The Team Behind 'The Crown' Had ‘Long Conversations’ About Recreating This Significant Moment for the Netflix Series

Fans of the Emmy-winning Netflix original series The Crown have been waiting for the series’ sixth and final season. Among the storylines that will play out in the new batch of episodes, one significant and heartbreaking moment audiences are bracing for involves the late Princess Diana, and there’s already a lot of anxiety around the series’ potential portrayal of the tragic scene. But the creative team behind the series recently shared their approach to filming such a pivotal moment in the royal family’s modern history, shedding light on what audiences can expect.

Of course, the plot point we’re gently gesturing toward is Princess Diana’s tragic death in Paris. The weight of such a harrowing, dramatic, and traumatic moment was front-of-mind for the creatives behind The Crown. “The show might be big and noisy, but we’re not. We’re thoughtful people and we’re sensitive people,” executive producer Suzanne Mackie said at the Edinburgh TV Festival, per Deadline. “There were very careful, long conversations about how we were going to do it,” Mackie continued.

“The audience will judge it in the end, but I think it’s been delicately, thoughtfully recreated. Elizabeth Debicki is an extraordinary actress and she was so thoughtful and considerate. She loved Diana. There’s a huge amount of respect from us all, I hope that’s evident.”

The sixth season of The Crown began filming in 2022, with images from the set reaching the public’s eyes over the course of the last several months. In late October 2022, photos were published featuring what appeared to be a recreation of the night Princess Diana and her late partner Dodi Fayed were tragically killed in Paris. The late Princess of Wales and Fayed died in a car crash in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel in August 1997.

The Crown‘s sixth season will cover a lot of storylines the world watched play out during the ’90s and early 2000s. Along with Princess Diana’s tragic passing, Prince William and Kate Middleton’s early romance at school will appear in the series, too. The show has received criticism in recent seasons for its portrayal of certain figures and stories. But we’ll ultimately have to wait and see how the show handles what might be the most difficult moment in the series.

Before you go, click here to see all of our favorite photos of Princess Diana.