The Crown Season 6 Finale: Prince Harry's Nazi Scandal

The Crown's Portrayal of Prince Harry's Scandal

The Crown season 6 finale dramatized the real-life scandal of Prince Harry wearing a Nazi uniform to a party, which occurred in 2005. Prince Harry is characterized in The Crown season 6 as a charming troublemaker, and the leaking of a picture of him in a Nazi costume marked the biggest scandal in his young life. Luthor Ford joined The Crown season 6 cast as Prince Harry, portraying the young prince from age 13 to when he wore the Nazi costume and received quite a bit of attention for doing so at 20.

Luther Ford As Prince Harry Dressed In Nazi Costume In The Crown Season 6 Part 2.jpg

The Crown season 6 ends in 2005, the year of the scandal, and with the impact it had, it would have been hard for the series to ignore. The Crown portrays fictionalized accounts of real-life people and events and has been questioned and even criticized for its accuracy. Though The Crown aims to tell the stories as accurately as possible, the series often takes creative liberty in its recreations, and this can be seen in season 6 as well with certain storylines. The Crown season 6 ending included one of Prince Harry’s most defining moments, but based on his accounts, it missed key details of the real-life story.

Prince Harry (Luther Ford) looking up in The Crown season 6 part 2

Prince Harry's memoir, Spare, also highlights the inaccuracies of its portrayal in The Crown season 6, which attributed his feelings about the costume parties to William. Prince Harry even revealed in the documentary that he spoke to the chief rabbi in London and went to Berlin to speak to a Holocaust survivor to educate himself. As he said, he “could’ve and gone on and probably made the same mistakes over and over again in [his] life, but [he] learned from that.' Prince Harry is certainly portrayed as immature and resentful in The Crown season 6, but as time went on, he was able to rehabilitate his image.

Jonathan Pryce standing in a cathedral as Prince Philip in The Crown season 6

The Nazi Costume Incident

In January 2005, Prince Harry attended a birthday party with the theme “Natives and Colonials,” with guests wearing a variety of different costumes in accordance. For the party, Prince Harry wore a desert uniform of General Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps with a swastika armband prominently displayed. The Afrika Korps was a German expeditionary force in Africa during World War II’s North African campaign to maintain Italy’s territorial gains in the area. General Rommel was a famous figure in Nazi Germany and became well-known in postwar popular culture, even inspiring the Rommel myth.

Matt Smith as Prince Philip in The Crown

The photograph of Prince Harry in the Nazi costume made the front page of The Sun, sparking great backlash and anger, particularly from Jewish communities. His actions were seen as even more insulting and insensitive as the party took place two weeks before the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz, where over a million Jews had been murdered. It also took place when he was set to enroll in Sandhurst, the royal military academy, though he was able to keep his spot. The Crown season 6 portrayed this as due to intervention by Prince Philip.

Prince Philip looks out the window in The Crown

Statements from Jewish groups in The Guardian referred to Harry’s costume as “tasteless” and scolded him for making a “joke” of the “evil that the Nazis were responsible for.” Prince Harry made his own statement that read, “I am very sorry if I caused any offence and embarrassment to anyone. It was a poor choice of costume and I apologise.” Prince Harry spoke about the incident years later in the documentary Harry & Meghan, where he referred to it as “one of the biggest mistakes of [his] life” and spoke about how “ashamed” he felt afterward.

The Crown: Prince Philip (Tobias Menzies) in ceremonial uniform speaking to Queen Elizabeth (Olivia Colman), whose back is turned to the camera

Reactions and Reflections

Prince Harry Watches The Crown And Fact-Checks The Series Prince Harry even revealed in the documentary that he spoke to the chief rabbi in London and went to Berlin to speak to a Holocaust survivor to educate himself. As he said, he “could’ve and gone on and probably made the same mistakes over and over again in [his] life, but [he] learned from that.' Prince Harry is certainly portrayed as immature and resentful in The Crown season 6, but as time went on, he was able to rehabilitate his image.

Prince Philip kneels in front of the Queen in The Crown

Prince Philip had a different reaction in The Crown season 6, focusing on the “inaccuracy” of the costume rather than what it represented. Prince Philip had also caused controversy in the past for statements that were deemed offensive, so his reaction to Harry’s scandal wasn’t surprising. Rather, he was most disappointed in the costume makers for including a swastika, which he said the German Africa Korps never wore. Prince Philip served during World War II as part of the Royal Navy. He was second-in-command of the HMS Wallace, which was positioned in the Mediterranean Fleet. This, along with Prince Philip’s comments in The Crown season 6, suggest that he may have fought against Field Marshal Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps, giving him firsthand knowledge of the accuracy of Prince Harry’s Nazi costume.