The Crown season 6 sees the Netflix royal saga finally ending — and what a ride it's been.
The final season will begin in 1997 and feature the tragic death of Princess Diana in a Paris car crash, one of the most infamous events in royal history.
Talking about how the makers are tackling the difficult subject of Diana's death, executive producer Suzanne Mackie told The Hollywood Reporter: "Some of it is very painfully sad because it deals with the death of Diana — over three episodes we follow what happens to Diana and the build-up to her death, the final days in Paris.
"It’s very sad, and it feels very real and vivid [and] I hope very respectful and beautiful. I think it will be a surprise for the audience because in many ways, where we go after Diana, it’s very hard. We have found a really beautiful new chapter, which is via Prince William and Kate Middleton, and it feels like little flowers coming up out of the earth after Diana's death."
Creator of the Emmy-winning show Peter Morgan had planned to make just five series of the drama, yet changed his mind in 2020 after meeting with the team behind the show.
"As we started to discuss the storylines for series five, it soon became clear that in order to do justice to the richness and complexity of the story we should go back to the original plan and do six seasons," he said in an official statement.
Elizabeth Debicki, who will reprise her role as Diana, says Morgan's vision for the final season was one she felt comfortable with...
“I think it's a really unique challenge as an actor, to portray those days," she explains. "I really just trusted in Peter's emotional blueprint that he created for us to follow. It's his interpretation and I think it made emotional sense to me, so I clung to that. Because, obviously, it's devastating and it's fraught and we can never know.”
Here's everything we know about The Crown season 6 so far...
The Crown season 6 release date
Netflix has confirmed the 10-part series will land on the streaming site in two parts.
The first part of season 6 will be made of four episodes and will be released worldwide on Thursday, 16 November 2023.
The second part will have six episodes that will be released worldwide on Thursday, 14 December 2023.
Netflix has released new posters for the launch of each part which you can see below...
The Crown season 6 plot
Season 6 covers events from 1997 through to 2005, broadly spanning the tenure of Tony Blair, who is played by Bertie Carvel.
Part 1 of season 6 is made up of four episodes which will depict a relationship blossoming between Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed before a fateful car journey has devastating consequences. Elizabeth Debicki will reprise her role as Princess Diana alongside Dominic West as Prince Charles, while also returning are Salim Daw (Mohamed Al Fayed) and Khalid Abdalla (Dodi Fayed).
“I adore this character," said Salim Daw when asked about Mohamed Al Fayed. "I love him so much and I enjoy portraying him because I love him. In this series, he is so human and he's so colourful. He's hard sometimes, very hard, funny, like a child - with his son he's sometimes very, very hard but he has plenty of love for his son and the audience will see that and will feel exactly what I'm talking about.”
Imelda Staunton is back as she continues her reign as Queen Elizabeth II alongside Jonathan Pryce as Prince Philip and Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret, and making their debuts are Rufus Kampa as Prince William and Fflyn Edwards as Prince Harry.
The first-part will see Prince Charles trying to forge a new life with Camilla Parker-Bowles, in the wake of Diana's death..
“I think he's got real sadness to Prince Charles and real compassion and what's great about The Crown is that you see these public figures in private," says Dominic West. "I suspect in private he's quite emotional, well that's the way I played him anyway… I think, hopefully, what comes out is compassionate but relatively well balanced. I talked to a lot of people who have met him because he's met a lot of people, he's met probably more than anyone except the Queen and Prince Philip. Almost everyone has extremely warm, kind things to say about him.”
The final chapter, released as season 6 part 2 in December, is told across six episodes in which Prince William tries to integrate back into life at Eton in the wake of his mother’s death, while the monarchy rides the wave of public opinion.
As the series comes to an end we will see the Queen reflect on the future of the monarchy as she reaches her Golden Jubilee, with the marriage of Charles and Camilla and the beginnings of a new Royal fairytale in William and Kate also featuring heavily.
For Part 2, taking on the roles of Prince William and Prince Harry will be Ed McVey and Luther Ford. Joining them will be Meg Bellamy as Kate Middleton. These will be debut roles for all three actors.
It has also been revealed that the show won't go beyond the early 2000s in the new series, meaning recent events such as Prince Andrew's fall from grace and Harry and Meghan's departure for the United States won't be shown.
Prince William's wedding to Kate Middleton, which took place in 2011, is also expected to come too late to be featured in the sixth series, yet there are plenty of powerful topics for The Crown season 6 to explore, not least the deaths of Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother, who both passed away in 2002.
Is The Crown season 6 the final season?
Season 6 will be the final season of The Crown and Imelda Staunton, who's played the Queen in seasons 5 and 6 says she's honoured to bring the story to a close.
“I've been living with her for a long time so, if anything, I felt more comfortable this time," she says. "I love her stillness and her ability to not be thrown by everything that must have constantly - throughout her whole life - gone on around her.”
The Crown season 6 cast
Most of the cast from season 5 will be returning for season 6 and the following stars will be stepping back into the world of the Windsors...
• Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth II
• Jonathan Pryce as Prince Philip
• Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret
• Jonny Lee Miller as John Major
• Dominic West as Charles, Prince of Wales
• Elizabeth Debicki as Diana, Princess of Wales
• Marcia Warren as Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother
• Olivia Williams as Camilla Parker Bowles
• Claudia Harrison as Princess Anne
• James Murray as Prince Andrew
• Khalid Abdalla as Dodi Fayed
• Bertie Carvel as Tony Blair
Yet there will be some new arrivals, with two actors set to replace Senan West as Prince William, who goes from a teenager to a young adult in this final run. Rufus Kampa will play William as a 15 year-old and as the series unfolds he will be replaced by Ed McVey. Ed posted an image of the two stars on his Instagram account in September 2022...
In an intriguing twist, Loose Women star Kelly Brook will also be cropping up in the sixth series, not as a cast member — but as a poster!
"I got an email from my agent. She said: 'We have had a picture clearance request for one of your images to be used on The Crown season six. It would be printed as a poster and it would be put in one of the character's dressing rooms,'" Brook told The Daily Star.
"That's definitely got to be a teenage boy's bedroom," Kelly added. "Could I be on the wall of Prince Harry or Prince William's bedroom at Buckingham Palace? Was I a pin-up for them back in the 90s? How old were they then? Well, this is incredible. Of course, I have said yes."
The Crown season 6 trailer
The full trailer has landed and it suggests the first part of this year's final season will be quite a ride.
We get a taste of Diana's final days as she and her new boyfriend Dodi Al-Fayed are hounded by the press and a scene that looks like her getting into that black Mercedes outside The Ritz on the night she died.
Intriguingly, the trailer also touches upon the aftermath of Diana's death and even includes a brief look at the controversial scenes in which the Princess "appears" to the Queen after her death. Blimey.
Who'll be playing Kate Middleton in The Crown season 6?
Ed McVey will be playing Prince William when he heads off for university, which is when he meets his future wife, Kate Middleton.
It's been revealed that newcomer Meg Bellamy will be playing Kate and we look forward to getting a glimpse of their first meeting at The University of St Andrews in Scotland.
We even got our first look at Meg, who'll star alongside Ed McVey as Prince William, when Netflix released first-look pictures of the couple on set recently.
Check out the first look at Prince William and Kate Middleton in The Crown.
How will The Crown end?
The Crown season 6 will draw to a conclusion sixty hours of television, and we now know that the series will end in 2005.
While we don't know the exact events the show will end on, it is likely that the new Royal fairytale in William and Kate will take center stage.
