--- title: The Crown Season 6: Princess Diana's Death description: The Crown Season 6 covers the car crash that killed Princess Diana and Dodi al-Fayed—and how the royal family reacted. canonical: https://time.com/6335265/princess-diana-death-the-crown-season-6/ author: Olivia B. Waxman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2023-11-16T11:05:00.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:52:51.921Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: The Crown Season 6: Princess Diana's Death og:description: The Crown Season 6 covers the car crash that killed Princess Diana and Dodi al-Fayed—and how the royal family reacted. og:url: https://time.com/6335265/princess-diana-death-the-crown-season-6/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c4b36c36112e6e4/698a425ddb29875fdd2698e7/ThCrown_TrailerImages_12.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2133 og:image:height: 1200 og:image:alt: The-Crown og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Crown Season 6: Princess Diana's Death twitter:description: The Crown Season 6 covers the car crash that killed Princess Diana and Dodi al-Fayed—and how the royal family reacted. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c4b36c36112e6e4/698a425ddb29875fdd2698e7/ThCrown_TrailerImages_12.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How the Royal Family's Reaction to the Death of Princess Diana on _The Crown_ Compares to the Real Story > Sponsored content. 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Terms and conditions apply. * Savings buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account. * No ATM fees from Ally Bank at Allpoint and Moneypass ATMs plus we reimburse for fees charged by other ATM owners nationwide up to $10 per statement cycle. * Early direct deposit offers eligible direct deposits up to two days sooner. * Spending buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Spending Account.  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Nov 16, 2023 11:05 AM UTC  A still of Elizabeth Debicki as Diana in Season 6 of The Crown A still of Elizabeth Debicki as Diana in Season 6 of The CrownCourtesy of Netflix  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Nov 16, 2023 11:05 AM UTC When [Princess Diana](https://time.com/6209559/princess-diana-death-history-25-years-anniversary/) died more than 25 years ago in a [car crash](https://time.com/6209937/princess-diana-legacy-royal-family/) in Paris at the age of 36, thousands poured into the streets of London to pay their respects and leave messages and flowers outside of Kensington Palace. Mourners were seen openly sobbing. But members of the British royal family were reportedly not as emotive. In the fourth episode in the sixth season of [_The Crown_](https://time.com/6229016/crown-season-5-review/)_,_ Queen Elizabeth II (Imelda Staunton) and her husband Prince Philip (Jonathan Pryce) are hesitant to issue a statement offering comfort to the nation. Dominic West as [Prince Charles](https://time.com/6224691/the-crown-king-charles-iii-diana/) (now [King Charles](https://time.com/magazine/us/6279473/may-22nd-2023-vol-201-no-19-worldwide/)) chides [the Queen](https://time.com/4619423/queen-elizabeth-dies/) for not showing enough grief and compassion in public. “We can't be a private family when we want to be and a public one when it suits us,” he says. Press coverage of the royal family in the aftermath of Princess Diana’s death noted a certain aloofness among the members. The Sep. 8, 1997, [issue](https://time.com/vault/issue/1997-09-08/page/1/) of TIME magazine described the [tension](https://time.com/4916157/special-report-princess-diana-death/): --- > “Diana’s family was outraged at the circumstances surrounding her death. Her only brother Charles, the current Earl Spencer, bitterly declared, “I always believed the press would kill her in the end. Not even I could imagine that they would take such a direct hand in her death, as seems to be the case.” He added, “It would appear that every proprietor and editor of every publication that has paid for intrusive and exploitative photographs of her, encouraging greedy and ruthless individuals to risk everything in pursuit of Diana’s image, has blood on his hands today.”As for Diana’s former in-laws, they kept a regal silence. Members of the royal family, including Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles, vacationing with his sons—her sons—William and Harry at Balmoral Castle, were notified by phone.None made any public statement.Actually, for several weeks, Britain’s first family had been maintaining a studied silence on the topic of Diana. Almost a year to the day after a final divorce decree ended her arid marriage to Prince Charles, the princess had exploded back onto the pages of the tabloids, on the arm—and in the arms—of the wealthy \[Dodi\] Al Fayed \[who was also killed in the crash\]. The photographs were the purest paparazzi stuff—grainy images furtively snapped through telephoto lenses the size of bazookas. The story they