The Crown creator and showrunner Peter Morgan reveals that Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle could never be covered in his hit Netflix drama because they fail his `20-year rule`.

The playwright and screenwriter revealed he didn't write about subjects unless 20 years had passed, because he needed time to understand the Royal family's stories and events better. Any more modern storylines would be journalism rather than drama.

Morgan said: `Meghan and Harry are in the middle of their journey, and I don't know what their journey is or how it will end. One wishes some happiness, but I'm much more comfortable writing about things that happened at least 20 years ago.`

He continued: `I don't know where in the scheme of things Prince Andrew or indeed Meghan Markle or Harry will ever appear. We won't know, and you need time to stop something being journalistic. And so I don't want to write about them because to write about them would instantly make it journalistic. And there are plenty of journalists already writing about them.`

View this post on Instagram

Devoted to duty. #TheCrown creator Peter Morgan shares the unofficial feedback he gets from the royal family and reveals why Meghan Markle and Prince Harry are off-limits, at the link in bio.

A post shared by Hollywood Reporter (@hollywoodreporter) on Aug 19, 2020 at 4:10pm PDT

Drama required perspective and the opportunity for metaphor. `Once something has a metaphorical possibility, it can then become interesting. It's quite possible, for example, to tell the story of Harry and Meghan through analogy and metaphor, if that's what you want to do,` he said.

Morgan confirmed that season four of The Crown was almost completely filmed before the lockdown and they would still be able to hit the release schedule of November.