When the party (prince) is over

Rufus Sewell on the subtle complexities of bringing Prince Andrew to life on screen in Scoop, the upcoming Netflix drama about his infamous Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis

- CLIFF JOANNOU

NINE YEARS AFTER Prince Andrew was photographed in New York with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, the royal joined Newsnight in 2019 for a 'car crash' interview of epic proportions.

In Scoop, Netflix brings to the screen the story behind the interview, with exceptional lead performances that mirror the awkward tension of the original Newsnight interview.

Rufus Sewell plays Andrew, while Gillian Anderson is BBC journalist Emily Maitlis, who challenges him on his dubious connections with child sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell as well as Epstein - whom the prince continued to visit despite Epstein's first conviction. It's a masterful pairing that sees Sewell and Anderson recreate in unnerving detail the interview that would see the prince step down from Royal duties.

You and Gillian Anderson inhabit your roles so powerfully. What were your thoughts when you were first offered the role?

For me, this was a chance to do the kind of thing that actually maybe people don't know that I can. And so, I said yes. Then I had a few months to think, 'What the fuck have I just said yes to,' because I sat down to look at the interview again, which I remembered watching at the time, and realised that though I felt I knew how I could inhabit it, it wasn't going to do itself. I had to do a lot of work to look like Andrew, sound like him and get behind the thoughts and gestures, from my perspective. It could only ever be my perspective.

I obsessed about the interview, and I worked on it and worked on it. I would physically disguise myself even to work on it on my own, so I could suspend disbelief about myself. I'd dull down my eyebrows and grease my hair and I'd pad myself out, and just walk around in the shape of it. Slowly, it started to get closer and closer to something that felt right. And I did that work for a very, very long time.