A principal of Gordonstoun, the Scotland boarding school Prince Charles and his brothers attended, has added her thoughts about the controversy over The Crown.
Principal Lisa Kerr told Daily Mail that the Netflix series must have a disclaimer to discourage any "misleading impression" about the school, especially when Prince Charles was one of its students.
Kerr believes that it's important to separate "fact from fiction," which they also tell members of their drama club. The principal said that they had told their students, especially those who love the Creative Arts, that the representation of Gordonstoun in the series is a dramatic depiction and not a documentary.
She also revealed that alumni members of Gordonstoun, especially the contemporaries of the Prince of Wales, expressed their shock at scenes portraying the institution and its students. Gordonstoun was tackled in the second season, which first aired in 2018. The Crown showed that Prince Charles had a miserable time at the boarding school because he was humiliated and bullied by his classmates.
However, in a 1974 interview with Observer Magazine, Prince Charles said that there have been "exaggerated" stories of his time at the Scotland school. More than 10 years after he graduated from the institution, Prince Charles addressed the "amount of rot" discussed about his former school in a speech during his appearance at the House of Lords.
The royal said that he was lucky to have had a Gordonstoun education because he learned "a great deal about myself and my own abilities and disabilities." He admitted that they had mental and physically tough times at the institution, but these were important to teach the students how to take the initiative.
In 2018, The Crown also attracted controversy for its "false claims" about Prince Philip's storyline. Senior school officials denied that the Duke of Edinburgh single-handedly built the school's gate and wall to overcome his grief over the death of his sister, which was told in the hit drama series.
As a policy about its alumni, a spokesperson from Gordonstoun did not want to comment on the implications in the series. However, some graduates said that they do not know such a wall in school. No one ever mentioned it during their seven-year stay.
Royal biographer Hugo Vickers said that The Crown creator Peter Morgan used dramatic license in coming up with the story. However, he's "deeply concerned" for the "awful lies" coming from the series.
But then Vickers think that all of Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth's sons didn't like their stay at Gordonstoun, despite what Prince Charles said. The biographer said that this is why the Prince of Wales sent his sons, William and Harry, to Eton instead of his Alma Mater.
