The Crown: season 5

[KillingMeDeftly]

Anyone seen this yet? I'm not quite as convinced by the casting for this season as I was for previous ones but will withhold judgement until I've watched the whole series.

Elizabeth Debicki looks the part as Diana, although I thought Emma Corrin captured her voice better. Dominic West is very flattering casting for Charles but Olivia Williams as Camilla is uncanny. I never thought she looked anything like her but they've made her a dead ringer! Same goes for Jonny Lee Miller as John Major.

It looks like this season will cover events up to and including Diana's Panorama interview.

Didn't the Fergie toe-sucking scandal break when they were all sat around the breakfast table at Balmoral? Or was that a different scandal?

It is weird that we all just kind of accepted the sex phone calls that Charles did. I was a teenager at the time and I was like “well I guess that’s just how adults are then”

I thought the telephone conversation wasn't as bad as I remembered . It was silly but it was kind of jokey rather than dirty, iyswim?
It was completely out of order for it to be in the press at the time and I think it was out of order for it to be repeated in the show really.

It did break around the breakfast table! I would give years of my life to have been a fly on the wall! We have to remember these were the days before the internet and so the first that people would find out about things was when they opened the newspapers. Although I suppose in all probability someone with advance knowledge might have made a phone call. But I have an image of The Royals descending for breakfast and picking up a newspaper....

In fact the scenes in episode one of the newspaper being hidden from HMQ give credence to the idea that they probably knew nothing until they picked up the paper.

I was staying with my sister at her holiday home, with various other guests she had. My BiL had been out and brought back copies of ALL the papers. Some of the headlines were very funny. It was a most enjoyable and entertaining breakfast. Poor Fergie, I can't imagine innocently walking into the dining room for breakfast and being confronted by that.

I'm not usually a conspiracy theorist, but looking back we were sold the story that amateur radio enthusiasts had picked up the telephone calls and recognised the voices and recorded them.....and most people believed those stories.

I think the truth is probably entirely different.

You are right. It shows how badly written this series when they prefer a boring chat between the Queen and Andrew instead of a juicy scene like that.

Yes I thought the phone call was funny, more like larking around, but I remember thinking it was gross that he wanted to be a tampon 😄

I adore the idea of strait laced John Major spending time with Boris Yeltsin.

That reminds me, I thought Yeltsin was well-cast!

It shows how badly written this series when they prefer a boring chat between the Queen and Andrew instead of a juicy scene like that.

I agree, and I couldn't believe season 3 passed up the opportunity to depict the Princess Anne kidnapping attempt. Who would've dared make up something like that?

Poor old Fergie, I suspect her biggest mistake was the papers catching her in the act. Had it gone unnoticed then I doubt she and Andrew would've divorced.

Even without paparazzi armed with long lenses Fergie wasn't exactly trying to be discreet. Her nanny and small children were among witnesses around the pool on that holiday. Personally I thought it was appalling to behave like that in front of her children. But Diana flaunted her lovers in front of her children too.
I just don't know why either of them wouldn't have sought to protect their children and keep their affairs secret.
Though of course both C & D made televised confessionals.
It must have been very hard for William, I suppose Harry was a bit younger.

Even without paparazzi armed with long lenses Fergie wasn't exactly trying to be discreet. Her nanny and small children were among witnesses around the pool on that holiday. Personally I thought it was appalling to behave like that in front of her children. But Diana flaunted her lovers in front of her children too.
I just don't know why either of them wouldn't have sought to protect their children and keep their affairs secret.
Though of course both C & D made televised confessionals.
It must have been very hard for William, I suppose Harry was a bit younger.

Reading your post, it's made me admire Catherine really. Who knows what might have gone on, or not gone on, in their marriage. Either way she hasn't put a foot wrong as a mother or (royal) wife.

@Morestrangethings

its complicated. George V asked David Lloyd george if they could come to the UK. DLG eventually agreed they could but by then george V had got cold feet & changed his mind.

however it does need to be looked at in context. Across Europe royal houses were collapsing because of WW1. In the UK george was terrified that they could lose the throne because of the anti German sentiment hence the name change from saxe coburg gotha to Windsor. The Romanovs were related to most of the royal houses in Europe but none of them put themselves out to help them. They were not actually very popular even with their relatives - Alexandra was famously awkward & most royal families thought they’d behaved insanely over Rasputin.

once they were out in Yekaterinburg they were out of sight, out of mind, there were just too many other things going on.

I don’t know if they expected them to be executed though and Tbf once they knew about the murder of the Romanovs, they did try & help what few survivors remained. Nicholas II mother escaped in 1919 on a ship sent to rescue her by the UK government (her sister was the dowager Queen Alexandra)

I do find it odd they've ignored Diana's multiple affairs. The drama with the "Squidgy" tape and the Will Carling & Oliver Hoare families were huge at the time. They definitely seemed to be alluding to it at the end of Series 4 with ?James Hewitt driving into KP at night.

Did they mention the scandal involving Diana bullying Tiggy Legge-Bourke at all? I remember it being all over the news at the time and all the rumours being reported (only on ep 3 so far).

But then again, I couldn't believe they didn't feature Anne's kidnap attempt (made for TV surely!) and Erin Doherty would have been brilliant in it.

And didn't Charles get shot at in Australia?

As a child I was always fascinated by the story of Anna Anderson and the prospect that perhaps one or more of the Romanovs had managed to escape. Even after the remains were found and tested, the last two bodies (Alexei and either Maria or Anastasia) were only discovered about 15 years ago. They're all now accounted for, although there will always be conspiracy theorists who claim the results of the DNA tests were faked.

I remember watching the film Nicholas and Alexandra when it came out, I think historically based films back then were perhaps more historically accurate than they are now??? Anyway for anyone sketchy on the details it's quite a good introduction, though I also read a very good book on the Romanovs which I have lost annoyingly.
I think the Rasputin was a significant factor in distant relatives behind less welcoming.

Yes, Anna Anderson was always in the spooky books of the 80s.

Yes @PrincessJanet, I think my aunt had a Reader's Digest Unsolved Mysteries book and that's where I first read about her!

Agreed. For one thing, he looked very much like Yeltsin. Same for the actor who played Charles Spencer.

I agree, and I couldn't believe season 3 passed up the opportunity to depict the Princess Anne kidnapping attempt. Who would've dared make up something like that?

Absolutely. Considering how many downright boring scenes there have been, and they left that out.

I love that story about Anne thwarting the kidnapping attempt. She's fabulous!

...

That interview with Anne I've never seen before, she comes over exceptionally well and very droll with it. Lots of people got hurt though, it is a miracle her bodyguard survived. Could have all been very different.

I know that Princess Anne isn't very old in that interview-about 30?

Her skin looks fabulous!

She was very attractive in a different way than Diana. Never photographed well, but she comes over as charismatic in that interview.

Anne was never conventionally pretty but she was what Victorian novelists called a "handsome" woman.