Princess Diana's brother says The Crown asked to film at Althorp: "I said obviously not"
He discussed his opinions on the Netflix series which depicts his late sister.
The brother of Princess Diana has revealed he denied a request by Netflix series The Crown to film at Althorp, the stately home of the Spencer family.
Earl Spencer appears as a guest on morning show Love Your Weekend with Alan Titchmarsh, where he discusses feeling some unease about the royal drama and its accuracy.
The fourth season of the show recently became available to stream, exploring Charles and Diana's marriage, with Josh O'Connor and Emma Corrin in the respective roles.
"The Crown asked if they could film at Althorp and I said obviously not," Earl Spencer says in the interview. "The worry for me is that people see a programme like that and they forget that it is fiction.
"They assume, especially foreigners, I find Americans tell me they have watched The Crown as if they have taken a history lesson. Well, they haven’t."
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He goes on to question the accuracy of the series, claiming that, while it may be propped up by factual events in history, there is less accuracy in some of the scenes that fall between.
Earl Spencer adds: "It is very hard, there is a lot of conjecture and a lot of invention, isn’t there? You can hang it on fact but the bits in between are not fact.”
His comments follow The Crown creator Peter Morgan's recent interview in The Times, in which he discussed having to take some liberties with the events as they unfolded.
"We do our very, very best to get it right, but sometimes I have to conflate [incidents]," he said. "You sometimes have to forsake accuracy, but you must never forsake truth.”
The story of Princess Diana will continue being told in the upcoming fifth season, where she is set to be portrayed by The Night Manager star Elizabeth Debicki, who joins The Crown cast.
Love Your Weekend with Alan Titchmarsh airs Sunday 22nd November at 10am on ITV. While you’re waiting, visit our TV Guide to see what’s on tonight, or check out our guide to new TV shows 2020 to find out what's airing this autumn and beyond.
