A very royal scandal
Five years on from Prince Andrew’s catastrophic Newsnight interview, a new drama reveals the inside story of the female team of journalists who landed the ‘scoop of the decade’
How long did it take to persuade Prince Andrew it would be a good idea to explain himself to Emily Maitlis in his (now infamous) 2019 Newsnight interview? According to Sam Mcalister, the ‘booker extraordinaire’ who sealed the deal for the senior royal’s grilling over his relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, it took more than a year of high-stakes negotiations with Buckingham Palace to secure a first meeting with the prince. It was then that Mcalister convinced him to tell his side of the story. ‘I knew right then that it wasn’t going to go well,’ she recalls, ‘but even I couldn’t have predicted how exceptionally badly it would go.’
Mcalister went on to unpick the scandal in her 2022 book, Scoops: Behind The Scenes Of The BBC’S Most Shocking Interviews. This month, a new Netflix drama starring Gillian Anderson as Maitlis, Rufus Sewell as Prince Andrew, Billie Piper as Mcalister and Romola Garai as Newsnight’s then first female editor, Esme Wren, revisits that account, with Mcalister serving as executive producer.
Among the other real-life figures portrayed in the film are Amanda Thirsk, Prince Andrew’s then private secretary who allegedly encouraged him to do the interview, and Princess Beatrice, who accompanied her father at the initial briefing (played by Keeley Hawes and Charity Wakefield respectively). ‘If you think you’ve seen it all, this film will tell you that you’ve only witnessed 5% of the story,’ reveals Mcalister, while adding that she felt a ‘huge responsibility’ to represent everyone involved fairly.
As for the casting of Piper in her own image, she couldn’t be more delighted. ‘It’s completely surreal to watch, but Billie is me,’ Mcalister laughs. ‘Right down to my bouncy walk fuelled by 25 Starbucks coffees, to the very distinctive high-street wardrobe of fake leather and snakeskin boots.’
Watch Scoop on Netflix from 5th April