🤐 SPOILER ALERT 🤐

If you’ve just raced through all 10 episodes of Season 5 of The Crown, you’ll know that the painful breakdown of Prince Charles (Dominic West) and Princess Diana’s (Elizabeth Debicki) relationship, ultimately culminating in their 1996 divorce, takes center stage. It’s a difficult chapter for both characters, who struggle to make space for their own wants and desires in the face of royal duty. But underscoring the drama of the season is a parallel love story: the forbidden but enduring romance between Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles (Olivia Williams).

The two spend little time in the same room over the course of the season, but their bond is palpable — and nowhere more so than during a private phone conversation in Episode 5. That call, which was illicitly recorded and leaked to the press, is best remembered as the basis for the Tampongate scandal. But West and Williams see it as a tender moment, and one that provides a rare glimpse into how this couple has persisted through adversity for so long.

Ahead, West and Williams explain how they approached the relationship between Charles and Camilla and reflect on the affection they feel for their characters.

How would you describe where Camilla and Charles are this season when we first meet them?
Dominic West: I think at the nadir of their lives. It’s the worst time for them and also the prime of their lives, which was in some way Charles’ tragedy. These are the events of the late ’90s and early 2000s and Diana’s divorce and death. If you look at the coverage [and] shots of Charles, he was a very, very sad person at that time.

Olivia Williams: Equally, if you take out the sort of royal elements, [you have] the breakdown of a marriage, the loss of a family home, and the massive intrusion on the life of a woman who was very private and had no defense. [Camilla] was actually left utterly exposed to whatever mud was being slung at her. That was a challenge for us, to actually keep finding the joy between the two of them and to try and work out what the magical thing is between them that clearly makes them such a happy and successful and supportive and humorous couple now, in this very successful marriage

[There’s] one particular scene that has been interpreted endlessly by everybody on Earth. And I think the secret of the conversation was that they were joking. That is how they’ve survived.

You’re referring to the so-called Tampongate phone call in Episode 5. How did you approach that sensitive moment?
West: That scene was all we needed to understand our relationship. It tells you everything about him, everything about her, and everything about the two of them together.

I remember the story back in the ’90s as being a sordid conversation. Actually, in reality, it was a very beautiful conversation between two people very much in love. As Princess Anne says in the show, “You remind me of two rather sweet teenagers.” That is how it comes across.

Williams: I think the clue to that conversation for me is, far from anybody wanting to be anybody else’s sanitary product, there’s the phrase “Knowing my luck.” It was self-deprecating. It was someone saying, “No, I wouldn’t be this wonderful romantic thing. I’d end up as this thing.” That’s a surreal sense of humor.

There’s a sense this season that Charles feels misunderstood. How did that affect your take on the character?
West: I’ve always been a fan, really. Particularly the Prince’s Trust and what he’s said about environment and architecture and all the things that he’s championed, which I’m interested in as well. What was very striking was talking to May el-Toukhy, who was the director of Episode 5. I said, “I don’t want him to be the villain.” It really helped, because I think in dramas, you’re looking for a villain.

Williams: The series is so brilliantly constructed because there is an episode about divorce and this idea of blame and fault. The whole Charles/Diana/Camilla thing is just a hideous situation that no one could ever construct or reconstruct under any other circumstances. In what other circumstances would this man take this woman? I mean, it was just a disaster. And it wasn’t anybody’s fault.

Did you learn anything about each of your characters that surprised you during this process?
Williams: Loads. Yeah. I just think the dignity that Camilla showed in not rising to the bait. There’s this wonderful video of Camilla winking at the press — the same press who stood outside her house and tormented her. She’s managed to befriend them and win them over and share a joke with them. That is such a tribute to a good-natured woman who I’d like to be my friend.

West: I loved the details about Charles. [Like] the fact that he has a pad next to him whenever he is having a dinner party, to make notes. He’s so conscientious.

Williams: I think she uses quite colorful language, and I’ve tried to bring that into pretty well every scene that I can.

Keith Bernstein/Netflix

What did you enjoy most about sharing scenes together this season?
Williams: Well, the problem is we are mostly on the phone to each other so we don’t get to play off [each other]. I [got] to play off of tape recordings of Dominic quite often.

West: I [got] to play off the real thing because Olivia’s a much kinder and more generous actor than me. So, she usually turns up when the camera’s on me.

Williams: It’s fun, and I think that [because] we both like the character we are playing, we are predisposed to like each other.

West: There was a certain sort of bonding in being the less popular couple, and feeling slightly righteous about it, that they’ve been unjustly served.

Williams: We want to vindicate them.

West: We were batting for their side.

Season 5 of The Crown is available to stream on Netflix now.

The Crown Season 5 Trailer

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.