'Meghan & Harry' Including 'Panorama' Interview "Pointedly Hurtful"

Britain's Prince William, Duke of Cambridge (L) and Britain's Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex arrive for the unveiling of a statue of their mother, Princess Diana at The Sunken Garden in Kensington Palace

(Image credit: Getty/YUI MOK)

published 13 December 2022

In Netflix' Harry & Meghan Volume 1, Prince Harry addresses his mom Princess Diana's Panorama interview, and a clip from the controversial conversation is included in the docuseries.

This comes after Prince William has expressly wished for the 1995 interview never to be shown on air again. "It is my firm view that this Panorama program holds no legitimacy and should never be aired again," he said last year.

"It effectively established a false narrative which, for over a quarter of a century, has been commercialized by the BBC and others.

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"This settled narrative now needs to be addressed by the BBC and anyone else who has written or intends to write about these events."

Harry & Meghan was able to include excerpts from Panorama without permission from the BBC under "fair dealing" agreements.

Royal expert Jennie Bond thinks that this decision takes specific aim at the Prince of Wales.

"I think Harry and Meghan's decision to include Diana's Panorama interview was pointedly hurtful," Bond told OK!.

"To go against your brother's express wishes about your mother.

"He's not respected William's wishes. I doubt he phoned his brother and said 'By the way we're going to be using that clip.'"

"It's blatantly, openly and pointedly hurtful."

It's worth noting that Prince Harry had nothing to do with the editing of the Netflix docuseries, and won't have been the one who decided to include clips from Panorama. It also feels like his right to speak about such a painful episode involving his mother. With that said, Bond is right that it's likely William wasn't warned about the inclusion beforehand, although Harry will have known about it before the doc aired.

There are all sorts of claims floating around about royals on both sides of the Atlantic these days, and Bond believes it's up to the Sussexes to set the record straight.

"We’ve got sources from the palace denying having done any harm to Harry and Meghan," she continued.

"We can’t determine who is telling the truth.

"So, I think the onus has to be on Harry and Meghan who are making the allegations to stand them up and stop throwing out general slurs against their family.

"It’s getting really unpleasant and dirty. Harry talked about it being a 'dirty game,' well this is dirty.

"We’ve seen so much of the Royal Family’s dirty laundry aired in public and this is a whole lot more."

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Iris Goldsztajn is a London-based journalist, editor and author. She is the morning editor at Marie Claire, and her work has appeared in the likes of British Vogue, InStyle, Cosmopolitan, Refinery29 and SELF. Iris writes about everything from celebrity news and relationship advice to the pitfalls of diet culture and the joys of exercise. She has many opinions on Harry Styles, and can typically be found eating her body weight in cheap chocolate.