As the saying goes, ‘hell hath no fury like a woman scorned!’ And Princess Diana certainly unleashed her wrath when she sat down with the BBC’s Martin Bashir for an explosive interview in 1995.
WATCH BELOW: Scared Diana’s “tense” interview with Charles
The interview – which was watched by 23 million people and is currently under inquiry by the BBC amid allegations Diana was tricked into talking through fraudulent documents – contained bombshell after bombshell as Diana discussed the breakdown of her marriage, admitted to an affair with James Hewitt and detailed her battle with bulimia and self-harm.
She also painted the royal family as cold and uncaring, and alluded that she hope William would succeed the Queen as King, rather than his father.
The revelation that Charles had been unfaithful was nothing new.
Charles himself had admitted it a year earlier (see below).
At the time, the couple were separated, although had not divorced, a move that Diana said she desperately wanted to avoid.
“There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded,” Diana famously told Bashir, a line that made headlines around the world.
Diana also revealed that Charles had renewed his relationship with Camilla as far back as 1986, but that she “wasn’t in a position to do anything about it.”
She then blamed the affair on contributing to her low self-esteem and “rampant” bulimia.
“If you can have rampant bulimia, and just a feeling of being no good at anything and being useless and hopeless and failed in every direction.
“It was a symptom of what was going on in my marriage. I was crying out for help, but giving the wrong signals, and people were using my bulimia as a coat on a hanger. They decided that was the problem: Diana was unstable,” she said.
“The cause was the situation where my husband and I had to keep everything together because we didn’t want to disappoint the public, and yet obviously there was a lot of anxiety going on within our four walls.”
A brutally candid Di also revealed that following the birth of Prince William she suffered from post-natal depression and that neither Charles or the rest of the royal family were sympathetic, explaining maybe she was “the first person to ever be in this family who ever had depression or was ever openly tearful”.
The lack of compassion led to princess deliberately injuring herself, she revealed.
“When no one listens to you, or you feel no one’s listening to you, all sorts of things start to happen,” she said.
“For instance, you had so much pain inside yourself that you try and hurt yourself on the outside because you want help, it it’s the wrong help you’re asking for. People see it as a crying wolf or attention seeking, and they think because your in the media all the time you’ve got enough attention, inverted commas.
“But I was actually crying out because I wanted to get better in order to go forward and continue my duty and my role as a wife, mother, Prince of Wales. So yes, I did inflict upon myself. I didn’t like myself. I was ashamed because I couldn’t cope with the pressures.”
In another explosive revelation, Diana also confirmed rumours that she’d encouraged friends to speak with biographer Andrew Morton for his book Diana: Her True Story. [Following her death in 1997, the author revealed that he had spoken directly with the Princess].
“I was at the end of my tether. I was desperate. I think I was so fed up with being seen as someone who was a basket-case, because I am a very strong person and I know that causes complication in the system that I live in.”
“I think [the royal family] where shocked and horrified and very disappointed.”
The interview was seen by the royal family as the ultimate betrayal, and as the final straw for the monarch. A month after it aired, Buckingham Palace confirmed that the Queen has sent Charles and Diana a letter ordering them to divorce.
As part of the divorce settlement, Diana was stripped of her HRH title. Several of Diana’s staff, including her press secretary Patrick Jephson also quit after the interview aired.
“The Queen finally lost patience. This public mud-slinging wasn’t just harming to the monarchy, it was damaging for the young princes,” says royal author Penny Junor of the aftermath.
Charles admits he was unfaithful
Princess Diana wasn’t the only one to drop a bombshell! In 1994, Charles incensed the royal family – and in particular Prince Philip – after admitting he’d been unfaithful while married to Diana.
At the time, Charles and Diana were still married, although they had been separated for two years.
During the interview, presenter Jonathan Dimbleby asked the future heir about rumours of infidelity.
“Did you try to be faithful and honourable to you wife when you took on the vow of marriage,” he asked.
“Yes. Absolutely,” replied Charles.
“And you were?” asks the reporter.
“Yes. Until it became irretrievably broken down, us both having tried,” responds Charles.
The confession sent shockwaves through the palace and did little to restore the prince’s reputation.
In a letter written by Charles to friend Marjorie Dawson, Charles admitted that the shock confession was “living dangerously”.
