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00:00Hello, and welcome to a brand new episode of Catching Up With The Royals with me, Richard Coles.
00:05And me, Emily Andrews. This is the podcast that takes you beyond the headlines
00:10and lifts the lid on what life is really like behind palace walls.
00:14We're taking a look into the Royals' relationship with the press.
00:17And they said, Emily, if you ever do anything like that again, you will not be invited on these engagements.
00:22We'll explore the history of this special but sometimes peculiar relationship
00:25and find out how it's changed over time.
00:28But monarchy only works if you shroud it in mystery.
00:31The royal family survives on births, deaths of marriages.
00:35Plus, we'll be chatting about one of the most turbulent times in the press' relationship with the Royals, Princess Diana.
00:42Now, you actually knew Princess Diana.
00:44Kind of gave power back to the monarchy. We were still interested in that story.
00:53So, Emily, this is something you particularly wanted to talk about
00:57and are particularly well qualified to talk about.
01:00Oh, thanks, Richard.
01:01Well, yeah, I suppose I've been part of the Royal Rotor for, I think, since 2011, 2012.
01:07Like, 15 years.
01:08Can I be that old?
01:10No.
01:10That's what you were going to say, wasn't it?
01:11No, I was going to say, what's the Royal Rotor?
01:13Well, good question.
01:15The history of Royal reporting is that it was very, very sort of deferential.
01:20I mean, if you were reporting under the court of Henry VIII, you'd just have your head chopped off if
01:24you even dare to question his policy towards France or whatever.
01:28And then if you sort of roll forward to the 20th century, it was still pretty much the same.
01:32I mean, we might have got rid of the heading, but the press' relationship with the Royals was very deferential.
01:38I think you reminded me earlier that Edward VIII, when he was king and when he was Prince of Wales,
01:44no one even wrote about his relationship with Wallis Simpson.
01:47It really was kind of nolome tangere.
01:49The Royals were untouchable.
01:52Then, of course, the tabloid press rolled into town with Rupert Murdoch's Purchase of the Sun in 1969.
01:58And it all got a bit crazy.
02:00And there were, you know, everybody wants to know about the Royals.
02:03Everybody wants to see the young, glamorous women, Diana, Sarah Ferguson.
02:08And it all got a bit too much.
02:09So between the palace and the royal correspondents on the newspapers, actually, they came up with what is called the
02:14royal rota.
02:15So how it works is each royal correspondent from the papers, and there are about four or five members of
02:21the broadcast press.
02:23That means that on every royal engagement and every royal job, there'll be a very, very small number of journalists.
02:30And it means it keeps the journalist numbers small, which is how the royals like it.
02:35And also, I suppose it kind of works for everybody, doesn't it?
02:39So then those people on the royal rota would share that material with other journalists.
02:44So it stops there being a feeding frenzy and also limits the amount of contact the royals have to have
02:49with press.
02:49Absolutely.
02:50On the latter point, yes, because the royals don't really like the press, even if they have to pretend that
02:55sometimes they do.
02:55When I first started doing Royal Report, it felt very counterintuitive to share information with my colleagues who weren't even
03:02part of the same newspaper.
03:04I wondered about that, because surely if you get something really juicy, your instinct would be not to share, wouldn't
03:09it?
03:09Yeah, exactly.
03:10And certainly, I mean, you know, I used to work on The Sun and The Daily Mail and The Mail
03:14on Sunday, all quite kind of tabloid.
03:17Well, they are tabloid newspapers where...
03:19They know the value of a story.
03:20They value a story. And I remember a news editor saying to me, Emily, bring me exclusives, not excuses.
03:26But the thing is, Richard, the benefit to the royal family of us being there is that often when we're
03:32invited, and we are invited, as the courtiers continually tell us, we're invited to cover these events.
03:39Actually, what you're seeing is nothing particularly salacious.
03:42You might be seeing, you know, the Prince of Wales, as then was Charles, you know, at a hospital.
