Actor Khalid Abdalla has said a crew member on The Crown paid tribute to the late Queen on the day she died by playing the national anthem.

Abdalla, 42, plays Dodi Fayed, son of business tycoon Mohamed Al Fayed, in the forthcoming final series of the hit Netflix show.

Queen Elizabeth II died in September 2022 while the sixth season of the drama was underway and Abdalla recalled the experience for the actors and crew members on set.

Speaking to the PA news agency, he said: “When the Queen died we were like everybody else in terms of the shock and how it touched us, but while also being inside The Crown.”

He then spoke of the crew members who had “given up their life and time and energy and dreams to exploring the lives of these people and the Queen herself”.

Abdalla told PA: “I think for some it was quite, sort of,  hurtful – some of the things that were said last year.

“Because, one of my memories is when one of the crew took out their trumpet that they brought … and played the national anthem on his trumpet, on the day that she died, in tribute to what he felt about her.”

Filming for The Crown halted as a mark of respect following the Queen’s death and was suspended once again on the day of her funeral.

Following her death, Netflix defended the show amid criticism of its fifth series and said the programme was a “fictional dramatisation”.

Both Dame Judi Dench and former prime minister Sir John Major had criticised the story lines before they aired.

The Crown
Prince Harry, played by Fflyn Edwards, Diana, Princess of Wales, played by Elizabeth Debicki, and Prince William, played by Rufus Kampa in The Crown (Daniel Escale/Netflix)

Speaking about the dramatisation of the royal family, Abdalla said: “It is absolutely right to explore and tell stories about the royal family, all people at that scale who exist in our life deserve both love and scrutiny.

“And I think anyone who watches The Crown and has watched it always tends to feel that there is that right balance of love and fairness.”

The final series explores the budding romance between Dodi and Diana, Princess of Wales, played by Australian actress Elizabeth Debicki.

– The Crown will be released in two parts on Netflix, with the first instalment of four episodes launching on November 16 and part two airing on December 14.