Angela Kelly, the former dresser and confidante of Queen Elizabeth II, has agreed to co-operate with a film about her life and extraordinary career inside the Royal Household.
The project is expected to combine interviews, archive material and possible dramatic reconstructions. It is being controlled by London production company 53 Degrees Global in collaboration with Walt Disney, with Bafta-winning screenwriter Jeremy Brock understood to be involved.
Ms Kelly, 68, was regarded as the late Queen’s gatekeeper and became one of the most influential figures in her private circle. Her decision to tell her story is likely to attract close interest from King Charles and senior courtiers, particularly over what she may reveal about the monarch’s private views and relationships.
An insider said: “The royals will be worried, and they are right to be worried.”
Ms Kelly was exceptionally close to the Queen, who once said the pair could have been “sisters”. She was trusted to break in new shoes, arrange the monarch’s hair and massage her feet, and was among a small group present at Balmoral when Elizabeth died.
Her long service included roles as dresser, personal assistant, adviser and curator. In 2023, she was made a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order.
Angela Kelly’s royal connections
Ms Kelly’s route to the Palace was unusual. The daughter of a dockyard crane operator, she worked as a lorry driver for the Women’s Royal Army Corps before becoming housekeeper to Sir Christopher Mallaby, then the British ambassador to Germany.
She met the Queen and Prince Philip when they stayed at the ambassador’s residence during an official visit to Berlin in 1992. She was offered a position as a dresser soon afterwards.
During the Queen’s final months, Ms Kelly moved into a room on the same floor as the monarch’s private apartments at Windsor Castle. She later told friends that she had effectively become the Queen’s carer.
Ms Kelly has already published two books with what was described as the late Queen’s “permission and blessing”. They included Dressing The Queen: The Jubilee Wardrobe, published in 2012, and The Other Side of The Coin – The Queen, The Dresser and The Wardrobe, published in 2019.
She is bound by a confidentiality agreement which is understood to restrict the commercial use of words including “King” and “Palace”. However, a letter from one of the Queen’s private secretaries is said to have given her permission to publish three books, of which two have appeared.
A royal observer said Ms Kelly knew “everything you ever wanted to know”, including the Queen’s views on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, adding: “I don’t think the Palace has a leg to stand on if she wants to tell her story.”
Ms Kelly’s relationship with some fellow courtiers was less cordial. She was known for her fierce temper and willingness to challenge others, leading some Palace staff to nickname her “AK47”, after her initials and the Soviet-era assault rifle.
She is also understood to have been hurt by the speed with which she was asked to leave the Royal Household and vacate her cottage on the Windsor estate. Friends have insisted that she does not blame senior members of the Royal Family.
The locks to the Queen’s private apartments at Windsor were changed within days of her death, while Ms Kelly’s Palace-issued mobile phone was disconnected.
She is said to have clashed with Camilla when she was Duchess of Cornwall and with Prince Harry. In his memoir Spare, Harry accused Ms Kelly of preventing Meghan from practising wearing her wedding tiara with a hairdresser ahead of their 2018 wedding.
Ms Kelly, who now lives near Sheffield in a home bought for her by the King, has acquired an agent and is expected to be in demand on American chat shows. A Disney source said the project would appeal to US viewers because it offers access to a Queen who “never voiced her opinions publicly”.
The production company describes itself as “trusted by royalty” and makes programmes under the True Royalty Originals brand. Buckingham Palace, Ms Kelly and 53 Degrees Global were approached for comment.