03:47I remember seeing him, meeting him for the first time at King's College Hospital in South London, and I stood
03:54in the line-up, and he came up over and spoke to me and said,
03:57Oh, hello. And who are you? I think he expected me, because it was the first time, one of the
04:02first jobs I did was The Sun's Royal Correspondent.
04:05And I think he expected me to say I was an anaesthetist, or a nurse, maybe.
04:08And I said, Hello, sir. Good morning. I'm The Sun's new Royal Correspondent.
04:14Oh, he said, looking me up and down, things are looking up, which was very kind of him.
04:20And it's a dance, right? Because they've got their steps and you've got your steps.
04:25And the other thing that occurs to me, if you've got a royal rota, if there's just a handful of
04:28you, then all those comms people employed by the palace can concentrate their efforts, right?
04:33They can. And also, it is a dance, as you say. We've got to get as many strictly references in
04:39here as we can, by the way.
04:40I'd like to apologise to the world for my Paso doble.
04:42No, I loved your Paso. And we need to talk about your tango, but another time.
04:46Because the palace allow access and invite the journalists along, that means, of course, that they can control the message.
04:53You know, in times gone past, I have written things that the palace haven't liked very much, and they've threatened
04:59to throw me off the rota.
05:01They've threatened to withdraw my access. And that's quite clever, isn't it? Because it ensures the journalists remain compliant.
05:08See, I'm seeing Henry VIII having a kind of meltdown somewhere. But I'm sure, is it some steely-voiced courtier
05:14who sort of phrases things in a certain... How does it work?
05:18Well, sometimes it literally is a phone call. I remember I was in the garden at Buckingham Palace.
05:24So I had, you know, to be fair to the courtiers, I had been invited in to the late Queen's
05:29backyard, January 2020.
05:32And Harry and Meghan had announced that they effectively wanted to leave.
05:37And there's a protocol, an unwritten protocol, but you are there to observe these engagements.
05:43You're not there to speak to members of the royal family. You're there to observe.
05:47And then afterwards, you can go and speak to the people that they've spoken to.
05:50You're not even... I wouldn't be as close to the royals as I am to you now.
05:54Sometimes it depends on the engagement. Sometimes you're allowed to shadow the royal as they're going around meeting people,
05:59or they might be doing something. Other times, you're literally kept quite a long way back.
06:04And Harry was doing a rugby engagement. So there was some rugby training going on in front of us.
06:08And there was a rope. And there were quite a few journalists.
06:11And I was with my friend Chris Shipp from ITV. And we did kind of... We were like, this is
06:16ridiculous.
06:17The biggest royal story this year, this five years, is happening with Harry and Meghan.
06:21We've got to ask him something. The Sandringham Summit had just happened.
06:25And then they were all trying to work out how Harry and Meghan were going to leave.
06:28So me and Chris cooked up a little thing. He and his producer filmed it as I shouted at Harry.
06:34Harry, sir, have you sorted things out with your family? Is something being decided?
06:38If looks could kill Richard, I would have dropped down dead on the Queen's Garden.
06:44And then afterwards, I was rung up and told off.
06:48Firmly?
06:49Firmly told off.
06:50There was no ambiguity about that.
06:52They were not messing around. And they were not jocular. And they said,
06:56Emily, if you ever do anything like that again, you will not be invited on these engagements.
07:00And do you sometimes feel that they're just throwing crumbs from their table?
07:03And actually, sometimes you don't want to do that.
07:05Maybe you want to perhaps do something a bit more direct, but you could do that.
07:09You have to do that without inclusion in that particular circle.
07:14So I think if you're part of the Royal Rater, it is a balancing act because you want to go
07:19to the engagements.
07:20You want to see the Royals. You want to see them doing their job.
07:23Often, well, I did, you want to give airtime and exposure to the charities or the causes.
07:30I do have a halo sometimes. Maybe working with you will improve that, Richard.
07:36Don't call it, babes.
07:37Oh, please. Come on. That's the only reason I signed up to do this.
07:41I want to get to the pearly gates, be a little bit more...
07:43I tarnish.
