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Season 6 of “The Crown” begins in Paris, the city of Princess Diana’s death. It’s night and the sidewalks are empty, save for a man walking his dog near the Pont de l’Alma tunnel. Suddenly a Mercedes flies by. Several motorbikes follow. A crash can be heard, followed by the distant sound of a car horn blaring, which then blends subtly into the notes of the show’s opening title music.
It’s an unexpectedly elegant choice from a show that has, creatively and thematically, preferred the more straightforwardly pedestrian. The first four episodes of the final season, which Netflix is releasing in two parts, focus on the lead-up to that fateful moment in the summer of 1997.
The core ensemble from Season 5 returns: Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth, Jonathan Pryce as Prince Philip, Dominic West as Prince Charles, Khalid Abdalla as Dodi Fayed and Elizabeth Debicki as Princess Diana, who would spend much of her final summer on a yacht in the Mediterranean as a guest of Dodi’s father, Mohamed Al-Fayed (Salim Daw).
Last season, the show’s creator Peter Morgan laid the groundwork for Mohamed’s grasping aspirations for royal proximity. Now, with Diana divorced from Charles, Mohamed sees an opening — and urges his son to make a move. If Dodi marries Diana, her prestige and influence will elevate the family.
Despite Mohamed’s hopes, it’s little more than a summer fling between two wealthy jet-setters. It begins in relative privacy, only for that to be blown apart once the paparazzi get photos of them together. This is where Morgan makes some compellingly messy speculations: What if it was Mohamed who tipped off the paps?
Then Morgan takes it even further. What if, once the couple stops in Paris, Mohamed’s continued meddling only worsens the ravenous press pack, leading to their death? Missing are Diana’s concerns that Mohamed was spying on her and had the yacht bugged (a detail to which her sister testified at the inquest). But the father-son dynamic is engrossingly fraught, and Abdalla is especially good as a spineless ne’er-do-well at the mercy of a controlling father. How controlling? We glimpse a portrait that has him painted to look like a pharaoh, perhaps a sly reference by Morgan to the media frequently referring to Al-Fayed as a “phony pharaoh.”
Dodi is the perpetual disappointment who has been coasting off his father’s money, and Diana makes her position clear when they dine privately at the Ritz in Paris just hours before the crash. For a show that spends a strange amount of time reducing its narrative to phone calls, finally here’s a scene that’s allowed to breathe. It’s a complicated dance between these two, and Morgan envisions Diana handling it with real skill and empathy.
Morgan has finally caught up to the events already depicted in his 2006 film “The Queen,” which focused on the immediate aftermath of Diana’s death, when an oblivious-to-the-moment Queen Elizabeth had to be coaxed into a public display of mourning.
If you’re wondering if he found a way around repeating himself, Morgan more or less shrugs and replays much of it. But he’s no longer interested in the Tony Blair of it all.
In the film, Blair provided a necessary counterweight — his continued bafflement in the face of the family’s baroque dysfunction is a commentary all its own. Which maybe explains why the show has always felt so narratively slack and self-serious by comparison.
The show tends to view the royals as if they’re trapped in a gilded cage, rather than deeply weird people who can and should be held accountable for their choices. They all suffer from arrested development, their trauma swaddled in Bubble Wrap. But “The Crown” has nothing to say about the corruption from which they all benefit — and is maintained by the monarchy itself. Like “Succession,” it is critical of individuals, but not the systems those individuals enforce and exploit.
The movie’s subtext is that a royal family existing in conjunction with an elected government is a farce. The TV series has been an exercise in walking much of that back. The movie got its jabs in. Morgan doesn’t seem up for that anymore.
The remaining episodes premiere next month and follow the British royals through 2005, including the wedding of Charles and Camilla (the next step in Charles’ obsessive focus on “Camilla’s campaign for legitimacy,” as he calls it) as well as the early days of the relationship between Prince William and future wife Kate Middleton.
