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Crew member at Andrew's BBC interview tells of moment that left him 'aghast'

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Prince Andrew speaks with journalist Emily Maitlis (Image: PA)
Prince Andrew speaks with journalist Emily Maitlis (Image: PA)

A photographer who was on set as Prince Andrew gave his car-crash BBC Newsnight interview has revealed the bombshell moment during the chat that left him 'aghast'.

The disgraced Duke of York was interviewed by then Newsnight host Emily Maitlis in 2019 where he was quizzed about his connection to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in the wake of his death. The interview sent shockwaves around the world as Andrew talked about his inability to sweat as well as his connection to Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Among those at Buckingham Palace when the interview was recorded almost five years ago was photographer Mark Harrison, who had been hired by the BBC to take photos of the interview.

Crew member at Andrew's BBC interview tells of moment that left him 'aghast' eiqetiquhideqprwAndrew during the interview in 2019 (BBC)

And he has revealed which moment during the interview left him and other crew members putting their hands over their mouths in shock. Speaking on Talk TV, he explained the mention of the royal saying he had visited a Pizza Express restaurant in Woking so could not have met his accuser Virginia Giuffre on the same day, was the bombshell moment. He explained: "I was aghast. Like everyone else was aghast, I suppose, but because it was live, I didn't know what was going to come next. I had my hand over my mouth at one point."

Speaking about the Pizza Express moment, he added: "I thought then, 'That's a headline'. And then another one came and it was like, ‘Oh, that's a headline’. I certainly didn't know it was going to be a headline five years on, but here we are."

Interest in Andrew's interview has been reignited as a dramatisation of the chat called Scoop is set to land on Netflix on Friday. It stars Rufus Sewell as Andrew, Billie Piper as Newsnight producer Sam McAlister, Gillian Anderson as Emily Maitlis and Keeley Hawes as Andrew's private secretary Amanda Thirsk.

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And despite the interview being regarded by many as a car crash, Mark revealed that as he took pictures of the Duke and Emily Maitlis after the chat, Andrew believed it had gone well. Mark added: "We took a final picture, going back down the marble corridor. They use it at the beginning of the interview, but we shot it at the end, and I'm running backwards taking the photograph. I'm reversing at high speed.

"You can see if you can see him almost running there. He's smiling. Everything's good. Emily was tense at the end. All my photographs taken after the interview there's no smiles. There's nothing. It's all tense from her.

"In fact, during that photograph, I'm trying to stop them run, you can see he’s almost running. I'm backing away. We end up in a huddle at the end of the corridor, a bizarre huddle with myself, Emily and Prince Andrew at which point, he says to her, 'Well, that was just terrific, wasn't it? That was wonderful. It went really well."

Jennifer Newton

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