07:44Yeah, untarnish. Untarnish me. Untarnish me.
07:47Well, it's time for a quick break, but we've got a question for you to tide us over.
07:51What is the most expensive paparazzi photograph ever taken of a member of the Royal Family?
07:57Back after this.
08:07Welcome back to Catching Up with the Royals.
08:09I asked you a question just before the break.
08:11What is the most valuable paparazzi picture ever taken of a member of the Royal Family?
08:15Well, the answer is a picture of Princess Diana on Dodie Fayed Yacht.
08:20It sold for £4.5 million in 1997.
08:25It was one of her sitting on the end of the diving board.
08:27It was taken not long before they both tragically died.
08:31£4.5 million.
08:32Wow, that is a lot of money.
08:33I remember it's such an iconic image,
08:36probably because it was one of the last taken before her death.
08:40And I can't let us talk about Princess Diana, Richard, without asking you.
08:43Now, you actually knew Princess Diana.
08:45Well, yeah, I met her a few times.
08:46We were involved in the same charity, actually.
08:49So I remember the first time I met her was a charity thing.
08:52And we were all terribly excited.
08:53What was the charity?
08:54Well, the charity we were involved with was actually HIV AIDS,
08:57which is where we worked together.
08:58Well, it's one of her big passions, wasn't it?
09:00And it was a game changer.
09:02I mean, it's an extraordinary thing.
09:02I was very much involved with the beginning of campaigning around that.
09:07And one of the really big issues was that people felt so frightened
09:10and sometimes so hostile towards gay people,
09:14who were one of the groups that was most affected by it.
09:16There was this kind of sense almost of revulsion around it.
09:19And Princess Diana, who understood a little bit about what it was like to be marginalised,
09:25I think, ironically, from the most looked-at person in the world,
09:28she came and visited a unit and she shook hands with someone who had obvious symptoms of HIV.
09:34And it was a game-changing thing.
09:36And she just really had a natural affinity, I think,
09:38for people who were suffering and marginalised.
09:40And she could close the distance between a maybe indifferent,
09:44even a hostile public and the reality of those people.
09:47And for that, eternal thanks to you, I think.
09:50And it's just interesting to see the way she did it.
09:52Because what was so clever about her,
09:54people often say that she wasn't, you know,
09:56they joke about not being very smart.
09:57Absolute nonsense.
09:58And I think you really saw how clever she was.
10:01She looked like a princess.
10:03She wore diamonds.
10:04It flashed, it sparkled.
10:06She looked great.
10:06But she undercut it at the same time.
10:08She'd make a joke about herself.
10:10And you immediately felt both dazzled by her and reassured by her.
10:14And I think that was part of why she was so effective
10:17and also potentially so difficult for the royal family
10:21as it worked out how to address the world in a new era.
10:25Exactly.
10:26Because in the 80s, they were really having to change
10:30and to become more modern.
10:32I mean, the sort of stereotypical picture of the royals
10:35with a stiff British upper lip.
10:37And here we were in the 80s,
10:38the decade of excess and champagne and city boys and girls,
10:42you know, spending all their megabucks and the media age.
10:47Do you think that it was a problem that she was such a modernising,
10:53a modern face of the family?
10:55I think she cut through in a way the other members of the royal family didn't.
10:58And I can quite see how, if you were the Prince of Wales
11:01and you had all the responsibilities that come with that,
11:03the destiny that awaits you,
11:04to have all of a sudden cameras turn away from you
11:07and turn on to your new glamorous, exciting wife,
11:09who was obviously at ease in the world of kind of pop music
11:12and celebrity and glamour.
11:15That must have been quite tricky.
11:16She was almost like the poster girl for the age, wasn't she?
11:20I mean, it's easy to forget now,
11:21but she was only 19 when she first started dating Prince Charles.
11:24I think they had something like a handful of dates
11:27before they even got married.
11:28Their wedding was still one of the most watched TV events.
11:32It's 750 million people worldwide watched.
11:36Yeah, I mean, I've married a lot of brides.
