Why Queen Elizabeth ‘banned’ this 1969 doc on the royal family
For a year in the 1960s, the royal family welcomed BBC cameras behind closed doors.
They soon regretted that decision.
The fly-on-the-wall doc, which was aptly titled “The Royal Family,” premiered in June 1969 and was so badly-received by the family — the monarch reportedly deemed it “too intrusive” — that it was supposedly banned from ever being broadcasted again.
The program aimed to show the daily lives of members of the royal family, including Prince Philip, the queen, who died at the age of 96 on Thursday, and their children Princess Anne, Prince Edward, Prince Andrew and King Charles III (then known as Prince Charles).
Other scenes portrayed the monarch at official engagements, her travels across the Commonwealth and her speeches to dignitaries.
It even included a private family moment showing them around the barbecue at Balmoral Castle, their vast country estate in Scotland.
The late Duke of Edinburgh — who died last April — commissioned the documentary to make the family seem less like an ancestral dynasty. The monarch was “initially uncertain” about letting the cameras into their homes, according to the Mirror.
The almost two-hour film was viewed by 30 million people in 1969 and 350 million people saw it all over the world.
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It wasn’t until 2021 that the movie was leaked on YouTube for fans and historians alike to analyze and view. It’s unknown who posted the long-lost footage.
Princess Anne, 72, previously discussed her discontent with the movie, saying: “I never liked the idea of the royal family film. I always thought it was a rotten idea. The attention that had been brought on one ever since one was a child, you just didn’t want anymore. The last thing you needed was greater access.”
Netflix’s “The Crown” even dramatized the creation of the ordeal during the Season 3 episode “Bubbikins.”
The episode dealt with the Firm creating the film as a public relations exercise in order to create more positive public opinion.
“We’re being filmed watching television. People might watch us watching television on their own television sets at home. This is really plumbing new depths of banality,” Helena Bonham Carter’s Princess Margaret noted on the show.
“I’d prefer to be in private and out of sight, hidden and out of view, for our own sanity and survival,” Olivia Colman’s Queen Elizabeth said in another shot. “The [royal family must use] mystery and protocol, not to keep us apart but to keep us alive.”
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