Open the palace doors: The Crown season 6 is officially on! The fictional dramatization of the royal family intends to bow out with an exciting finale based on Queen Elizabeth II, Princess Diana, Prince Charles (now King Charles III), Prince William, Kate Middleton, Prince Harry and more — and we've got all the details.
Season 5 ended right before Princess Diana embarked on a summer whirlwind with her future boyfriend Dodi Al-Fayed. Queen Elizabeth puts Prince Charles in his place while wagging a metaphorical finger at his affair with Camilla Parker Bowles.
No doubt, there's still tons of ground left to cover. But is season 5 of The Crown its last season? If not, who will play Diana in season 6? To answer that and more, here's everything we know about The Crown season 6, including its cast, release date, episode news and more:
Will there be a season 6 of The Crown?
The show must go on. Netflix UK confirmed The Crown season 6 after previous plans that season 5 would conclude the royal drama. In July 2020, the streamer announced on Twitter: "News from the palace: we can confirm there will be a sixth (and final) season of @TheCrownNetflix, in addition to the previously announced five!"
The thread continued with a direct quote from showrunner Peter Morgan: "As we started to discuss the storylines for series 5, it soon became clear that in order to do justice to the richness and complexity of the story we should go back to the original plan and do six seasons.”
When is The Crown season 6 release date?
This marks The Crown's sixth and final season and as such, Netflix plans to let the anticipation mount by debuting in two parts before the end of the year: Part one's four episodes will premiere on November 16, 2023, while part two's final six episodes are set for December 14, 2023.
The Crown trailer dropped on October 26, showing that all eyes are on Elizabeth Debicki's Princess Diana. Set to the haunting tune of "Mad World," the footage speeds through her attempts to evade paparazzi and her foreboding trip to Paris with Dodi Fayed (Khalid Abdalla).
As shared on the series' official Instagram, the teaser starts and ends with Elizabeth re-creating one of the most famous photographs of Diana as she sits alone on the edge of a yacht's diving board, dressed in a blue swimsuit.
Who will be in The Crown season 6 cast?
All the key players of season 5 will carry out their legacy characters through the final season. That means Elizabeth Debicki will reprise her role as Princess Diana, acting out the final days leading up to the late royal's life.
- Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth
- Jonathan Pryce as Prince Phillip
- Lesley Manville as Princess Margaret
- Dominic West as Prince Charles
- Olivia Williams as Camilla Parker Bowles
On September 2, Deadline reported that, following an "exhaustive" casting process, The Crown found its Prince William and Kate Middleton. Rufus Kampa will embody the young prince at 15 in the wake of his mother's passing. Ed McVey will inherit the role of William when he enters his university years and courts Kate at St. Andrews in 2001.
Meanwhile, Meg Bellamy will play the future Duchess of Cambridge. Fflyn Edwards plays Prince and Luther Ford will both play young Prince Harry in part 1 and part 2, respectively.
Will The Crown season 6 focus on Princess Diana?
Season 6 stands to be all about Princess Diana's final days. "I don’t really understand how I ended up here," Elizabeth voices in the new clips. "Dashing around, and losing sight of myself in the process. I think that’s been the story of my whole life."
Another scene depicts the rooms of Balmoral Castle lighting up in the middle of the night with each telephone ring as William somberly looks on and Queen Elizabeth II keeps an eye on the television.
Other clips cut to a car surrounded by motorcyclists, then Diana and Dodi holding hands. It all mounts to reveal Charles, with a phone in hand, saying, "This is gonna be the biggest thing that any of us has ever seen."
Elizabeth previously revealed in a press statement that it was a "really unique challenge as an actor" to portray Diana's final days on screen. "I really just trusted in Peter [Morgan]'s emotional blueprint that he created for us to follow," she said. "It's his interpretation, and I think it made emotional sense to me, so I clung to that. Because, obviously, it's devastating and it's fraught, and we can never know."
As the next season inches toward the early 2000s, The Crown cast and crew told Deadline that they'd "been dreading" filming the events that inevitably led up to Princess Diana's tragic death. Showrunner Peter clarified to Variety that the infamous 1997 Paris car crash will not be shown on-screen. "Oh, God, we were never going to show the crash," he said. "Never."
Deadline also said that the show is slated to show Prince Charles arriving on a royal flight to bring Diana's body back home to London and perhaps, the funeral of the people's princess. Back in June, King Charles III's on-screen counterpart, Dominic West told Deadline the forthcoming season would be ”as tumultuous as it gets.”
Any other The Crown season 6 news?
As the series ends with this upcoming sixth installment, that means it won't cover any modern-day royals. Peter, himself, confirmed Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's relationship is off the table since he prefers to cover events 20 years in the past, as a rule.
"I just think you get so much more interesting [with time]. Meghan and Harry are in the middle of their journey, and I don’t know what their journey is or how it will end," he told The Hollywood Reporter. "One wishes some happiness, but I’m much more comfortable writing about things that happened at least 20 years ago."
He added: "That is enough time and enough distance to really understand something, to understand its role, to understand its position, to understand its relevance."
Jacqueline (she/her) was a commerce editor for Good Housekeeping from 2021 to 2024. Prior to joining GH, she was a style and beauty reviews fellow at Insider, testing viral trends, reviewing sustainable brands and more. She's a graduate of the University of Florida's School of Journalism, with a specialty in magazines and mass communication.
