On 9 October, Netflix announced the first half of the sixth season of The Crown on Twitter by sharing a single image: Elizabeth Debicki sitting on a diving board in a turquoise swimsuit, with her back to the camera as she stares out into the sea. With over 2.6 million views, it’s a visual that resonated with many – and not just because of the Netflix marketing department’s graphic design skills.
There are tens of thousands of photos of Princess Diana in existence. A handful of them, including the royal in front of the Taj Mahal and wearing the little black “revenge dress”, are considered iconic. There is, however, perhaps only one of those legendary images that could be considered harrowing.
On 24 August 1997 – a week before her tragic death in Paris – paparazzi captured Princess Diana sitting on the diving board upon Mohamed Al-Fayed’s private yacht “Jonikal” off the coast of Portofino. What was intended to be a private vacation quickly turned into a media circus after the British tabloids published photos of her kissing Al-Fayed’s son, Dodi, on board. Bids for those photos went up to £500,000. Although Diana always had a de-facto bounty on her head, it was now at an eye-watering and dangerous sum – especially as rumours that the Princess was pregnant, or engaged, began to swirl.
As a result, paparazzi swarmed her the entire trip, desperate to capture the Princess and her new love interest. One of those photos? Diana, solo, on a diving board. Even far off shore, she could be tracked down by a camera lens – and, therefore, never alone.
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Once she arrived in Paris, an accessible and busy metropolis, this clamour to take her photograph reached a fever pitch. On 31 August, while being chased by paparazzi on motorbikes, the car Diana was being driven in by an intoxicated driver crashed in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel. According to witness testimony, paparazzi continued to take photos as the couple lay dying.
Over two decades after her death, the haunting photo of her on the diving board is still seared into our consciousness: a symbol of Diana’s glamour, her isolation, and the relentless pursuit of her likeness. It was used for the 2013 poster of the biopic Diana, starring Naomi Watts, and inspired SZA’s cover art for her album SOS. Now, Peter Morgan and The Crown are just the latest to have harnessed its emotional power.
While it’s unclear how much the photo will play a role in the upcoming season, the show will cover Diana’s final days – bringing the tragic story of the final weeks of Diana’s life front and centre once again.
