’s portrayal of Princess Diana.
Royal biographer Angela Levin criticised the Duke of Sussex for not ‘finding his voice’ over the streaming giant’s controversial portrayal of his mother.
It comes after Princess Diana’s friend Jemima Khan withdrew her support for The Crown over its ‘disrespectful’ script after she broke up with the show’s creator.
Levin, author of Harry: A Biography of a Prince, told The Sun: ‘Harry has remained absolutely silent about Netflix.
‘He should tear the deal up and make a stand for his mother.
‘What’s more important? Money or defending his mum? It’s astonishing he can’t find his voice on this.’
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle signed a deal with the streaming service last year for their new production company to make documentaries, feature films, scripted shows and children’s programming.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle signed a deal with the streaming service last year for their new production company to make documentaries, feature films, scripted shows and children’s programming
The fifth season of The Crown, which will be released in November next year, focuses on Princess Diana’s relationship with her sons and Prince Charles before her tragic death in a Paris car crash in 1997.
Critics have criticised the series over their portrayal of Princess Diana, played by actress Elizabeth Debicki, 31, in her final years.
Ingrid Seward, editor of Majesty Magazine, told the publication: ‘I don’t think Harry gets it. I presume when he did the deal with Netflix he didn’t think it through — but Meghan would have, she’s not an idiot.
‘He talked about The Crown during his bus interview with James Corden, so he’s not totally oblivious.’
The comments come after Khan, 47, refused a writing credit in The Crown and backed out of the project because the show wasn’t handling Diana’s story as ‘respectfully or compassionately’ as she had hoped.
Khan was hired to advise writer Peter Morgan, 58, who she enjoyed a brief romance with from this January to February.
Morgan has since been reunited with his partner of four years Gillian Anderson, who played Margaret Thatcher in the show, The Sunday Times reported.
Diana, Princess of Wales with Jemima Khan and her son on a British royal tour of Pakistan in 1997
Elizabeth Debicki, who is playing Diana in the fifth season of The Crown
Khan worked with Morgan from last September to this February, on stories such as Diana’s relationships with heart surgeon Hasnat Khan and Dodi Fayed as well as her sensational BBC Panorama interview with Martin Bashir.
She added that she agreed to help write the fifth series when approached by Morgan in 2019 even though she hadn’t publicly spoken about her past with Diana because she wanted her story to be ‘portrayed accurately’.
She said she requested that her ‘contributions be removed from the series’ and declined a writing credit.
A spokesman for The Crown said that Khan has ‘been a friend, fan and vocal public supporter’ of the show since its beginning and that while she has been a ‘well-informed source’ she was never contracted as a writer.
Khan was associate editor of political magazine The New Statesman and was European editor-at-large for the US magazine Vanity Fair and now runs a film production company.
She has two sons – Suleiman, 24, and 21-year-old Kasim – from her marriage to former cricketer Imran Khan, now Pakistan’s Prime Minister and Hasnat Khan’s distant cousin.
Jemima married Imran Khan in 1995 but they divorced nine years later. Diana visited the pair twice in 1996 and 1997
Diana with Imran and Jemima Khan in 1997. From last September to this February the film producer worked with Peter Morgan on stories such as Diana’s relationships with heart surgeon Hasnat Khan and Dodi Fayed
Khan, pictured, said the series was not as ‘compassionate’ as she hoped it would be
The couple married in 1995 but divorced nine years later. Diana visited the pair twice in 1996 and 1997.
Since then, the daughter of the late tycoon James Goldsmith and socialite Lady Annabel Goldsmith has dated several high-profile men including Hugh Grant, Russell Brand and Shane Warne (ex of Liz Hurley).
Father-of-five Morgan was nominated for an Academy Award for his script for the 2006 film The Queen, starring Helen Mirren.
Margaret Thatcher portrayed by Gillian Anderson in series four of The Crown
Peter Morgan has gained critical acclaim as the writer behind Netflix hit The Crown (pictured in 2017)
His other screenwriting credits include the movies Frost/Nixon and The Damned United, as well as the acclaimed stage play The Audience.
In September shots captured in sunny southern Spain showed director Philip Martin on set of the highly anticipated fifth series of The Crown, which is thought to cover the Royal Family from the 1990s to 2003.
There were no official visits to Spain by the royals in the 1990s and it is thought that the crew could have been recreating scenes from when Diana and her lover Dodi Fayed visited St. Tropez together in 1997.
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