David Farnor | On 16, Mar 2023

Netflix has announced the full cast for its upcoming film Scoop, which will relive the BBC’s 2019 interview with Prince Andrew.

Based on former Newsnight Producer Sam McAlister’s memoir Scoops: Behind The Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews, Scoop promises to give the inside track of the women that broke through the Buckingham Palace establishment to secure the scoop of the decade that led to the catastrophic fall from grace of The Queen’s ‘favourite son’. From navigating Palace vetoes, to breaking through to Prince Andrew’s inner circle, the high stakes negotiations and intensity of rehearsal – to the jaw dropping interview itself, Scoop is the insider account of the inner workings of the Palace and the BBC, spotlighting the journalists whose tenacity and guts broke through the highest of ceilings – and into the inner sanctum and calculations of a man with everything to lose.

Gillian Anderson (Sex Education, The Crown) will play Emily Maitlis, Newsnight’s former lead presenter who conducted the now infamous television exchange, with Rufus Sewell (The Diplomat, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel) playing Prince Andrew. The film co-stars Keeley Hawes (Bodyguard, It’s a Sin, Stonehouse) as Amanda Thirsk, former Private Secretary to Prince Andrew, and Billie Piper (I Hate Suzie, Collateral, Secret Diary of a Call Girl) as Sam McAlister, who negotiated and secured the bombshell booking.

They will be joined by Romola Garai (Becoming Elizabeth, The Hour, Miss Marx) as Esme Wren, then Newsnight Editor overseeing the historic interview, Lia Williams (The Capture, The Crown) as Fran Unsworth, then Director, News & Current Affairs for the BBC, Amanda Redman (Tommy Cooper: Not Like That Like This, New Tricks, The Good Karma Hospital) as Netta, mother of Sam McAlister, Connor Swindells (Sex Education, SAS: Rogue Heroes) as Jae Donnelly, the photographer who captured the infamous photograph of Prince Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein in Central Park, and Charity Wakefield (The Great, Wolf Hall) as HRH Princess Beatrice.

Philip Martin (The Crown, Prime Suspect, Wallander, Mo) directs the project, which is produced by Hilary Salmon and Radford Neville (Luther, The Night Of, MotherFatherSon) for The Lighthouse Film & Television, with Sanjay Singhal (Bin Laden: The Road to 9/11, Trouble at Topshop) for Voltage TV.

Martin says: “I’m thrilled to be directing this film for Netflix and – together with an extraordinary cast – to be bringing Sam McAlister’s revelatory insider’s account to the screen. Uptempo, immersive and cinematic, I want to put the audience inside the breath-taking sequence of events that led to the interview with Prince Andrew – to tell a story about a search for answers, in a world of speculation and varying recollections. It’s a film about power, privilege and differing perspectives and how – whether in glittering palaces or hi-tech newsrooms – we judge what’s true.”

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