Suzanne Mackie has worked as an executive producer on Netflix’s The Crown for about 11 years, since its inception, when it was adapted from creator Peter Morgan’s The Audience, the play that originated on the West End starring Helen Mirren. After more than a decade working as one of Morgan’s closest producing partners across every aspect of The Crown, she reflects on the Emmy-winning historical drama as it approaches its sixth and final season.
Did you and Peter Morgan, at the outset, realize this was going to function almost as an anthology series in regard to the recasting in seasons three and five?
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In many ways, we stumbled on something that gave a whole new dimension to The Crown. The original conversation, as I recollect it, was really one of pragmatism — that if we were spanning 60 episodes, and [roughly] 60 years, how could we have one actress, who needs to be very young in the first season, play it convincingly across that time period? The decision to change the cast every two seasons was made very, very early on, way before we even cast Claire Foy, Matt Smith or Vanessa Kirby [as Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip and Princess Margaret, respectively]. We didn’t think about it with any sense of what it might give to us creatively. And I remember all of us, when we’d worked with Claire and that original cast, realized how good they were, particularly how striking Claire was as the queen, that when we got to the end of season two and we were saying goodbye to them, there was a moment of panic: “Oh, God. Can’t we just convince ourselves to change our minds and keep them?” And we knew we just couldn’t do it. Then you move on because you have to move on. We met Olivia Colman and Helena Bonham Carter and Tobias Menzies, and suddenly you’ve got your new cast.
What none of us anticipated happening, because none of us had done this before, is that it gives a whole new energy. You feel like you’re mounting a new show, not least because you’re in a new decade — even if there’s this suspension of disbelief that it might only be a week later. And yet somehow, you feel like you’re in a different time period. Of course, we all fell in love with Olivia and Helena. Peter would write the language slightly differently. He’d suddenly say, “Oh, hang on, Olivia speaks with a different rhythm.” We are the same team that’s made The Crown from the very beginning, most of us have been on it for the duration. And we’ve even had dinners where they’ll all come along, and Vanessa is going to sit next to Helena. [We] remained this beautiful company of people who have made The Crown. Some people might not be with you anymore, but they’re still part of the fabric of your life.
With season four, you won the Emmy for best drama series. Did that feel like the right season?
It’s interesting because for season one, we got the Golden Globe for best series; with the Emmys, we didn’t. The Handmaid’s Tale had just come out. We took one look at that and went, “That’s got to win, it’s so good.” It was so of the moment. I remember even standing outside with Elisabeth Moss saying, “You’re going to win it,” and she was like, “No, you’re going to win it.” But with season four, I think we all knew it was great work. There were great stories. We had Princess Diana come in. She was so fantastic: Emma [Corrin in season four], as is [season five’s Elizabeth] Debicki, my God. With Gillian Anderson’s Margaret Thatcher, there was something very special — each one of those episodes was a particular treat, a rich time in history.
How do you go about making the editing decisions of which stories from history get included and which don’t?
Peter Morgan is very methodical about how he prepares, before he starts writing the scripts. He does a lot of big architectural work. To be honest, even 10 years ago, we knew what stories we’d be telling — we mapped out a timeline for the whole 60 episodes, and what the key events were that we would choose to try to depict. There were some obvious ones, like meeting Princess Diana for the first time, or the Margaret Thatcher years.
I remember Peter very early on saying, “I want to get into the Al-Fayeds as a dynasty, as a family,” and I remember being like, “Oh, that’s really good. I don’t know that side of the story.” [He said]: “Particularly when it comes to Diana’s death, I want to know what happened to Dodi.” I remember thinking that’s so interesting and bold. To go that far away from the royal family, that far away from the queen, you go back in time, and that’s so interesting to do, not least because we know how much he’s going to feature in season six and what the intersection of his world is with our world via Diana, and that felt like such an interesting proposition. But you have to make decisions about what you leave out. Because otherwise, you’d do 20 episodes instead of 10. We knew very early on what we’d be roughly covering.
Are you close to finishing season six?
Yes, we’ve been in the cutting room for months now. I spend a lot of time in the cutting room. That’s a place I really love, because in many ways, Peter will often say he does a lot of writing in the cutting room. You start to rewrite the episodes, almost. We’re now just doing final mixing, all the sound and the music — our very last stages of postproduction. We finished filming about two months ago.
How does it feel that the show is coming to an end?
It’s an interesting thing to contemplate, because I am really, really proud of this final season. I think it’s some of our best work. Imelda [Staunton] is extraordinary as the queen, she really is. And I don’t want to spoil the very end, but it’s really beautiful and, I think, quite profound, and it feels like a culmination of a very long journey. Talking about our other queens, it feels like it honors that, and you’ll understand that when you see it. Some of it is very painfully sad, because it deals with the death of Diana — over three episodes we follow what happens to Diana and the build-up to her death, the final days in Paris. It’s very sad, and it feels very real and vivid [and] I hope very respectful and beautiful. I think it will be a surprise for an audience, because in many ways, where we go after Diana, it’s very hard. We have found a really beautiful new chapter, which is via Prince William and Kate Middleton, and it feels like little flowers coming up out of the earth after Diana’s death.
And how do I feel [about being done]? I don’t know whether I’ll ever work on a 10-year project again, who knows? It’s a very odd feeling. I said to someone earlier that I feel like I’m having to take my first baby steps away from a place of safety. I know where I am with The Crown. It allows you to feel very defined by it. I am so thrilled to feel like I’ve made a big contribution to it. You suddenly feel a bit bereft, and I feel a little untethered by it. You go, “Oh, God, what next?” So, you’ve caught me on a day where we’re all having that slightly big, profound question to ourselves. But at the same time, what a privilege. How lucky am I?
Interview edited for length and clarity.
This story first appeared in an August stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