“I was enormously grateful for your very kind letter following the television programme the other day,” Charles wrote. “I suspect it was what it called ‘living dangerously’, but it seems difficult to avoid nowadays!”
Royal author Penny Junor says many inside Buckingham Palace thought that Charles’ honesty would have long-lasting ramifications.
“The Duke of Edinburgh was incensed, the rest of the family flabbergasted, the queen’s advisers and courtiers stunned, the prince’s friends appalled,” she writes in her book The Firm, The Troubled Life of the House of Windsor.
“Many regarded as the worst mistake of his life,” she adds. “At the time many people thought it might cost him the throne.”
Andrew’s ‘car crash’ tell-all
It was supposed to finally him of any impropriety over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, but instead Prince Andrew’s interview with Newsweek quickly became a PR nightmare that saw the Duke of York dismissed from his royal duties.
For years, Andrew had been dogged by his friendship with the accused sex trafficker and allegations that he’d had sex several times with then 17-year-old Virginia Roberts-Giuffre, who says she was one of Epstein’s sex slaves.
Following Epstein’s suicide in 2019, the prince was also accused of avoiding the FBI who wanted to question Andrew over his former friend’s activities.
Widely dubbed a ‘car crash’ by royal commentators and PR experts, Andrew failed to hose down any of the criticism labelled against him and showed an astounding lack of compassion for Epstein’s victims.
“That was a plane crashing into an oil tanker, causing a tsunami, triggering a nuclear explosion bad,” royal expert Charlie Proctor told the Guardian newspaper.
In the 50-minute-long interview Andrew said he didn’t regret his decades-long friendship with the Epstein, which continued even after the billionaire was jailed for sex offences in 2010.
“The people that I met and the opportunities I was given to learn, either by him or because of him, were very useful,” Andrew said of the friendship.
When asked why he continued to see Epstein following his release from jail, Andrew explained that staying at Epstein’s house “was definitely the wrong thing to do … But at the time I felt it was the honourable and right thing to do and I admit fully that my judgment was probably coloured by my tendency to be too honourable but that’s just the way it is.”
And of the allegations of underage sex with Roberts-Giuffre?
“I have no recollection of ever meeting this lady, none whatsoever,” said Andrew, arguing that a a photo of him with his arm around his accuser was fake.
“Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored but I don’t recollect that photograph ever being taken,” he claimed.
The Duke claimed that on the day he was supposed to have had sex with his accuser, he was at a Pizza Express restaurant with daughter Beatrice and refuted a description by Roberts-Giuffre that he had been sweating while dancing at a London nightclub.
“There’s a slight problem with, with, with the sweating,” he argued. “Because I had a particular medical condition, which is that I don’t sweat, or I didn’t sweat at the time… because I had suffered what I would describe as an overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War when I was shot at.”
Many of Andrews claims were widely criticised and a palace source told The Sunday Times the interview would “go down as one of the single worst PR moved in recent history,” and one that would have serious implications for the royal family.
“This has damaged the royal family,” royal commentator Peter Hunt told CNN, adding that the Duke was “toxifying the House of Windsor”.
“Many people’s judgement has been called into question over this, not least the Queen for allowing the interview to take place.”
Just days after the interview aired, Prince Andrew announced that he was stepping down from royal duties as a result of the Epstein saga.
“It has become clear to me that over the past few days that my association with Jeffrey Epstein has become a major disruption to my family’s work and the valuable work going on in the many organisations and charities that I am proud to support,” the statement read.
“Therefore I have asked Her Majesty if I can step back from public duties for the foreseeable future, and she has given her permission.”
Phillip puts his foot in it
In 1996, following the Dunblane school shooting in which 16 children and a teacher were killed, Prince Philip was asked a question about an impending gun control regulation during an interview with the BBC.
His response caused outrage, as he expressed his doubts that change was necessary, and likening gun control to his favourite sport, cricket.
“If a cricketer, for instance, suddenly decided to go into a school and batter a lot of people to death with a cricket bat, which he could do very easily… I mean are you going to ban cricket bats?”
While Philip said that he sympathised with the families of those killed in the mass shooting, the duke said he didn’t believe that a ban on handguns was a rational response.
“I can’t believe that the members of shooting clubs are any more dangerous than members of a squash club or a golf club or anything else.”
