Josh O’Connor would “love to know” what King Charles thought of his work on The Crown.
The 34-year-old actor played the then-Prince of Wales in seasons three and four of the Netflix regal drama and though he has never met the monarch – who has been undergoing cancer treatment this year – he has a “great affection” for him. Asked if he’d heard what the king made of his turn in The Crown, Josh told: “No, I’m the same as you. I’d love to know. I’ve not heard a thing. I guess he’s been quite busy.
“My heart goes out to him in these times, but I’ve said it many times, I have great affection for him. I don’t know him [but] for the person who I’ve done lots of research on, like a weird stalker. He’s done an awful lot of good, in spite of a pretty bizarre life.” The Challengers actor admitted he initially “wasn’t over excited” about playing Charles because the idea was “very daunting”, but ultimately looked at the role like just another character, rather than a portrayal of a real person.
He told Vanity Fair magazine’s Hollywood issue: “These are characters. When I started working on Charles, I wasn’t overly excited at the idea of playing a real person. The prospect of playing someone who exists, particularly someone who is present in our national psyche, was very daunting.
Josh O’Connor has no idea what King Charles thinks about The Crown (
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Getty Images)
The King apparently believes the show is ‘too close to the bone’ (
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Scott A Garfitt/Invision/AP)
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“The one film that I referenced in my head, that I loved, was Todd Haynes on Bob Dylan [‘I’m Not There’]. The reason I love that movie was the conceit that we don’t know who Bob Dylan is. Joe’s Bob Dylan is going to be very different to my Bob Dylan, which is going to be very different to my dad’s Bob Dylan. Whatever he is, let’s put eight actors playing different aspects of Dylan and let’s present it. That’s filmmaking at its finest.
“So with Charles, it was like, I did the research, everything that helps put together a script, but I never see it as having played Prince Charles. I just don’t want to feel guilty. This is how I excuse myself.” The God’s Own Country actor previously admitted he felt “spiritually lost” after taking on the role of the Prince of Wales.
Speaking in a previous interview, O’Connor commented: “I felt spiritually lost, but it was a combination [of things]. At the time I was living in New York – I’m a country bumpkin who likes gardening, and that wasn’t really the best match. But we’d just come out of the pandemic, and The Crown had come out, and there’d been this big hoo-ha around The Crown, but I hadn’t really been outdoors to see what that was like and what the impact of that was. And suddenly, there I was walking down the street, and people were stopping me, and I hadn’t experienced that before to that level, that degree. So there was a kind of real shape-shifting going on and a real element of trying to understand where I sat in the world.”
However, Josh could be in luck as it was claimed in 2022 that the now King Charles had seen The Crown which focused on his relationship with Diana, Princess of Wales. Royal author Katie Nicholl said on True Royalty TV, she said: “[King] Charles watched it and stopped watching it at the last series because he felt that it got too close to the bone.” However, it’s claimed that the late Queen Elizabeth “was never going to watch any of those herself,” but members of her family had.
