Elizabeth Debicki, Dominic West talk about how 'The Crown' will handle Princess Diana's death

Season 5 of "The Crown" arrives Nov. 9.

October 19, 2022, 12:14 PM

Elizabeth Debicki is the latest actress cast as Princess Diana on "The Crown," portraying her in the show's upcoming fifth and sixth seasons. Season 6, which is currently being filmed, takes the Emmy-winning drama, which chronicles the modern history of Britain's royal family, to the point of Diana's untimely 1997 death and beyond.

The late Princess of Wales died from injuries sustained in a car crash in Paris, on Aug. 31, 1997, leaving behind her two sons Prince William and Prince Harry.

In an Entertainment Weekly cover story, Debicki insisted show creator Peter Morgan is being careful with the heavy content. "I'll say that Peter and the entire crew of this job do their utmost to really handle everything with such sensitivity and truth and complexity, as do [the] actors," she said.

"The amount of research and care and conversations and dialogue that happen over, from a viewer's perspective, something probably that you would never ever notice is just immense," the "Tenet" actress continued. "From that very first meeting [with] Peter, I knew that I'd entered into this space where this was taken seriously [in] a deeply caring way. So that's my experience of the show."

Elizabeth Debicki as Diana and Dominic West as Prince Charles in season 5 of "The Crown."
Netflix

Dominic West, who portrays Prince Charles opposite Debicki, added that the filmmakers feel a "heavy responsibility" to do the actors' real-life counterparts justice.

"It's a hell of a season, because it deals with Diana's death and appalling scenes, like having to break that news to your sons," he said, referencing William and Harry, played in the show by Timothee Sambor and Teddy Hawley, respectively.

"I've got two boys of that age and so it's a heavy, heavy responsibility to get it right and something I think we all take pretty seriously."

"The Crown" season 5 debuts Nov. 9 on Netflix.