Jonathan Pryce defends The Crown over viewer complaints

What did you miss?

Jonathan Pryce has defended The Crown over backlash from viewers, saying complaints come from a “small minority”.

The Netflix series about the Royal Family has come under fire over the years, with suggestions that some of the events it looks at are too recent and over it being a fictional take on historic events, rather than being fact.

But the actor, who plays Prince Philip in the series, has said complaints come from a small sector. Pryce opened up during an appearance on Good Morning Britain, after host Ben Shephard quizzed him about the complaints.

What, how and why?

“We have heard all those arguments but they come a very, quite a small minority of people, because the viewing figures, they keep growing all the time,” he said. “It is still the number one TV show in the world. They gathered Golden Globes nominations, we have broken records for every series it has been nominated.”

Pryce said when the events of The Crown started, he was six and that it was history as opposed to the present day. “Now it’s much closer to people’s living memories, it’s a little, it becomes a bit more sensitive to people’s sensibilities about what happened at the time,” he explained.

The sixth series of the drama covers Princess Diana's death following a car accident in Paris in 1997, and there has been a lot of talk about those scenes and others in which the late royal appears as a ghostly presence.

But the actor said Diana scenes have been handled well. “The four episodes that have been on now concerning Diana mostly, I think it has been dealt with in an extraordinarily respectful and sincere way,” he said. “It’s been great.”

What else did Jonathan Pryce say?

Pryce also talked about how he prepared to play Prince Phillip, sharing that he watched a lot of footage of the royal, who died in 2021. “I looked at a lot of YouTube videos,” he said.

“I’d never heard him speak really so it was finding a way that he spoke, finding a way that he walked, how he behaved in public… there is a huge research team behind The Crown as well.”

The actor, 76, said while he does not usually watch himself on screen, he does watch the royal drama. “I find it quite easy to watch The Crown because I don’t recognise myself at all,” he said. I see myself about 40, 45, and I see this old geezer on screen there, I don’t recognise him!”

Read more: The Crown

• How critics have soured on The Crown over the years

• The Crown stars Ed McVey and Meg Bellamy wanted to give ‘truthful’ portrayals of Prince William and Kate Middleton

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