For more evidence, watch Scoop, a behind-the-scenes Netflix drama about a disastrous interview Prince Andrew gave in 2019 in response to allegations of sexual misconduct.
Anderson says the “complex” relationship between royalty and media needs reassessment.
“Whether that’s [Prince] Harry and his cases against the tabloids and all of the truths around that have come to the fore, or other aspects that are becoming more public knowledge, it probably needs a proper rethink,” says Anderson.
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Scoop is based on a book by Sam McAlister, the tenacious producer who secured the interview. As played by Billie Piper, she promises the palace: “An hour of television can change everything.”
That proved grimly true for Andrew.
Under Maitlis’ gentle, determined probing, the prince denied all allegations, failed to show empathy for the exploited young women and said Epstein had “conducted himself in a manner unbecoming”, which struck many viewers as an understatement.
He claimed he could not have been at a nightclub with his accuser on an alleged date because he was at a suburban Pizza Express restaurant with his daughter.
He could not have been sweating on the dance floor because an “overdose of adrenaline” during his time as a helicopter pilot in the 1982 Falklands War had left him unable to perspire.
McAlister recalled the “extraordinary” experience of being in the room as the interview was recorded inside Buckingham Palace.
He is a creature that cannot get the oxygen
“As a journalist, and an ex-lawyer, I knew profoundly that he was doing something that would change the course of his life and the course of life of everyone in the royal family,” she said at the show’s London premiere.
Andrew initially thought the interview had been a great success, even giving Maitlis a tour of Buckingham Palace after it was recorded.
Sewell, who spent up to four hours a day being transformed into the prince with make-up and prosthetics, said he tried to find “all of the contradictions” in Andrew.
He saw a man whose self-image was forged through a lifetime of deference from those around him, and who played up to his tabloid image as a “naughty scamp” – “Randy Andy” in his youth, “Air Miles Andy” in his role as a British trade emissary.
Sewell says he felt Andrew’s self-image was “dependent on the other party acquiescing to the idea that he is the prince”.
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“In order to maintain the idea of himself, he needs someone to play along,” says the British actor, recently seen as a mischief-making ambassadorial spouse in The Diplomat on Netflix.
“And the interview is the process by which this fish finds himself out of his bowl, gulping for air – because Emily Maitlis does not even need to be rude or aggressive, she just needs to not agree to her side of that contract. And suddenly he is a creature that cannot get the oxygen.”
The show’s recreation of the interview is remarkably tense, even for viewers who have seen the real thing.
“We prepared completely separately and, and there was no rehearsal,” Anderson says. “So when we came together to shoot the interview, it was on our first day of work together and we started the day sitting across from each other in those chairs and the cameras rolled. And so there was tension in and of itself.”
Anderson is proud that Scoop is a story with “four strong female leads in the ensemble”.
The cast also includes Keeley Hawes as Andrew’s private secretary Amanda Thirsk and Romola Garai as Newsnight boss Esme Wren.
As for what the palace can learn from it, she says: “If this tells us anything, it would be that the royal family should never do an interview at all.”
“But actually,” she adds, “I think what is amazing and what stands out is the importance of independent journalism, to hold authority to account and to at least attempt to get some semblance of the truth.”