11:38And I've always felt a sort of, you know, the pressure on the bride
11:43because you're not just, it's not just you.
11:45It's all the expectations of everybody around you.
11:48And we're talking about a dynastic thing.
11:50I think what's really hard for people to grasp now
11:52is they don't just fall in love and marry.
11:55That's a lovely story, isn't it?
11:56It's about dynastic.
11:57Who's this person?
11:58Are they going to be able to do the job?
12:00That's the critical thing.
12:01And I think with Diana, who of course grew up the daughter of an earl
12:05and grew up in an aristocratic world, in fact, grew up at Sandringham
12:07because the Spencer family grew up there
12:09before they inherited, altered up their family seat,
12:14that they kind of knew what it looked like.
12:17But once you're in it and once you're carrying
12:20all that dynastic expectation, the politics of that,
12:23that's really tough.
12:25You encapsulated that brilliantly.
12:26And you said, you know, when she met members of the public,
12:29she looked the part, she looked like a princess,
12:32but she kept it real by being so approachable.
12:36Do you think she used the press or the press used her?
12:40I think it's a symbiotic relationship,
12:42which is a posh way of saying I think they ate each other's vomit in a way.
12:47Well, yeah, I mean, parasitical.
12:48I mean, I'm sure that the members of the royal family
12:50and William and Harry would have a very,
12:52well, they do have a very definite view
12:54in that the press were the parasites
12:55and they got rich off the back of their mother.
12:58But I think also it gave Diana power,
13:00and especially as she became a bit more remote from the royal family
13:02and she started to have a vision about what her life might look like
13:06and also the life she'd want for her boys, of course.
13:09I think one of the ways she acquired power
13:12was through that relationship with the press.
13:14You know, if you were a comms person for the royal family
13:17and you had Princess Diana come along
13:18and all of a sudden she was having her own relationship with journalists,
13:21you would feel that was a very potentially threatening situation to be in
13:27because, you know, they manage those messages so carefully.
13:30This is not just a family.
13:31This is not just a soap opera.
13:33This is the head of state.
13:35This is what holds together our notion of who we are,
13:38our place in the world, our place in history.
13:40Those are really, you know, significant things to have to carry.
13:44And it's a brand that has to be protected at all costs.
13:47In fact, it's funny.
13:48I was talking to my 10-year-old daughter yesterday
13:51and about, you know, what we're going to be talking about today.
13:54And she was like, Mommy, she said,
13:56no one at school even knows who Princess Diana is.
13:58And I thought that was fascinating because to you and I,
14:01she is such a seismic figure.
14:05I think to everybody, whether you're a royalist,
14:07whether you're interested in the rules or not,
14:09there is that kind of sense of Marilyn.
14:11I think she was 37 when she died so young.
14:14But the generations that are coming after us,
14:17will she keep her place?
14:20I think she'll always keep her place in royal history.
14:21There should be another mysterious sculpture
14:23standing in a public park somewhere
14:25that people think, I wonder who that was, you know?
14:27Their shelf life.
14:28This is a terrible way of talking about someone.
14:30But I mean, as kind of royal figures,
14:32I think is quite short.
14:33Because the whole point is new ones come along, right?
14:36Yeah.
14:36They refresh the product.
14:38Yeah.
14:38All the time.
14:39It's interesting, isn't it, about everyone who was around then
14:43remembers where they were when they heard the news.
14:45It was a huge, huge story and it was terrible too.
14:48And people were very moved by it in all sorts of ways,
14:52in sometimes quite odd ways, I think.
14:54I thought that maybe royalty, the royal family, the monarchy,
14:58was losing power and losing its grip on our imagination
15:01and our interest.
15:03I think the irony is that Diana,
15:05who perhaps many in the court circle thought of as dangerous,
15:10actually kind of gave power back to the monarchy.
15:13We were still interested in that story.
15:15We were interested in her because of who she was,
15:16who she married, who she mothered.
15:20That was what was interesting to us.
15:21In a way, I think it gave power to the monarchy.