Morgan spends an inordinate amount of time contemplating Mohamed Al-Fayed’s marriage plotting. It’s fair to wonder if he sees Kate’s mother Carole Middleton in a similar light. As parents, they are mirror images of one another. That irony is tantalizing enough to finally give the series something meaty in which to sink its teeth.
Will Morgan go there? Only time will tell.
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‘THE CROWN’ SEASON 6
2.5 stars (out of 4)
Rating: TV-MA
How to watch: Netflix
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©2023 Chicago Tribune. Visit chicagotribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
PEBBLE BEACH — RJ Manke first played Pebble Beach Golf Links to celebrate his 18th birthday with his father. The young professional had another festive occasion at the same location Sunday.
Manke, 25, who played collegiately at Pepperdine and the University of Washington, carded a 7-under-par 65 to win the TaylorMade Pebble Beach Invitational by three shots over Rico Hoey.
Manke, who also began the tournament with a 65, had seven birdies in his bogey-free final round to finish at 18 under 270 after parring the final three holes.
“I feel like I’ve always had the ability to make a good number of birdies in a tournament,” said Manke, who began the final round at 11 under and tied for fifth. “And the good events come when the bogeys are limited. I just stayed away from the drop shots, hit a lot of good t-balls and iron shots and the putter was working well today.”
Manke, who turned professional in 2022, had only three bogeys in the tournament and also accumulated 19 birdies and an eagle. He earned $60,000 of the $300,000 purse. His previous career earnings were $64,279.
“It’s pretty fun when you can spend a week at Pebble Beach and they pay you to do it,” said Manke, who also played in the mixed tour event last year and missed the cut.
Manke, who previously competed in the Korn Ferry Tour, has played in one career PGA Tour event, this year’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. He received a sponsor’s exemption and shot a third-round 69 but missed the cut. He has no pro status for the 2024 season but has a lower-tier pro recent next month in Napa. Manke also has Monday qualifier plans for early next season on the PGA Tour.
“I’ve never really played in a tournament before when I knew where I stood when I came down the stretch,” Manke said. “I guess I had a fear of being too scared where I stood relative to the field. But I didn’t feel any nerves when I looked up at the leaderboard.”
Manke won a one-day mini-tour event in Florida in February but hadn’t won a tournament since his 2021 collegiate season.
Hoey, 28, a native of the Philippines who played collegiately at USC, finished with a 65, matching his opening round at Spanish Bay. He finished at 273 in the event’s 52nd edition after birdies on the 17th and 18th.
Paul Barjon, the French native who played collegiately at Texas Christian University, finished with a 72 and joined Mina Harigae, who shot a 70, in a third-place tied at 14 under.
Former Pebble Beach Invitational titlists Jeff Gove (67) and Brandon Harkins (72), Paul Stankowski (72) and Jeffrey Kang (68) tied for fifth at 12 under.
Kang set the course of 63 at The Links at Spanish Bay in the second round but faltered to a 76 in the third round at Spyglass Hill Golf Course. Gove set the previous course record of 64 in 2019.
Harigae, 34, the long-time LPGA Tour pro from Monterey who finished second in the 2022 U.S. Women’s Open, had a unique final round with an eagle, three birdies, one bogey and one double bogey. She tied for 33rd in July at the 2023 U.S. Women’s Open at Pebble Beach.
Harigae had consecutive 67s to begin play and shot 70 in the third. She finished Sunday with eight straight pars in the event she regularly played since she was a teenager. Harigae tied for second in 2018.
Only seven players in the final-round field 43 pros broke 70.
Defending titlist Parker Coody, who will join the PGA Tour next season with his brother Pierceson, shot a final-round 75 and tied for sixth at 8 under. John Mallinger (72), Jacob Bridgman (68) and Jeremy Paul (67) also finished at 8 under. Pierceson Coody finished with a 75 and was among four players at 1 under.
Ted Potter Jr. (70), the 2018 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am winner, finished in a foursome at 4 under.