Philip’s comments were labelled “crass” and “insensitive” from parents of the slain children and Members of Parliament.
Buckingham Palace quickly moved to hosed down the remarks, issuing a statement apologising for the remarks.
“The prince had no intention whatsoever of causing offense or distress to anyone, and he is sorry if he has done so,” the statement read.
“Prince Philip made absolutely clear… his horror at the incident… his remarks were made in the course of a wide-ranging interview about various aspects of sport and should be seen in that context.”
A royal smackdown as a rift between siblings is confirmed
If the royal motto is ‘never complain, never explain’, someone forgot to tell Meghan Markle.
In the lead up to their spectacular split from the firm, Meghan revealed her struggle as a new mum under the spotlight.
During an interview for a documentary on their royal tour in Africa, an emotional Meghan was asked about her physical and mental health.
“Look, any woman, especially when they’re pregnant, you’re really vulnerable, and so that was made really challenging…“And especially as a woman, it’s really – it’s a lot. So you add this on top of just trying to be a new mom or trying to be a newlywed, it’s…”
“Yeah, and also, I thank you for asking, because not many people have asked if I’m okay. But it’s a very real thing to be going through behind the scenes.
“I really tried to adopt this British sensibility of a ‘stiff upper lip’ – I really tried, but I think that what that does internally is probably really damaging.”
For many royal commentators Meghan’s ‘stiff upper lip’ comment was a direct attack on the royal family who are known for hiding their emotions.
“This comment by Meghan could, however, been seen as a swipe at the traditional royal way of doing thing,” royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams told the Express newspaper.
The documentary also raised eyebrows for a candid interview with Prince Harry, in which he seemed to all-but-confirm his falling with Prince William.
Rumours that the brothers had drifted apart had been circulating for months.
“We are certainly on different paths at the moment, but I will always be there for him, and I know he will always be there for me,” Harry responded when asked about the rumoured rift.
“I love him dearly and you know, the majority of the stuff is probably – well, the majority of the stuff is created out of nothing. But as brothers, you have good days and you have bad days.”
Anne storms out!
The Princess Royal is renowned for her brusque manner, but in 2013 she stormed out of an interview while promoting the charity Save the Children, for which she is patron, with British tabloid the Daily Mail.
Photographer Kent Gavin recalled the incident in the documentary Royalty Close Up: The Photography of Kent Gavin.
“I’d just got back from Africa on a two-and-a-half week tour with her and she never got anywhere near picking up babies, like Princess Diana did,” says Giles.
So, while looking through a list of questions from the reporter, Giles says he thought “there’s something missing here…”
“We do need to ask why she never picked up a baby, because that picture would go round the world as much the same as Diana’s used to do.”
Naturally, the reporter was reluctant to ask such a prickly question, so Giles suggested that he throw it in at the end of the interview.
After making his way through the list of questions, the reporter then said, “Can I just ask you one more question?”
“Is there a reason you don’t pick up any of these children when you’re on tours?”
According to the photographer, Anne then turned and looked directly at him.
“He asked you to say that, didn’t he?
“I don’t do things like that, like other members of the family do. And he knows that!”
The Princess Royal then proceeded to storm out of the room in a huff.
Fergie’s Bizarre Aussie Interview
Anne is not the only royal to storm out of an interview after taking offence during a line of questioning.
In 2011, Sarah Ferguson abruptly ended a sit-down interview with Australia’s 60 Minutes after reporter Michael Usher bought up her News of the World bribery sting.
During the interview, Usher replayed the video of the undercover sting, before asking the Duchess if she only returned the money after “the scandal broke.”
“I knew it was a scandal not once it broke Michael – but don’t try and trick me now because I’m not going to play this game,” she responds, before asking the camera crew to delete the footage.
Fergie eventually walked out of the interview after Usher asked if the experience had been a wake-up call, with her manager in Australia John Scott accusing the program of an “ambush”.
“She did walk out when she was ambushed – no this was entrapment – but after cooling down she said to me, ‘F… them, lets do this’ and she did,” Scott told the Daily Telegraph, ‘but it was a banal interview and her demeanour reflected that.”
“It was the largest train wreck interview I’ve ever done,” Usher told Triple M radio in the wake of Prince Andrew’s explosive interview, adding that the experience was “absolutely horrendous.”
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