15:23Well, I guess what happened two years before her death,
15:25that unprecedented interview with Panorama in 95,
15:30we'd never really heard a royal speak, be interviewed,
15:35and certainly be so open with their emotions.
15:38You know, there is still, even now, in 2026,
15:41there's this stiff, the royal stiff, half a lift.
15:43I mean, I think William and Harry have done a lot to dispel that.
15:45And to be fair, you know, Charles himself.
15:48But before that interview, no one had really sat down in front of a camera
15:52and spoken and spoken and been so open.
15:55Was that a game changer?
15:57I think it was, actually.
15:58And I think it's an interesting one,
15:59because I remember at the time thinking,
16:01they're going to go into meltdown over this.
16:03It's just not what you do, right?
16:04It's completely off, there's no precedent for that.
16:08Actually, I think it's, they are quite like that.
16:10They often are quite outspoken.
16:12They often are quite direct.
16:13They are people who I think can,
16:15through force of personality, change the way we perceive them.
16:18I'm going to think of, you know, the royal family,
16:20the doc made, what, 1969?
16:22Yeah.
16:22Prince Philip's idea.
16:23I think you let the cameras in for a year.
16:24Yeah.
16:25It was very, very polite.
16:27I mean, the most exciting thing that happened
16:28was that Charles's cello string broke, you know?
16:31Or they burnt some sausages on a barbecue.
16:33They couldn't find the dressing up at Balmoral.
16:35I thought that was funny.
16:36And I remember there being,
16:37well, I was only a kid when it happened.
16:39I remember being absolutely fascinated by it.
16:41We all watched it.
16:41We all wanted to see.
16:42And in retrospect now,
16:44I think a lot of people would say that
16:46monarchy only works if you shroud it in mystery.
16:49Okay, if you shine light on that,
16:50if you open the window,
16:51you lose something that takes some of its power away.
16:55And I'm not sure about that now.
16:57I think you energise it a bit that way.
17:00And then maybe you withdraw again.
17:02And again, why this sort of constant change of personnel
17:04is a good one.
17:05And you would think, in a way,
17:08what Princess Diana enabled was Catherine Middleton.
17:11But I think Catherine Middleton,
17:12the Princess of Wales, as she is now,
17:14in a way, is picking up a narrative
17:17which is more like the late Queen, right?
17:19I think for the royal family, with the media,
17:22we do want, don't we want to be let in?
17:24Don't we want to see?
17:25But I don't think we want too much, do we?
17:27I think we want impossible things.
17:29I think we want them to be contradictions, right?
17:31We want them, on the one hand,
17:32to be accessible and available to us.
17:34On the other hand,
17:34somehow to embody something that's separate from us.
17:37So the mystery, the history, the authority.
17:40I mean, lots of people don't like that.
17:41And they're perfectly entitled to that view.
17:43But I think if you think monarchy
17:45does bring something of value,
17:47then it does need to be kind of ring-fenced a little bit.
17:50So it's, I'm saying, a contradictory thing.
17:51On the one hand, we want access.
17:53On the other hand, we want them also to be a bit separate from us too.
17:56Because we want them to be like us
17:58so that we can identify with them.
18:00But we don't want them to be too like us
18:02because then the mystique goes,
18:04and what's the point of them?
18:04And why are we paying for them?
18:06And also, why would you do it if it were you?
18:09I mean, I often think if, you know,
18:11I imagine, I think there was a period with Prince William
18:15for a while ago
18:16when he sort of realised the awfulness of the destiny
18:20that lay ahead of him.
18:21Yes, the enormity.
18:22Because nobody in their right mind would choose to do that, right?
18:25Absolutely.
18:25You get born into it.
18:26You get trained for it, unfortunately.
18:28But I can quite see why you might think
18:30I would much rather just go and, I don't know.
18:33Farm my estate.
18:34Farm my estate.
18:36And live the life of a simple landowning aristocrat, right?
18:39Totally.
18:39And I guess what happened with the press and Diana
18:42during the 80s and then the 90s
18:45with the War of the Waleses.
