Dennis Skinner - Sue Townsend - Diana: 7 Days that Shook the Windsors TV - Diana TV - The Diana Interview: Revenge of a Princess TV - Lord Mountbatten: Hero or Villain? TV - Princess Alice: The Royals’ Greatest Secret TV - Prince Philip: The Bachelor Years TV - Fergie & Andrew: The Duke & Duchess of Disaster TV - Meghan & Harry: The New Revelations TV - Camilla: Making of a Mistress TV - Wallis Simpson: Femme Fatale TV - Princess Margaret: Queen of Mustique TV - Zara & Anne: Like Mother, Like Daughter? TV - Harry & Meghan vs The Monarchy TV - Oprah with Meghan & Harry TV - When the Spencers Met the Monarchy TV - Queen Elizabeth: Love, Honour & Crown TV - The Windsors: Inside the Royal Dynasty TV - Queen Elizabeth and the Spy in the Palace TV - The Widow Queen and the Monarchy after Prince Philip TV - The Queen and Her Cousins with Alexander Armstrong TV - The Queen Mother TV - Meghan: Where Did It All Go Wrong? TV - Elizabeth II & The Traitor King TV - Charles & Harry: Father & Son Divided TV - The Queen & Charles: Mother & Son TV - Fergie & Meghan: Inconvenient Rivals TV - Prince Philip: The Royal Family Remembers TV - Princess Michael: The Controversial Royal TV - Princess Margaret: The Unlucky Princess TV - The Real Windsors TV - Tweets TV - William & Kate: Too Good to be True? TV - William & Harry: An Unusual Truce TV - Frankie Boyle TV - Andrew: The Problem Prince TV - Prince Harry: Secrets of His Hollywood Life TV - Meghan: Famous But Friendless? TV - Andrew: The Rise and Fall of the Playboy Prince TV - Roddy & Margaret: The Affair that Shook the Royals TV - The Real Crown: Inside the House of Windsor TV - Scoop 2024 - A Very English Scandal TV - Edward v George: The Windsor Brothers at War TV -
The royal family as ‘little monsters’ who stick a respectable face on deadly ogres such as poverty, inequality and unfairness. Dennis Skinner
The monarchy is finished. It was finished a while ago, but they’re still making the corpses dance. Sue Townsend
Grief turned into anger: the royal family became the target … The biggest royal crisis in half a century. Diana: 7 Days that Shook the Windsors, Channel 5 2017
Queen Elizabeth was woken by her private secretary. ibid.
Diana was seen as a great danger to the royal family. ibid.
The Queen was about to deliver her first live address in half a century. ibid.
The biggest funeral in British history. ibid.
The biggest global audience in television history. ibid.
There is more to the story of Princess Diana than meets the eye. The nursery school assistant who became the most famous woman in the world. But who she really was is still disputed. Some see her as a victim. Others cast her as manipulative. But while she may have tried to use the press there is no doubt they hunted her … The princess who changed the world. Diana, ITV 2021
When Diana is six, her parents split up. It is a bitter divorce for which her mother is blamed for. Her father wins custody, and Diana is sent to boarding school the following year. ibid.
Diana has been asking her parents if she could move to London for some time. ibid.
The Royal Family approve of the relationship. But Diana is becoming aware that Charles still has feelings for his ex, Camilla Parker Bowles. ibid.
As a teenager, Diana didn’t get along with her stepmother. And having lived out the fallout of a divorce first-hand, she’s determined that her marriage will be different. ibid.
Charles and Diana go no honeymoon on the royal yacht Britannia, along with over 200 members of Her Majesty’s media. Diana becomes consumed with jealousy about Camilla, and is dismayed to discover that Charles has taken a photo of him with her. The couple begin to argue. Diana’s weight loss becomes ever more apparent. And Charles is becoming concerned. ibid.
Diana is suffering from post-natal depression. ibid.
She is becoming the biggest star in the world. ibid.
Diana arrived unannounced in the Bullring near Waterloo Station to meet the homeless who lived there. She spent the evening listening to stories of the men and women of cardboard city. ibid.
Rumours began to circulate that a tell-all book was about to be published. As the publication date nears, Diana is asked by the Palace if she has had any hand in the book. She strongly denies her involvement. The book is a huge scandal. The Queen and Prince Philip hold crisis talks with the couple and urge them to save their marriage. ibid.
Diana starts to become involved in an ever-more elaborate game with the press. As the paparazzi chase her, she briefs journalists and has dinner with editors. ibid.
