Interview for the books. Former BBC NewsnightProduce Sam McAlisterHere are some behind-the scenes details from the infamous TV interview. Prince AndrewThis was in 2019.
“This started with an innocent email asking to do what we call a puff piece,” the author told Us WeeklyOnly on Tuesday, august 2, ahead of her book SCOOPS: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking InterviewsSimon and Schuster will publish the book in September.
“On the day of the negotiation [for the interview], I’d say [Prince Andrew] was in very good spirits,” McAlister continued. “He comes from a position of power, and he spent a couple of hours with us. [Then]He threw a complete curveball at us: His daughter Princess Beatrice came to that final negotiation.”
The second son of the Duke of York is Queen Elizabeth IIPrince Philip, the late. The royal has been a focal point for his friendship and past associations with Prince Philip. Jeffrey EpsteinWhile serving time at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York, he took his own death in August 2019.
Andrew was accused by the FBI of sexual assault. Virginia Roberts GiuffreDuring the Epstein scandal he denied the allegations in the aforementioned interview. He also stumbled during the interaction, leading many people to believe he was guilty.
Andrew, despite his royal duties, stepped aside amid the controversy. However, his daughters Beatrice and EugenieHe was always there for him. A source told Use in December 2019 that the girls were “being really supportive of their dad,” believing “their dad made a huge mistake in judgment ever being associated with Jeffrey Epstein.”
McAlister, for her part, couldn’t believe the Brit allowed his daughter in the room in preparation for the conversation. “I had researched myself … how’s this gonna work? What’s he gonna say, how am I gonna present myself?” she shared with Use. “And then he brought his daughter to negotiate those delicate issues of which he was accused. [To talk about] those associations — which were pernicious and appalling — in front of his young daughter was quite something.”
Though McAlister described the prince as “congenial and casual” during the negotiation process, she noted how things quickly changed after he went in front of the camera.
“The first time he started saying the very same things he’d said to us in the confines of that private small room … I knew that this was going to be an absolute fire starter,” she shared. “But the size of the fire got bigger and bigger as every terrible answer progressed.”
As the booker for the BBC, McAlister noted how important it was for her to share this “really essential part” of the interview with the public — as well as numerous other moments with celebrities like Stormy Daniels, Julian AssangeYou can find out more.
“That is my story, which is how the interview came about from the very beginning, the first interaction, the first second,” she noted about the book, which is now being turned into a movie, titled Scoop, reported Deadline last month. “I wrote the book now that all of the litigation had concluded to be honest, and I wanted to write this and tell my tiny little part in this huge historic tale.”
Christina Garibaldi reporting