18:47And, I mean, look, let's be honest about this, Richard.
18:49There was briefing from both camps.
18:51There was briefing from Diana's side.
18:53There was briefing from Charles' side.
18:54He had the kind of...
18:55Just explain what that means for the benefit of...
18:57Oh, sorry.
18:57Briefing.
18:58Yes, we know from Diana telling us in 95
19:01that Charles had an affair with Camilla Parker Bowles.
19:04Now, it was pretty well known by that point.
19:07But I think when no one knew about it in the press,
19:12it was briefed that Charles was having an affair with Camilla.
19:15What does that mean?
19:16It means that people who were sympathetic to Diana
19:19would tell sympathetic journalists.
19:22Then photographers would follow Charles and Camilla.
19:26Obviously, there was that infamous incident
19:28with people listening in to phone calls
19:31on a radio transmission.
19:33You know, Princess Diana had partners as well.
19:36And it became very acrimonious written about in the press.
19:41And so if you are seeing that your point is not getting out
19:45or you're being unfairly victimised,
19:47you might let it be known or get your staff to let it be known
19:50to newspaper editors or proprietors or friendly royal journalists
19:54so that they can print your side of the story.
19:57But also, the intensity, the focus on her,
20:01the Princess of Sales, I believe,
20:02as journalists refer to her, that's right?
20:04Well, yeah, because her pictures could command such high prices
20:08for the photographers who were following her.
20:10I mean, there was that awful...
20:11I think she only ever sued once
20:13because they were taking pictures of her inside her gym.
20:17She was a member of the Harbour Club in Chelsea,
20:19and I remember reading that they had to build up
20:22all these huge walls because the photographers
20:25were training their lenses in.
20:27I mean, I say that would never happen now,
20:28but of course, you know, Kate Middleton got pictures taken of her
20:32when she was sunbathing topless in a very private French chateau
20:36where photographers should never have been anywhere near.
20:37And the value of those pictures, of course,
20:39created such a market for her.
20:41I mean, there was somebody I know who was a good friend of hers
20:43who was with her when she left the building once
20:45and they were perhaps outside.
20:47And it wasn't just, you know, that familiar thing
20:49of lots of people saying,
20:50Diana, Diana, and taking pictures and flash.
20:52They were saying stuff deliberately intended to antagonise her
20:56because they knew that there'd been incidents
20:58when she'd just kind of, you know, lost it.
21:00Remember that thing when she was going through an airport
21:01and she was just being pursued by...
21:03And she put the handbag up.
21:05Yeah.
21:05And of course, those pictures have got real value.
21:07So they would often deliberately say things
21:09which were really, really very shocking things to say.
21:12And to kind of go out for dinner
21:15and step out onto the pavement and be greeted with that
21:17day after day after day, well, I would be volatile.
21:21And also, I think we...
21:23It's easy to forget now,
21:24but the effect it had both on William and Harry.
21:28Yeah.
21:28Look, we don't want to be armchair psychologists
21:30because I hate all that, you know,
21:31body language, psychologist rubbish.
21:33But Harry and William, in their own way,
21:35have spoken a lot about how the experience
21:40with their mum impacted them,
21:42the way that they deal with the press now.
21:45And obviously, you know, the brothers are still not...
21:47I mean, it's very, very sad.
21:48The brothers are still not speaking,
21:49but we can talk about that another time.
21:52Because of such indelible memories from their childhood,
21:57neither Harry or William really want to engage with the press.
22:00And I think it's very interesting with William now,
22:03he is leaning in more to his destiny.
22:07I think you're right.
22:09I think he's more comfortable now with becoming king,
22:12but you're absolutely right.
22:13There was a period when he really, really didn't want it at all.
22:15Isn't that interesting?
22:16Because the one thing they perhaps had in common
22:18was that united, shared loathing of the media,
22:22whom they both understandably blame for hounding their mother.
22:28And perhaps one of the reasons why the division between them
22:30widens rather than narrows is that, as you say,
22:34William is more and more conscious that the role that he inhabits now
22:38and will inhabit is one in which he's going to have to engage with the press more.
