‘Canny’ Princess Diana had ‘no regrets’ about her Panorama interview with Martin and it’s ‘offensive’ to say the ‘resourceful’ royal was was a ‘vulnerable’ victim, biographer Tina Brown claims
- Princess Diana’s biographer Tina Brown said had no regret about Panorama
- Brown, 68, said Diana was ‘pleased’ with the 1995 Martin Bashir interview
- Doesn’t like ‘pervasive narrative’ that Diana was vulnerable victim of media
- Said it is ‘offensive’ to portrait the ‘resourceful’ Diana as ‘foolish, duped child’
Princess Diana’s biographer Tina Brown has blasted the ‘offensive’ narrative that the late royal was manipulated into giving her Panorama interview with Martin Bashir.
Writing in Vanity Fair ahead of the release of her new royal book, The Palace Papers, Brown, 68, said the Princess of Wales was ‘pleased’ with her 1995 Panorama interview with the BBC presenter where she opened up about her marital issues with Prince Charles.
A 2021 inquiry found that the BBC fell short of ‘high standards of integrity and transparency’ over the interview, and that Bashir used deceitful methods in order to obtain an audience with Diana.
However, Tina, who penned The Diana Chronicles in 2007, said the Princess of Wales didn’t ‘have a bad word to say about Martin Bashir’ before her death in July 1997.
Princess Diana’s biographer Tina Brown, 68, said it is ‘offensive’ to say that the mother of Prince William and Prince Harry was a manipulated by Martin Bashir into giving her 1995 Panorama interview
‘I don’t subscribe to the now pervasive narrative that Diana was a vulnerable victim of media manipulation, a mere marionette tossed about by malign forces beyond her control,’ she said.
‘While strongly sympathetic to her sons’ pain, I find it offensive to present the canny, resourceful Diana as a woman of no agency, as either a foolish, duped child or the hapless casualty of malevolent muckrakers.’
The author went on to say that Gulu Lalvani, a wealthy Pakistani-born British entrepreneur who briefly dated Diana before her death, told her the late royal was happy with the Bashir interview.
Lalvani claimed she had no regrets about speaking to the BBC presenter because it served her purpose.
A 2021 inquiry by Lord Dyson found Bashir, pictured in the 1990s, had used ‘deceitful’ methods in order to secure the interview with the Princess of Wales
According to Brown, Diana wanted to be portrayed as a betrayed woman in the eyes of the British public before her divorce to Charles the following year.
The author recalled how opinion pools were 92 per cent in favour of Diana after the interview aired.
The author also claims that Diana breached her own privacy several times in order to make the men in her life jealous.
For instance, she claims it was Diana who tipped off the photographer Mario Brenna about her holiday in Corsica with her lover Dodi Fayed, to send a message to Hasnat Khan, a heart surgeon and the true object of her affection.
Lalvani also suggested that Diana used him to make Hasnat Khan jealous and potentially tipped off the paparazzi about their dates.
The Palace Papers, by Tina Brown, will be released next week on April 12
Brown, who met Diana in person in 1997, six weeks before her death, said she was impressed with how media-savvy the Princess was, and how she wooed her and Vogue Editor Anna Wintour, who was present at the same lunch meeting.
She said the royal sucked them in by talking about the loneliness she felt, before expertly switching to how she hoped to used her fame to promote the causes she cared about.
She went on to say that the camera was Diana’s weapon of choice, and that though it could not be denied that Princess Diana was hounded by the press, it was also true that she relished media attention.
After the 2021 Lord Dyson inquiry into the BBC’s handling of the 1995, Panorama interview, Prince William said in a statement
‘It is my view that the deceitful way the interview was obtained substantially influenced what my mother said.
‘The interview was a major contribution to making my parents’ relationship worse and has since hurt countless others.
‘It brings indescribable sadness to know that the BBC’s failures contributed significantly to her fear, paranoia, and isolation that I remember from those final years with her,’ he added.
Meanwhile, Prince Harry, 37, said the ‘ripple effect of a culture of exploitation and unethical practices’ ultimately took his mother’s life and is still ‘widespread today.’
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