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Twenty weeks later, I had managed to persuade Amanda Thirsk that Prince Andrew's position – of silence in the face of global scrutiny - was untenable," McAlister writes.Īfter a further meeting, McAlister, presenter Emily Maitlis and the show's deputy editor Stewart Maclean were called in to talk to Prince Andrew in person. "Eight weeks later, Jeffrey Epstein was arrested. Newsnight declined the interview, but McAlister picked up the trail again when events pushed Prince Andrew's desperately ill-conceived friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein into the ugly glare of the world's headlines. Prince Andrew was friends with Jeffrey Epstein. The Prince would not talk about Jeffrey Epstein, who at that stage was probably a last question for us, but of course became every question after that negotiation." "I managed to negotiate all of those, unbelievably, but then there was a red line. The more pertinent issues were Brexit, the future of the monarchy, Harry and Meghan, what was going to happen to The Queen after she was no longer in charge. "The Epstein connection was a news issue that we would have to mention, but it was not the main event for us. At that juncture Prince Andrew wasn't the contentious figure that he's become now," McAlister explains. "My expectation in going along was to try to negotiate onto the table all the news issues that were pertinent to Prince Andrew at that time. But curiously Thirsk was willing for her boss - Prince Andrew - to face the rigours of a Newsnight grilling. McAlister had done her research and knew Thirsk to be "formidable, well-educated, competent and someone who wouldn't suffer fools gladly" and she was all those things when they met. "Prince Andrew was now open to a broader chat, one that wouldn't have any parameters." Intrigued but sceptical, she took up the invitation to go to Buckingham Palace for a chat with Andrew's Private Secretary Amanda Thirsk.
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( Reuters: Andrew Winning)īut six months later McAlister received a call. Prince Andrew and his mother the Queen at the Epsom Derby in 2013. She was right the answer was a firm "no".
#INFAMOUS SECOND SON PAPER TRAIL PART 3 LOCATION TV#
McAlister's first request for a TV interview with Andrew was in response to an innocuous press release about his business initiative was a shot in the dark in a royal world she admits she knew nothing about, and she had "zero expectation" that the Prince would agree to the sort of no-holds barred interrogation required by Newsnight, famed for its uncompromising journalism. The roadblocks that royal correspondents regularly come up against simply weren't there, which makes this interview all the more incredible. The road to securing the interview was long, but not as rocky as you would imagine, McAlister says. It's a jaw-dropping read that begs a catalogue of questions about the inner workings of the royal machine. It also gives fascinating insight to the mindset of Prince Andrew who, though stripped of his royal duties, remains ninth in line to the throne and one of four counsellors of state, authorised to carry out the official duties of The Queen should illness or absence abroad prevent her from doing so. "I don't think anyone envisaged that the answers would be as bad as they were," says McAlister, who recounts the extraordinary tale of how it all happened in her new book Scoops. Sam McAlister, producer for BBC's Newsnight current affairs show. Sitting 15 feet behind Prince Andrew in a room in Buckingham Palace as the cameras rolled was the woman who set it all up: the whip-smart, uncompromising Sam McAlister, producer for BBC's Newsnight current affairs show.Ī former criminal defence barrister, McAlister is lauded in the TV news industry for her steely tenacity and dogged resilience - qualities that undoubtedly paid dividends in securing the exclusive that stunned the world as the Prince repeatedly failed to show a glimmer of remorse or apology in that now infamous car-crash interview.īut as she watched what turned out to be the scoop of the century unfold before her eyes, McAlister was as much in shock as the 1.7 million viewers who tuned in on the night of November 16, 2019. It could well be dubbed The Queen's "Andrew Horribilis", the night her "favourite" son unwittingly lit the touch paper to the end of his career as a working royal in a TV appearance that will certainly go down in the history books and caused seismic damage to the monarchy.