Diana nicknames her boyfriend [Dr Hasnat Khan] Mr Wonderful. She is extremely careful to keep him a secret from the world’s press. And then she takes a big step to introducing him to William and Harry. ibid.
Lady Diana Spencer was just 19 when she became engaged to the 32-year-old Prince of Wales. It was her first serious relationship. After more than a decade in a suffocating marriage the Princess was desperate to speak out. And in 1995 the Princess began a serious of clandestine meetings with BBC journalist Martin Bashir. His attempts to secure an interview with Diana are now the subject of fresh allegations by her brother Earl Spencer. Here, the man accused of helping Bashir speaks on camera. The Diana Interview: Revenge of a Princess s1e1, ITV 2020
Charles had been in a relationship with Camilla Parker-Bowles for several years. But she had had a series of boyfriends and was deemed an unsuitable match for the heir of the throne. ibid.
Prince Charles was simply unable to give Diana the emotional security she so badly desired. ibid.
Back then, Diana probably believed she could win Charles’ love and make him forget Camilla. Charles himself was also trapped by circumstance. ibid.
‘I couldn’t believe that a man with a newborn baby was gonna leg it and play some daft game of Polo. Doing something like that to a wife with a newborn baby [Harry] was atrocious. If he thought he could treat his wife like that, he was in deep trouble.’ ibid. Ken Lennox, press photographer
On 20th June 1994 Charles attempted to hit back at Diana’s growing popularity. As well as rehabilitating his reputation – there was Camillagate – by giving an exclusive interview for Jonathan Dimbleby on ITV. ibid.
Diana’s BBC Man and Fake Bank Statements: Documents were falsified before Royal Interview. ibid. Daily Mail headline
‘This was an interview that went to the absolute dark heart of English establishment and the monarchy.’ The Diana Interview: Revenge of a Princess s1e2, Andrew Morton
‘She [Camilla] won’t go quietly. That’s the problem. I’ll fight till the end. Because I believe I have a role to fulfil.’ ibid.
The interview had been done without the knowledge of [Marmaduke] Hussey or the Board of Governors. ibid.
Eventually, Diana received £17 million but lost her HRH title as part of the settlement. ibid.
In the weeks before he secured his global scoop with Princess Diana, Martin Bashir asked his friend and colleague at Panorama, a BBC graphic designer, to do a job for him late one evening … ‘I am this guy that’s remembered for forging the document. And I want to clear my name … Martin asked me to make up a couple of bank statements about people being paid to do surveillance that he needed the following day. And he did say that they were just going to be used as copies.’ ibid. Matthias Wiessler, BBC graphic designer 1986-1995
Lord Louis Mountbatten: the respected war hero. Brutally murdered by the IRA in 1979. But does his public image reflect the man he really was? Known for his military might in World War II, he made some disastrous mistakes that cost the lives of his men. As Viceroy of India he was in charge of independence, but was he to blame for the resulting bloodshed? As self-appointed adviser to Prince Philip, Prince Charles and the Queen, he penetrated the heart of the Royal Family. But his carefully created public image hid a scandalous marriage and sexual exploits. Lord Mountbatten: Hero or Villain? Channel 5 2020
‘He was very impressive and he was a bully. He was very good at getting his own way.’ ibid. historian
‘I’m the most controversial man you can possibly imagine.’ ibid. Mountbatten
‘The shattered and splintered woodwork is mute testament to the severity of the bomb blast.’ ibid. news report
Mountbatten was born in 1900 at the beginning of a century when Britain underwent massive change … A great-grandson of Queen Victoria, they lived in Britain as members of the extended Royal Family. One of four children, Mountbatten, known as Dickie, was the youngest by eight years. ibid.
Cosying up to senior royal would only help in his quest to bring honour back to his family name and avenge his father’s departure as head of the Navy. But his aspirations were very nearly derailed by his marriage and the dysfunctional and scandalous private lives led by him and his wife. ibid.
In October 1939, while in command of HMS Kelly, Mountbatten was given orders to engage with a German battleship and rescue several hundred British seaman: ‘He decided to do things a different way. He always liked going shortcuts. He was impatient. And the result was he that missed the battleship and he also failed to rescue 600 seaman. As a result, they spent the war in a prisoner of war camp. Mountbatten was arrogant. He thought he knew best. ibid.
‘During his command of the Kelly he lost more than 150 men.’ ibid. historian
‘He was shameless really in his ambition and his ruthlessness. And he was very effective.’ ibid.