told, however, was unmistakable. After years of smiling bravely and brittlely by the side of a man she was no longer in love with, the princess just may have found one she did love.” --- Robert Lacey, who has consulted for _The Crown_ and is the author of the 2020 book _Battle of Brothers: William, Harry and the Inside Story of a Family in Tumult,_ [told TIME](https://time.com/6209937/princess-diana-legacy-royal-family/) around the 25th anniversary of Diana’s death in 2022 that there is “no doubt” there was a coolness in the royal family’s reaction to the Princess’s premature death. “If you’re looking for the moment when the British monarchy was most severely challenged and found itself most at odds with public opinion, it has to be following the death of Diana and the perception that the Queen and the royal family didn’t care,” he said. But as noted by Lacey and the 1997 TIME magazine issue, the coolness from the royal family preceded Diana’s death, and even her divorce from Charles. The royal family disapproved in general of the attention [Diana](https://time.com/4922601/princess-diana-fashion-evolution/) attracted, from the explosive [1995 BBC Panorama interview](https://time.com/6231367/the-crown-martin-bashir-panorama-interview/) to the sustained tabloid coverage. This comes through in _The Crown_ Season 6, which picks up well after Charles and Diana’s divorce and in the midst of her romantic relationship with Dodi al-Fayed (Khalid Abdalla).When Diana and Dodi vacation on his father’s yacht, they are chased by paparazzi the entire time. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip are shown as disappointed that photos of two hanging out are splashed across the front pages of tabloids.  Elizabeth Debicki and Khalid Abdalla in season 6 of The Crown Daniel Escale—Netflix In the third episode of Season 6, the cameras follow Dodi and Diana to Paris, where Dodi proposes to Diana, and shortly thereafter, they get into the car that crashes and kills them. However, according to the 1998 [book](https://time.com/vault/issue/1998-02-16/page/77/) _Death of a Princess: The Investigation_ written by TIME’s Tommy Sancton and Scott McLeod, it’s believed that Dodi did not get a chance to fully carry out a formal proposal. The ring was found in an unopened box in his Paris apartment. In the fourth episode, Charles is shown waking up William (Rufus Kampa and Ed McVey) and Harry (Fflyn Edwards and Luther Ford), at Balmoral castle in Scotland. He gently breaks the news of their mother’s death and encourages the boys to be brave. While Charles is depicted as showing tenderness toward the boys, in real life, Prince Harry has said his father displayed a certain stiffness when he told them of Diana’s death. “Pa didn’t hug me,” he wrote in his 2023 memoir [_Spare,_](https://time.com/6246029/prince-harry-spare-review/)noting that a pat on the knee was the extent of the comfort he received_._ Prince Harry says he himself didn’t cry at that moment or during her funeral procession. He claims he only cried when he saw his mother’s coffin being lowered into the ground and alluded to the family’s stoicism in front of the press. “My body convulsed and my chin fell and I began to sob uncontrollably into my hands,” he wrote. “I felt ashamed of violating the family ethos, but I couldn’t hold it in any longer. It’s OK, I reassured myself, it’s OK. There aren’t any cameras around.” Similar to Peter Morgan’s other royal family drama _The Queen_, the fourth episode of Season 6 follows Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip in their hesitation over making a public statement about Diana’s death. Philip argues Diana is not part of the royal family anymore. But the episode ends with a dramatic reinterpretation of the queen’s actual first public statement after Diana’s death. Notably, she [said](https://www.royal.uk/queens-message-following-death-diana-princess-wales), “​​No-one who knew Diana will ever forget her. Millions of others who never met her, but felt they knew her, will remember her. I for one believe there are lessons to be drawn from her life and from the extraordinary and moving reaction to her death.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6335265/princess-diana-death-the-crown-season-6/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6335265/princess-diana-death-the-crown-season-6/"},"headline":"How the Royal Family's Reaction to the Death of Princess Diana on The Crown Compares to the Real Story","datePublished":"2023-11-16T11:05:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:52:51.921Z","description":"The Crown Season 6 covers the car crash that killed Princess Diana and Dodi al-Fayed—and how the royal family reacted.","url":"https://time.com/6335265/princess-diana-death-the-crown-season-6/","keywords":["Television","Explainer","culturepod"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3c4b36c36112e6e4/698a425ddb29875fdd2698e7/ThCrown_TrailerImages_12.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Olivia B. 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