22:42I think that Harry's road has been to litigate, to litigate, to sue.
22:47William's road has been to understand that he can use the press.
22:55He doesn't want to answer any difficult questions.
22:58Time for another break.
22:59But after, we'll be taking a look at the royal family's biggest PR disasters
23:04and how they navigate a so-called crisis.
23:06But before we do that, we have another trivia question for you.
23:09And it's this. In her lifetime, how many corgis did Queen Elizabeth II own?
23:23Welcome back to Catching Up with the Royals.
23:26And you'll remember before the break, I asked you,
23:28how many corgis did Queen Elizabeth II own in her lifetime?
23:31Well, the answer is more than 30, and all descended from the corgis she got
23:36on her 18th birthday, which was called, in a very Elizabeth II way, Susan.
23:42Love that.
23:43Corgis, corgis, corgis.
23:45I don't think there's been a huge press PR disaster around corgis, Emily, has there?
23:50But there have been a few.
23:51And I'm thinking, I was in Lowestoft the other day.
23:54Were you? What were you doing in Lowestoft?
23:56I was doing a book festival in Lowestoft.
23:58Charming place.
23:59Do you think of...
24:00I've never been.
24:01Well, it's a lovely little place.
24:02We should go.
24:03We should definitely go.
24:04We wouldn't be the first to go, because 90 years ago, almost to the moment, actually,
24:09there were two temporary residents of Lowestoft.
24:11Wallace Simpson, the wife of an American businessman,
24:15and King Edward VIII, who was having an affair with her.
24:18He was about to abdicate, perhaps the greatest royal scandal...
24:22Ever.
24:23...just in living memory.
24:25And the reason was that he wanted to marry her.
24:28And the deal was that he could only marry her, because she was a divorcee twice, I think,
24:32was if he abdicated the throne.
24:34Now, to establish the facts of a divorce in those days,
24:38you had to sort of do this little thing where you were seen together at an hotel or somewhere.
24:43Oh.
24:43And they chose Lowestoft, of all places.
24:45There's a charming hotel at Lowestoft.
24:48You can stay there now today.
24:49I highly recommend you do a lovely tea.
24:51And it was there that Mrs. Wallace Simpson stayed,
24:54and there that the King was also, so that the...
24:58Was seen.
24:59They were seen together.
25:00Well, he used to go to a pub, actually,
25:03and you used to stand people drinks in the bar, I was told, while I was there.
25:06Oh.
25:06Which tells you something, I think, about...
25:08Well, you could never do that now, because the press would be all over it.
25:11Well, everyone would get their mobile phones out as well, taking all those pictures.
25:14But, I mean, it's hard to overstate, I think, the impact the abdication had.
25:19It was all...
25:20I mean, you thought sort of Diana's interview on Panorama was shocking.
25:24Well, the King coming on the wireless and saying,
25:26I am unable to fulfil the meaning that I'm married to the woman I love.
25:30I mean, it was just startling.
25:32It struck at the heart of state, church, monarchy, government.
25:38Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, was involved.
25:40The Archbishop of Canterbury was involved.
25:42All these really tricky negotiations.
25:44And it ended up with Edward VIII abdicating,
25:47going off into a life with Wallace Simpson of kind of awful, sterile luxury, I guess.
25:53And it meant that George VI, who never intended or wanted the job, ascended the throne.
25:59The Queen Mother, as we know her, his wife, Queen Elizabeth,
26:02never forgave him for it because she'd think it killed her husband, not unreasonably.
26:07Net benefit to us, we ended up with Elizabeth II,
26:09who did a pretty brilliant job as monarch.
26:11But it was a moment that it's hard to...
26:15You couldn't really overstate just how significant it was.
26:17Totally.
26:18And I still think it is the defining royal moment of the 20th century.
26:22And it still has ramifications today in the 21st,
26:26because when Harry and Meghan were trying to negotiate their withdrawal as working royals,
26:31that spectre of the abdication still hugely hung over the whole discussion.
