Anger over The Crown scene showing Princess Diana 'lying in open casket'
21 December 2022, 08:57 | Updated: 21 December 2022, 08:59
The Crown's Elizabeth Debicki is shown dying in a blood soaked operating theatre and lying in an open casket in her depiction of Princess Diana.
Crew members are said to be disgusted by the grizzly scenes, claiming producers and scriptwriters are insensitively chasing ratings.
They also fear the impact they could have on Prince Harry and Prince William, whose mother Diana died in a Paris car crash in August 1997.
Both princes will also be depicted following Lady Di's coffin at her funeral, which will be shown in season six of Netflix dramatisation.
One person working on the show told The Sun: “Princes William and Harry never saw their mother dead in a coffin and they shouldn’t have to watch this. Nor should the British public.
"The bosses went way over the top to chase ratings. Everyone was very uncomfortable doing the shoot. It is obscene and should be banned from broadcast.”
The insider tells how producers hired real surgeons for the hospital scene, which shows blood all over surgeons' gowns as they surround Diana's lifeless body.
They added: “There were conversations on set between cast members visibly upset at what they were being asked to do."
Reports of the upcoming scenes have sparked fury on social media, with fans of the Royal Family describing them as "sickening".
"Zero proof Diana was ever in an open casket so its a tasteless prop by Netflix to add drama to its top rating show," one tweeted.
"Keep misleading the US viewership Netflix. Perhaps the deceit will transfer into subs. Desperate days beget desperate measures. Low ones."
Another added: "This is disgusting... I wish The Crown cast & crew had refused to do that. NOBODY IN THE WORLD wants to relive the grim actuality of Diana’s death - and so many [families] are affected!"
A third wrote: "What @netflix is doing is grotesque. Their "re-imagining" of graphic events is not artistic, it is [sadistic]."
But others thought the outrage was excessive, including Republic CEO Graham Smith, who tweeted: "There have been countless dramatisations of real peoples’ lives including their deaths and funerals.
"Real footage of JFK actually being shot in the head has been shown thousand of times. Why do they think this is any different?"
Netflix has previously insisted that the show will not depict the "exact moment" of Diana's car crash on screen.
Although The Crown is a fictional dramatisation, it has been criticised for inaccuracies over its depiction of the Royal Family, to the point where a disclaimer had to be added to a trailer.
