Prince Harry is likely to avoid watching the new Netflix series The Crown as it depicts the events leading up to his mother’s tragic death, says PR expert Mayah Riaz.
The final series of the popular Netflix show will portray the period before the fatal car crash in Paris that claimed the lives of Princess Diana, her boyfriend Dodi Fayed and their driver Henri Paul.
Harry was only 12 when he lost his mother and has spoken openly about the pain he experienced following the accident.
Mayah told the Daily Mirror: “I don’t think Harry will watch the new series. The reason he won’t watch it is because it is not a reflection of what he went through. He has spoken about how upsetting that period was for him.”
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She added that it would be distressing for Harry to see his mother’s death recreated for entertainment.
“Seeing someone else’s depiction of it will be upsetting as he may feel it did not need to be recreated for entertainment. For that reason he will avoid watching it,” she said.
In the latest series of The Crown, actors Elizabeth Debicki and Khalid Abdalla portray the budding romance between Princess Diana and Dodi. One scene shows Diana on a private yacht with Dodi, while another captures a tense moment in the back of a car.
Prince Harry has been candid about how his mother’s death affected him, revealing his disbelief when he first heard the news.
In his debut memoir Spare, Harry shared that he initially thought Diana had faked her death to escape the public eye.
He wrote: “She’s been very unhappy, she’s been harassed, lied to, and lied about her. So she’s faked this accident as a move to make them get away from her.”
Harry also imagined that Diana might be living in a Paris apartment or a secret cabin in the Swiss Alps. This idea, he said, made him feel “much better” about her tragic passing.
He confessed that he always held onto the hope that she would return. In Spare, Harry wrote: “This is her way of fighting. She will come back. Sure. In two weeks it’s my birthday.”
