Everything ‘The Crown’ cast has said about filming final season — and Diana’s death

“The Crown” will meet its end when the final season concludes on Dec. 14.

Season 6 is broken up into two parts — with the first turn dropping Nov. 16 and the second premiering a month later.

The last segment will take viewers into the modern era of the British royal family, beginning with Princess Diana’s untimely death in 1997 and ending in the mid-2000s.

While there has been controversy over how Netflix would portray the late Princess of Wales’ passing from a Parisian car crash alongside her lover, Egyptian billionaire Dodi Fayed, the event will still be played out in some form on screen.

It was reported last month that the series wouldn’t show the actual tragic event and wouldn’t even present a dead body to those who tune in.

“We did film Diana, but very respectfully — not in a big close-up,” director Christian Schwochow told Deadline, adding that the historical moment was shot with enormous sensitivity. 

“It was very, very clear to us that we don’t want to see her dead body. I actually think that it was not a discussion. Not even in the first version of the cut we would ever see her body,” he stated.

The new season stars Elizabeth Debicki as Diana alongside Dominic West as Prince Charles, Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth, Jonathan Pryce as Prince Philip, Khalid Abdalla as Fayed and Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret.

Keep reading to learn everything that “The Crown” cast has said about the last 10 episodes and what they have noted about portraying Diana’s traumatic death.

Dominic West

“The Wire” star, 54, revealed that in Season 6, he is playing the monarch, 74, during “the worst period” of his life.

“There were some really heavy scenes this season and a lot of tears for Charles,” he said during a Netflix cast interview in April, according to Deadline.

The British actor added: “There are a lot of the scenes of Charles trying to come to terms with [Diana’s death] and breaking the news to his sons, trying to help his sons mourn and having varying degrees of success at that.”

“I’m always trying to present him in a good light, and I don’t always succeed in doing that, but I think in the latter half of the season where William is giving him a really hard time and he’s very angry with him and won’t talk to him and [Charles] can’t get through to him, to his son, I can understand how that feels,” he said. 

The final episodes will show Charles as he becomes a single parent to his sons, Prince Harry and Prince William in their teen years, as well as his wedding to his now-wife, Queen Camilla, in 2005.

Elizabeth Debicki

Debicki, 33, admitted that filming her Diana scenes was “difficult,” “heavy and very manic and incredibly invasive.”

“At times it’s almost like an anomalistic response to being pursued, by that many actors playing the press, because there’s nowhere you can go and you only have to be in a situation like that for about a minute, before you realize this is completely unbearable,” the “Great Gatsby” star said earlier this year.

“And no-one should ever be having to experience what it feels like to try and get the scenes in the daytime in Paris, trying to get from one place to another, and to have this swarm around you. You feel very trapped. It’s a really unpleasant experience,” she went on.

Peter Morgan

“The Crown” showrunner and creator addressed rumors to Variety recently whether or not Diana’s ghost will actually appear in the finale.

The Daily Mail claimed earlier this year that the scene in question would occur and Charles, as well as the queen, would see Diana in her ghostly form at some point.

“I never imagined it as Diana’s ‘ghost’ in the traditional sense,” Morgan said. “It was her continuing to live vividly in the minds of those she has left behind.” 

“The Queen” screenwriter added: “Diana was unique, and I suppose that’s what inspired me to find a unique way of representing her. She deserved special treatment narratively.”   

Josh O’Connor

The “Only You” star, 33, played a young Prince Charles in Seasons 3 and 4 of the Netflix drama, set during the 1970s and early 1980s.

He confessed that his time on the show was “f–ked up.”

In an August interview with British GQ, he explained of his instant spike in notoriety after starring on the series: “I found it so impactful, people stopping me.”

“You want to be in stuff that’s successful and seen, but I think sometimes we underestimate how powerful even a slight loss of anonymity can be,” he added. “What I was doing in my career before ‘The Crown’ — I just wanted to carry on doing that.”