Who is The Crown’s new Princess Diana, Elizabeth Debicki? The Aussie actress is a trained ballet dancer who had her breakout role in The Great Gatsby – and is similar to the late British royal too
- Netflix’s The Crown season five airs on November 9, with Elizabeth Debicki replacing Emma Corrin as the older version of Britain’s late Princess of Wales, Diana
- If Debicki looks familiar, that’s because she’s in Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby with Tobey Maguire and Leonardo DiCaprio, as well as Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy
For all the controversy that shrouds the show, one thing’s for sure: Netflix’s The Crown knows how to cast the perfect actors, at least in our opinion. Unavoidable physical differences aside (see the previous brouhaha over Olivia Colman’s brown eyes versus Queen Elizabeth’s blue ones), getting the right actor to capture a real-life person’s essence is, arguably, even more important.
Here’s what else you need to know about the Australian actress, including a few things she has in common with the late princess.
She trained as a ballet dancer
Remember that iconic performance of “Uptown Girl” last season? In real life, Princess Diana loved to dance, a passion that 32-year-old Debicki shares.
Born in Paris as the eldest child of professional ballet dancers, young Debicki wanted to follow her parents’ career path. However, like Diana, she was forced to quit ballet due to her height, per Allure. At just 12 years old, Debicki was already taller than her instructors. So she went on to pursue acting instead.
“Dancing gives an innate physical awareness – it’s physical training. Acting feels like the same medium but just with words,” she said in an interview with Allure.