Diana Film Just Gossip, Says Khan

I, for one, am waiting with bated breath for the new Diana film to come out next month, but the man at the centre of the narrative, Diana’s penultimate lover Hasnat Khan, is not quite so excited, slamming the movie as mere, “gossip,” and vowing he will never see it.

Dr Khan, who was nicknamed Mr Wonderful by the Princess, has rarely spoken to the press but has been provoked into launching a scathing criticism of the forthcoming movie, claiming it was “completely wrong” and vowing he would never watch it after seeing just one still image from the film, which shows the actors playing him and Diana side by side at the hospital where they met.

Speaking to the Mail on Sunday, Dr Khan, commenting on the actors’ stance in the still, said: “I could tell immediately those were never our mannerisms at all, with [my] hands folded behind the back and all that. You could tell from that picture that it is all just presumed about how we would behave with each other, and they have got it completely wrong. There wasn't any hierarchy in our relationship. She wasn't a Princess and I wasn't a doctor. We were friends, and normal people stand like friends with each other.”

He said he had refused to co-operate with either the fim makers or the author of the book on which it is based, and told the paper it was all “based on gossip and Diana's friends talking about a relationship that they didn't know much about, and some of my relatives who didn't know much about it either. It is all based on hypotheses and gossip.”

The film, due to be released next month, stars Naomi Watts as Diana and Naveen Andrews as Khan and is directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, who made Downfall.

Jemima Khan, Diana’s close friend, said last month in Vanity Fair that the Princess had been “madly in love” with Dr Khan, with whom she had a two-year relationship.

Diana had wanted to marry the doctor and secretly met his family in Pakistan to discuss the possibility of a union, Mrs Khan told the magazine.

The surgeon – who is raising money to set up a charitable hospital in Pakistan - says "There are a hundred could-have-beens. She (Diana) could be living very happily and married and having more kids, with me or with someone else. It could have led in that direction. I try not to think about these things. I can’t change anything now."