The People's Princess

Diana Spencer grew up next door to the royal family, became Princess of Wales at twenty, and within a few years was the most photographed woman in the world.

This episode follows the whole arc: the fairytale wedding, a marriage that broke down in public, the 1995 Panorama interview and its famous line about Camilla Parker Bowles, and the hands she held on AIDS wards and in minefields.

It ends in a Paris tunnel in 1997, with the grief that followed, the inquest's verdict, the 2021 inquiry into how Panorama obtained the interview, and the strange way her story has since played out in the royal family.

Chapters

1. 0:08The People's Princess
2. 1:26Sandringham
3. 2:40A shy girl in London
4. 3:33The proposal
5. 4:48The fairytale wedding
6. 5:35Mother and Dianamania
7. 6:38Three people in a marriage
8. 7:48Panorama
9. 9:31Divorce
10. 10:09The hands she held
11. 11:42Summer 1997
12. 12:22Paris
13. 13:14A nation in mourning
14. 14:37Questions and answers
15. 15:58Who was she?

Sources

This episode was written from the public record. These are the sources behind the script; quotations and dates were checked against them.

• European Audiovisual Observatory (IRIS)The Dyson Report on the BBC's 1995 Panorama interview with the Princess of Wales · summary of the 2021 independent inquiry
• WikipediaDiana, Princess of Wales · life, marriage, charity work, divorce; dates and quotations
• WikipediaWedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer · the 1981 wedding
• WikipediaAn Interview with HRH The Princess of Wales · the Panorama interview, audience, Dyson inquiry, BBC apology
• WikipediaDeath of Diana, Princess of Wales · the crash, the inquest and its verdict
• WikipediaFuneral of Diana, Princess of Wales · the funeral and Earl Spencer's eulogy
• WikipediaPeople's princess · Tony Blair's statement, 31 August 1997
• WikipediaQueen Camilla · marriage in 2005, coronation in 2023
• Wikimedia Commons / Ronald Reagan Presidential LibraryPresident Reagan dancing with Princess Diana, White House, 9 November 1985 (photograph, public domain) · the photograph used on this page

Further reading

• Andrew Morton, Diana: Her True Story, in Her Own Words (1997 edition)
• Tina Brown, The Diana Chronicles (2007)
• Sally Bedell Smith, Diana in Search of Herself (1999)
• Lord Dyson, Independent Investigation into the BBC Panorama interview (2021)

Quoted words are read by SI voices from the published record; they are not archival recordings. Spotted an error? Email support@realtimecomms.co.uk and we'll correct the episode.