The Crown Season 4 True Story: Everything Netflix Left Out

The TV drama The Crown is masterfully researched and delicately performed with great attention to detail, but some things were still left out of season 4 of the Netflix drama. The season focused on the true story of the Royal House of Windsor, showcasing the marriage of Prince Charles (Josh O’Connor) to Diana Spencer (Emma Corrin), as well as the failing health of Princess Margaret (Helena Bonham Carter) and the ministry of Margaret Thatcher (Gillian Anderson). The prestige Netflix series, though sophisticated in its portrayal of historical events, is still a work of fiction, and certain events were omitted.

The fourth season continues the dramatic retelling of the reign of Queen Elizabeth II (Olivia Colman) and her family, though characters like Prince Philip (Tobias Menzies) and Princess Anne (Erin Doherty) no longer take front and center, instead stepping aside to allow for the Diana and Thatcher years to shine. Fans have been hungry for the drama between Charles, Diana, and Camilla (Emerald Fennell), the royal scandal that many still hold in their memories. The show balances the romantic tribulations and political unrest brought between the years 1979-1990, including as much as possible in the eleven-year span.

Key historical events are put brilliantly on display in this character study, including Princess Margaret’s failing health and discovery of disabled relatives living in an institution, Charles’s near miss with a deadly avalanche, and Diana’s dance performance to Billy Joel’s “Up Town Girl.” Unfortunately with the time allotted, there wasn’t enough room for every major event that went down in the decade. Here are some things from the true story of The Crown that are missing in season 4.

The Royal Wedding

When Diana Spencer married Charles, Prince of Wales in July of 1981, the event was spectacular. The estimated global audience was some 750 million people. The only detail included in the show, however, is Diana’s iconic wedding gown, designed by Elizabeth and David Emmanuel of ivory silk taffeta and lace. The dress was recreated by The Crown‘s costumes designer Amy Roberts with special permission from the Emmanuels, who told Roberts to have fun with the construction and not to obsess over details. The rest of the wedding, however, was omitted from the drama.

Corrin spoke on the topic in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “We never recreate things just for the sake of recreating them. I think if we do recreate a scene—like the engagement scene, for instance, when they do the announcement—it has to be because it’s linked to something that the characters are going through. It has to be part of the story. It has to further the plot, basically. The wedding scene, you can YouTube it and you could be watching it in 10 seconds, so I don’t think there’d be any point in us recreating it.” Instead, the show focuses on the evening leading up to the wedding and the choices the characters are faced with. Princess Margaret suggests that they allow the couple to break up before marrying, for their sakes and for the sake of the royal house. It is a stunning character moment, offering a glimpse of the heartache of Charles and Diana’s marriage before they ever tied the knot.

Paul Burrell (Diana’s Confidante)

Perhaps in an effort to express how very isolated Diana was, her greatest real-life confidante was omitted from the show entirely. Paul Burrell was a servant and butler to the British Royal Family who moved with Diana and Charles to help them in their home, Highgrove House. Burrell has stated that Diana trusted and confided in him, leaning on his friendship during the trying years in which she was married to Charles. Burrell has been vocal about the truths about Diana and Charles that The Crown bravely disclosed, saying that Charles was unfortunately very cruel and cold toward Diana, insulting her clothes on more than one occasion and behaving jealously about her popularity with the public. He knew many of the details of Diana’s eating disorders, self-harm, and the bitter fighting between the unhappy pair.

Prince Philip’s Letters To Diana

The Crown takes some care to show tender, gentle moments between Diana and her father-in-law, first when she passes “The Balmoral Test,” charming the royals on a hunting trip in Scotland. Diana and Philip share a quiet moment on a hilltop where she impresses him with her hardy willingness to trudge through mud and her knowledge of stalking and shooting. Through the course of her marriage to Charles, the fictional Diana is not able to find sympathy from the Queen. However, in a scene between Prince Philip and Diana, once more at Balmoral, he looks at her with kindness and later approaches her for a quiet conversation, listening to her woes and attempting to encourage her. The scene is a sweet one, though tinged with an ominous tone helped along by dramatic irony, and it reflects a real-life warmth that the Prince felt for his daughter-in-law.

