Taking the next giant leap in its quest to produce original content, Netflix went on to receive widespread acclaim as well as continued spotlight for The Crown series. Revolving around the life of the late Queen Elizabeth II, depicting her life from 1947 to 2005, the show brought back to focus the tumultuous times and hardships that come with being a working royal of the British throne.
The Peter Morgan brainchild also came across as the fuel for numerous debates with its exploration of a storyline arc involving Princess Diana.
Becoming the centerpiece of the narrative, the late royal found Emma Corrin and Elizabeth Debicki as the two actresses responsible for maintaining her on-screen posthumous accuracy, showcasing different stages of her life. However, the senior actress of the two had almost lost out on hope of ever landing a role thanks to her counterpart.
Elizabeth Debicki gave up on The Crown after Emma Corrin
The real-life saga involving Princess Diana and her time within the royal family ignited a fierce division of public opinion and scrutiny from critics way back in the ‘90s. Remarkably, Emma Corrin and Elizabeth Debicki managed to bring back that same riveting tension on-screen with The Crown, except that the latter did not expect to get the role, especially after the former’s casting in season 4, as she revealed to them in a candid discussion on the June issue of Variety’s Actors on Actors.
After losing out on an audition for an undisclosed role in a very early season of The Crown, Debicki’s agents had kept her in the loop regarding a possible Princess Diana role coming to her. However, when she learned that Corrin was to officially star in that very role, she gave up on her “dream”.
I guess they must have felt something Diana in it, which is hilarious because I wasn’t playing an English person even. The funny thing is, for five or six years, I continued to watch “The Crown” religiously, and I would think, ‘I wonder if that’s ever going to come around.’ And when you were cast, I thought, ‘Well, it was a nice dream.’
Debicki also added that,
And not only that, I thought, ‘Well, you’re perfect.’ And I was also like, ‘Who is this creature?’ So funnily enough, I sort of gave up the thing when you appeared.
The Tenet actress, however, did not have any idea that further seasons beyond the fourth were planned and that she might still get the role to portray a senior version of the character, which is precisely what happened.
Debicki’s version of the friendly and charismatic royal in the pivotal stages of her life, from a wedding separation to controversy and an unfortunate death, made her stand at the receiving end of critical acclaim.
The two Princess Diana actresses shared a similar fate
Emma Corrin and Elizabeth Debicki had both originally auditioned for smaller roles early on in the show’s history, but fate had planned differently for them. On her side of the story, the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 actress recalled how she appeared for a somewhat big role but crashed out as she “was almost completely physically wrong for it”.
Refusing to disclose the identity of her earlier character, she simply characterized it as:
You know how in The Crown, there are cameos that pop up and the whole episode becomes about that person that might only appear for one or two?
Sharing their side of the story, Corrin, however, did disclose that they originally auditioned for a “chambermaid — a real ‘Tree No. 2’ role,” which Debicki corrected as being called “Lady-in-waiting”. Yet, they ended up assisting with chemistry reads for the part of Camilla Bowles. Regardless, their potential finally worked in their favor, and has now paved the way to play a part in even bigger franchises than The Crown.
Watch The Crown on Netflix.
