Princess Beatrice 'Game Changer' In Prince Andrew BBC Interview, Helped Make It Happen: Sam McAlister
Princess Beatrice was the "game changer" who helped convince Prince Andrew to participate in what would later turn out to be a disastrous interview with BBC's "Newsnight," according to the producer who secured the sit-down.
The Duke of York's infamous 2019 sit-down with journalist Emily Maitlis returned to the headlines recently after the release of Netflix's "Scoop," which dramatizes the events leading up to the "Newsnight" interview.
In the drama, Princess Beatrice (played by Charity Wakefield) joined a meeting between her father Prince Andrew (Rufus Sewell), his chief of staff Amanda Thirsk (Keeley Hawes), Maitlis (Gillian Anderson) and then-"Newsnight" producer Sam McAlister (Billie Piper) in Buckingham Palace to negotiate the interview.
McAlister -- whose book "Scoops" was used as the basis for the film -- recently revealed on the Daily Mail's "The Crown: Fact or Fiction" podcast that Princess Beatrice's appearance at the meeting caught them off guard.
"So when you arrive to find out that he's brought a surprise guest, Princess Beatrice, [that's] a bigger shock," McAlister explained. "And so I really felt that was a massively seismic moment."
According to the ex-BBC producer, Princess Beatrice -- who she described as "very friendly," "very cool," and "very clever" -- helped make the interview happen.
"My calculation was, in those three seconds that I had to think about it, she is the game changer because if we alienate her, then when she's theoretically asked about this option, if she is very negative then that's going to end it," McAlister said on the podcast.
McAlister said she believes the princess "loves her father" and was "looking out for" Prince Andrew during the meeting but could not have predicted the fallout of the interview.
During an interview with People earlier this month, McAlister described Princess Beatrice's surprise participation as the "curveball of curveballs."
She said she initially thought that Prince Andrew had brought along a lawyer or a communications aide, so she was shocked when the unexpected guest turned out to be his daughter, whom he shares with ex-wife Sarah Ferguson.
"So, to have prepared to do this incredibly important negotiation and then have to do it on these sensitive and difficult subjects in front of his young daughter really was taking an already extraordinary experience to the next level," the producer explained.
"Nothing prepares you for a professional experience like that. And even though it was something that I like to think I was pretty adept at, we really were all out of our depth in Buckingham Palace, sitting just across from him and his daughter," McAlister recalled.
The November 2019 interview marked the first time Prince Andrew spoke publicly about his friendship with Epstein, who died in prison that August while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
During his sit-down with Maitlis at Buckingham Palace, the Duke of York claimed that he only stayed at the disgraced financier's home because it was a "convenient place to stay" and that he had "no recollection" of ever meeting Virginia Giuffre.
Giuffre alleged that Epstein coerced her into having sex with Prince Andrew several times when she was 17.
But Prince Andrew claimed that he could not have had sex with Giuffre because he was at home with Princess Beatrice after a pizza outing.
The interview ended up sparking a huge backlash against Prince Andrew, who then announced he was stepping back from royal duties soon after it aired.
Queen Elizabeth II stripped her second son of his royal patronages and military titles in 2022 just before he was set to face a civil trial in New York over Giuffre's allegations.
Giuffre's lawsuit was ultimately dismissed after she and Prince Andrew reached an out-of-court settlement for an undisclosed sum.
"Scoop" is available to stream on Netflix.
