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'The Crown' Took Some Liberties With Its Depiction of Michael Shea, the Palace Press Secretary

'The Crown' Took Some Liberties With Its Depiction of Michael Shea, the Palace Press Secretary

From Harper's BAZAAR

After watching the newest season of The Crown, I can safely scratch off another idea from my list of potential dream jobs: “press secretary to the Queen of England.” I’d rather not be fired for doing what Queen Elizabeth asks me to do, which is exactly what happens to poor Michael Shea in Episode 8, titled “48:1.” When Her Majesty decides to break royal protocol by expressing an opinion about Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s policies, she asks Shea to leak those opinions to the press. Apparently, she thinks it might not be such a bad thing for the world to know how she feels about Thatcher’s “uncaring” actions, including (but not limited to) not supporting sanctions on South Africa in the throes of apartheid.

Problem is, the queen’s not allowed to express political opinions under Britain’s constitution. So when in 1986 Shea slips those scandalous comments to the Sunday Times, all hell breaks loose.

Thatcher was understandably surprised by the article, but the one who ended up facing the most turmoil for the scandal was Shea himself. Here’s the real story—and what happened to Shea after he left Buckingham Palace for good.

Photo credit: Tim Graham - Getty Images
Photo credit: Tim Graham - Getty Images

Shea denied ever leaking the queen’s opinions.

Although The Crown makes it look as though Shea was the obvious culprit for the palace leak, the actual events were less cut-and-dry. As The Guardian explained in its obituary of Shea, who died in 2009, the then-press secretary admitted to speaking with a Sunday Times reporter but denied being the source who outed the queen’s political leanings. It’s also possible (if not likely) that Shea was “sympathetically interpreting” the queen’s views to align with his own ideologies, rather than conveying the queen’s direct order.

Here’s where Netflix likely takes a few leaps. Shea was identified as the “palace mole” by Sir William Heseltine, the Queen’s private secretary—rather than Martin Charteris—in a letter published in the Times. “What’s more up for debate is whether the leak was sanctioned or whether Shea decided to take the initiative, or was even tripped up by his own loose tongue,” explains The Tab. In other words, it’s unknown whether the queen herself actually asked Shea to speak with the press.

Shea likely left of his own accord, rather than being ousted by the queen.

The Crown depicts Charteris appearing at Shea’s desk and more or less firing him on the spot. This never actually happened. In reality, Shea remained in his position until the following year, after which he left the palace to become director of public affairs for the Hanson Group. He did not immediately retire to write books, as The Crown shows.

It's likely Shea had his eye on the door for several months before the Sunday Times scandal. He’d served the queen through Princess Diana’s many media moments, the outing of royal photographer Sir Anthony Blunt as a Soviet spy, and the break-in of Michael Fagan into the queen’s bedroom. He was slowly growing sick of the intense focus on the family, apparently saying, "There were aspects to [the job] I could have done without, such as the endless tabloid queries that exhausted one's patience: 'Does the Queen use a heated loo seat?'"

When he left his role at Queen Elizabeth’s side, he was not awarded a knighthood, though the palace did state in 2009 that the queen was “saddened” to hear of his death.

He became an author.

After retiring from the Hanson Group, Shea did indeed become a novelist, writing more than 20 books, including a memoir about his time at Buckingham Palace called A View From The Sidelines. His other stories were mainly political thrillers, most of them reminiscent of his own life in the palace.

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