Reportedly, Prince Philip and Diana exchanged letters in which he took her side in the separation and divorce. The letters, signed “fondest love, Pa,” contained such words from the Prince as “I cannot imagine anyone in their right mind leaving you for Camilla,” and “Charles was silly to risk everything with Camilla for a man in his position. We never dreamed he might feel like leaving you for her. Such a prospect never even entered our heads.” Diana confided in her private secretary, Patrick Jephson, telling him how much the letters edified her. She designated them as proof that her father-in-law honored her and recognized the pain she was going through, though this was unfortunately left out of The Crown season 4.

Assassination Attempt On Margaret Thatcher

In the first episode of season 4, “Gold Stick,” the assassination of Lord “Dickie” Mountbatten (Charles Dance) is highlighted. The Irish Republican Army plant a bomb on his boat, and he along with some others are killed in the explosion. Margaret Thatcher expresses to the Queen that she will no longer tolerate the violence coming from the IRA, stating that there is no difference between “political violence” and “criminal violence.” What the show does not cover, however, was the 1984 IRA bombing of the Brighton Hotel in an attempt to murder Margaret Thatcher.

On October 12th, 1984, a long-delay bomb was planted by the paramilitary organization member Patrick Magee with the express purpose of killing the Prime Minister along with members of her cabinet. Thatcher was there for a Conservative Party conference, which was taking place five floors beneath where the bomb was planted. At 2:54 a.m., the bomb was detonated, collapsing a five-ton chimney stack which left an enormous hole in the hotel’s wall. It was said by firefighters that many lives were likely spared due to the Victorian construction that allowed the hotel to remain standing. Thatcher was still awake when the bomb went off, but she and her husband were able to escape unscathed.  There were five deaths, none of whom were cabinet members and 31 injuries. The IRA claimed responsibility for the attack the day after its occurrence and said in a statement that the group would be making another attempt on Thatcher’s life: “Today we were unlucky, but remember we only have to be lucky once. You will have to be lucky always. Give Ireland peace and there will be no more war.”

Diana’s Confrontation Of Camilla

In The Crown, Diana and Camilla engage in an uncomfortable and tense lunch during which Camilla goads Diana for how little she knows about her betrothed. While it is true that this lunch occurred, this was not the only time that Diana spoke to Camilla about the latter’s relationship with the Prince of Wales. At a birthday party in 1989, Diana decided to confront Camilla over being Charles’s mistress. She told Camilla that she knew what was happening between her and Charles, and that she wanted Camilla to be aware of her, Diana’s, knowledge. Camilla responded that Diana had everything she ever wanted. She said to her, “All the men in the world fall in love with you and you’ve got two beautiful children, what more do you want?” Diana replied, “I want my husband. I’m sorry I’m in the way, and it must be hell for both of you. But I do know what’s going on. Don’t treat me like an idiot.” The recollection of the incident was disclosed in the Diana tapes.

The Scandals Of Princess Anne

In season 3, one of the victims of limited screen time was Princess Anne, and that oversight continued in season 4. Just as the third season failed to highlight Princess Anne’s attempted kidnapping, the fourth didn’t spend much time on all the turmoil her choices brought to the royal family. In one episode, the strife in her marriage with Captain Mark Phillips and her dissatisfaction is discussed in a scene with her and the Queen, but the remainder of Anne’s troubles are not touched upon. In a move that upset her family, she chose to withhold royal titles from her son Peter and her daughter Zara. She explained her choice to Vanity Fair. “I think it was probably easier for them, and I think most people would argue that there are downsides to having titles. So I think that was probably the right thing to do.” The decision, along with her choice to give birth in a hospital instead of at home, broke with centuries of tradition.

In 1989, Anne underwent another scandal. The love letters between the princess and Royal Navy Commanding Office Timothy Laurence were obtained and leaked to the press, compelling the Royal Family to release a statement in which they refused to make a comment about the personal letters. The stolen letters were the subject of a police investigation, and eventually, Anne’s marriage to Mark crumbled and they divorced in 1992. Anne would go on to marry Timothy Laurence a few months after her divorce.

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