The Crown’s recreation of Princess Diana’s funeral has been blasted as "inhuman" and "hurtful" by outraged critics.
Makers of the Netflix show are reconstructing the heartbreaking service, held in 1997, in scenes filmed for its sixth and final season – which is expected to be aired next year.
The scenes feature actors playing Diana’s grieving children, princes William and Harry, who were aged 15 and 12 at the time, and were filmed in secrecy at a disused RAF base, according to reports.
The Crown’s recreation of the funeral shows the Royal Standard flag draped over Diana’s coffin on the gun carriage – as it was in real life.
The show’s production team will also be in Paris next week to recreate her final hours before the car crash that killed her at the age of 36, it has been reported.
According to The Mail on Sunday, those close to the Royal Family have blasted The Crown as "crude, cruel and totally insensitive, particularly in light of the Queen's recent death".
William Shawcross, the Queen Mother's official biographer, told the paper: “Nothing is sacred to [the writer of The Crown] Peter Morgan. He has made his republican sentiments and his contempt for our late Queen very clear.
“This is a vile series which lies to the public and has been incredibly hurtful to the Royal Family from the Queen and our new King down. Unlike any other family, they cannot sue.'
Author Angela Levin, who penned a biography about Prince Harry, also slammed The Crown’s reconstruction of Diana’s funeral.
She told The Mail on Sunday: “It's inhuman, beyond any sense of decency, and hurtful.
“When I first went to interview Harry, he asked if I had seen The Crown, which at the time was on Series 2. I said no and he said, 'Oh you must watch it. My only problem is they've got to stop before they get to me’.”
Both Prince William and Harry have spoken publicly of their anguish at having to follow their mother’s coffin for its final mile to Westminster Abbey in London in 1997.
Harry, 38, told biographer Ms Levin: “My mother had just died and I had to walk a long way behind her coffin, surrounded by thousands of people watching me while millions more did on television.
“I don't think any child should be asked to do that, under any circumstances. I don't think it would happen today. No child should lose their mother at such a young age and then have his grief observed by thousands of people.”
Speaking in 2017, William, 40, said: “It was one of the hardest things I've ever done – that walk. It felt like she was almost walking along beside us to get us through it.”
The funeral scenes are likely to cause more controversy for the show – which has recently come in for criticism from high-profile figures including Dame Judi Dench, who said it has begun to verge on “crude sensationalism”.
Meanwhile, Sir John Major is said to have described forthcoming scenes, which reportedly depict the King, then the Prince of Wales, plotting to oust the Queen, as “malicious nonsense”.
The latest trailer for The Crown features a disclaimer saying the series is a “fictional dramatisation” and “inspired by real events”.
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