Netflix has acquired “Scoop,” a feature film about the 2019 interview Prince Andrew gave about his ties to Jeffrey Epstein that effectively ended his career as a royal. The film will star Rufus Sewell as Andrew and Gillian Anderson as BBC presenter Emily Maitlis, who conducted the interview.
Based on the memoir “Scoops: Behind The Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews” by Sam McAlister, “Scoop” also stars Billie Piper, who will play McAliester, and Keeley Hawes as Amanda Thirsk, former private secretary to Prince Andrew.
The film aims to go behind the scenes of the interview, which Andrew gave following the death of Jeffrey Epstein when his ties to the wealthy pedophile became widely known and he was accused of sexual assault by one of Epstein’s victims.
Per the official logline, the film will give “the inside track on 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 ‘favorite 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.”
The interview was notable in particular for the moment when Andrew attempted to claim, falsely, that his accuser’s claims can’t possibly be true because he lost the ability to sweat during the Falkland Islands war.
Following the interview, Andrew was forced to step down from his royal family-related public roles in 2020, and in 2022, Queen Elizabeth stripped him of honorary military affiliations and royal charitable patronages.
It’s directed by Emmy and BAFTA-winner Philip Martin.
“I want to put the audience inside the breathtaking 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 high-tech newsrooms — we judge what’s true,” Martin said in a statement.
