25 years before Meghan, Princess Diana's shocking interview shook the English monarchy

The walls of Buckingham are still shaking after the explosive confessions of Harry and Meghan broadcast on American television on Sunday.

The 39-year-old former Métis actress accused the royal entourage of racism and confessed to having suicidal thoughts.

As for Charles' youngest son, he considered that his father and his brother were "prisoners" of the monarchical institution, from which he freed himself a year ago.

Prince William also reacted this Thursday against the accusations made by Harry and Meghan: "We are not at all a racist family," he said during a visit to a school in the east of London.

This storm, comparable to the earthquake of 1936 (the abdication of King Edward VIII) or the crisis caused by the death of Diana in 1997, forced Queen Elizabeth II to come out of her royal silence, by way of a press release.

Like twenty-five years ago, after another vitriolic interview ...

The big unpacking

After the acrobats of Cirque du Soleil and the frenzied tap dancing of the Irish of Riverdance, the evening ends at the Dominion Theater in London.

Cliff Richard has the honor of closing the annual Royal Variety gala in the presence of Elizabeth II, who has hardly ever missed this meeting since 1945. "Keep smiling, keep shining", coo 'English Elvis in front of a VIP audience.

In the front row, the queen "smiles" and "shines".

However, the heart is not there.

This Monday, November 20, 1995, she knows very well that the real show is not in the theater but on television.

Twenty-three million of his subjects, connected to the BBC1, attended an incredible

royal

soap

that evening

.

Faced with journalist Martin Bashir, Diana unwraps everything: her marital despair, the icy distance from Prince Charles, his binges and self-harm, depression, morbid thoughts, but also her secret adventure with Major James Hewitt, whom she "adored" ...

For an hour, she goes on confessing in a tired voice, and ends up putting the laughers on her side by evoking Camilla, the lifelong rival, who stole her happiness: “Well, there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a little overcrowded, ”she says with a sad smile where each viewer guesses years of humiliation.

A whole country, stunned, holds its breath.

Even the

jelly (Editor's note: jelly)

freezes in the plates ...

An interview recorded at night and secretly edited

It must be said that his score is perfect.

"Cocker Spaniel" gaze from below, head slightly tilted like a Virgin and Child, dark and sober suit on a white T-shirt, haggard cheeks delicately pink with blush ... If the wounded dignity had a face, it would have the features of this 34-year-old princess, abused by this loving Windsor family as a Westminster gargoyle.

How could such a thing happen?

Despite the ears on the alert for her herd of advisers, Elizabeth II was only warned in the morning, like everyone else.

Neither the boss of the BBC, a familiar with Buckingham, nor Diana's private secretary, have been kept informed.

God only knows how this cunning Martin Bashir landed his royal scoop.

Elizabeth II, here alongside Princess Diana in May 1987 at a polo match, was not made aware of the interview's existence until the morning of the broadcast./DAVID LEVENSON / Getty Images / AFP  

Two weeks before the broadcast of the program "Panorama", his small team had waited for the staff to leave their service to slip, at nightfall, in Kensington Palace.

Questions and answers had been rehearsed before filming.

For more confidentiality, the interview will not be mounted on the BBC but in a hotel in Eastbourne, a seaside resort on the south coast ... sheltered from the London winds.

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Poor Robert Fellowes.

When the queen returns to her apartments, it is this somewhat staid advisor - also Diana's brother-in-law - who is responsible for giving her the report of the show.

One can easily imagine the disgust of this queen from another time, who adopted the Windsor motto

"Never complain, never explain".

Charles' abilities questioned, the queen retaliates

Like any Briton, she is fully aware of the sinking of the couple called to reign.

In the summer of 1992, Andrew Morton's shock book, secretly fed by Diana, exposed the disaster of a separation chronicled daily by the tabloids.

But at the end of the interview, Lady Di, inflexible, commits a crime of lese-majesté by declaring that she wants to "be the queen in the hearts of the English".

More seriously still, she questions Charles's ability to succeed his mother: “because I know his personality, I think that being a king would expose him to enormous constraints, and I don't know if he could. adapt to it ”, she scolds, calling for a monarchy“ more modern, more in contact with the people ”.

She even suggests that the throne would be better occupied by her eldest son William… A blow from Trafalgar, unacceptable to Elizabeth.

The rebellious princess must be brought into line.

VIDEO.

Lady Di: the Flame became a memorial stele for the princess

The next morning, the fate of the “marriage of the century” is sealed.

Along with the soothing press release that split the palace, the queen writes to the Prime Minister, John Major, to tell him that the divorce - which Diana opposes - is now inevitable.

It will be pronounced on August 28, 1996. One year before the ultimate crash of this cursed wedding, in Paris, under the Alma bridge.

A manipulated princess?

A question still remains open about this interview, ultimately fraught with consequences for the couple Charles and Diana, and the Windsors.

Twenty-five years after this explosion on the BBC screens, the brother of the late princess accused Martin Bashir of forging documents to convince her to be interviewed.

Charles Spencer claims the reporter showed him bank statements proving two people at court were paid by security services to spy on his sister.

Fakes, we learned later.

"If I hadn't seen these readings, I would never have introduced Bashir to my sister," he wrote in a November letter to the BBC.

Bashir's conduct, propelled by this scoop towards an international career, would it have been dishonest?

The British channel announced in the wake of the opening of an independent investigation led by John Dyson, a former judge of the Supreme Court.

It took no less than a highly respected lawyer to oversee this royal affair.