26:39And the late Queen, as we now must call her, her leech majesty, Queen Elizabeth,
26:43as the courtiers call her.
26:44The whole course of history was altered because of her uncle forsaking his duty for the sake of an American.
26:51And here it was, was history repeating itself.
26:54Fine, Harry's not the heir.
26:56He's the spare, as he always likes to remind us.
26:59But the royal family see their job as duty.
27:06And you never, ever give up on duty.
27:09You know, the Queen famously never retired.
27:11Charles will never retire.
27:12We're not going to see...
27:13Some European monarchies, like Denmark, the Queen of Denmark...
27:18Lightweight.
27:18Lightweight.
27:19She abdicated, you know, so that her son could become king.
27:22But the Queen of Denmark effectively gave up the throne to retire.
27:25You're not going to see that here in the UK, partly because, in my opinion, of the legacy of abdication.
27:33Because even when the late Queen Elizabeth was really seriously ill,
27:38she still believed that she had a job to do, partly because it was God.
27:43God had chosen her, Dio et Mendois, and God on my right,
27:47and that it was her God-given job to fulfil to the state.
27:51But I think maybe Meghan didn't quite realise what it involved walking away as a working royal
28:00and all the history that went with that.
28:02It's fascinating.
28:03I always wondered that moment at which someone who comes into the royal family
28:06realises what they've actually let themselves in for.
28:09Yeah.
28:10It's so interesting that so few of those marriages survive, let alone seem to prosper.
28:15I do sometimes wonder about Camilla Shand, then Parker Bowles, now Queen Camilla.
28:22You know, Harry's accusation that her, you know, she always wanted to be queen.
28:27She left bodies on the floor in her way to try and rehabilitate her image.
28:32Did she actually want to be queen?
28:34Yes, she loved Charles.
28:35I do believe that.
28:36But, you know, to marry into the royal family, I think she was quite happy to be his mistress.
28:41I think she does what she can to maintain a life that's separate from it.
28:46So she can sometimes take herself off and try to live a life where,
28:51obviously with a barricade around it, where it's her and a dog, you know,
28:55and a smelly old horse and all that kind of stuff that they seem to like.
28:58She can kick her shoes off, have a glass of red wine, roast a chicken.
29:01She used to be a smoker.
29:03The sacrifices one makes in the country.
29:04The sacrifices you make after marrying into the royal family.
29:07I've got a good story about her.
29:09Go on, tell me.
29:10Can you share it?
29:10Well, I can, though, because it's the actor Dominic West,
29:13as you remember, played Prince Charles in that season of The Crown,
29:16which was about the marriage to Diana.
29:18It was very, very, must have been so difficult for the royal family to have to watch.
29:22Oh, yes.
29:23I hated it.
29:24Well, it was announced that Dominic West had got this part.
29:26And then his wife, who lives in Ireland, has a big gardener,
29:31and Camilla is also into gardens.
29:34And it was when Camilla was Duchess of Cornwall,
29:35and they had a reception at Clarence House for all these gardening people to come.
29:39And anyway, Dominic West's wife came.
29:41And Dominic said, can I come too?
29:42And the wife said, no, you can't.
29:44No way.
29:44You've just been announced as pretty.
29:45It's not going to happen.
29:46But he cajoled her into it.
29:48So anyway, he turned up.
29:50There they were at Clarence House.
29:51The Duchess of Cornwall walks in, came straight over to him,
29:55and he went, oh, good evening, your royal highness.
29:56And she went, good evening, your royal highness.
29:58And Camilla had carried on past.
30:01But that rehabilitation of Camilla, I mean, after the death of Diana,
30:04when everyone was so deeply affected by that,
30:06and the whole thing was just too awful for words,
30:09to gradually all of a sudden start appearing in public life,
30:13and then to be accepted as a sort of palace insider,
30:17and then to be rehabilitated in that way.
30:21I think it's a very well-executed thing.
30:24It was, and I think that obviously there's a lot of comms people
30:27who are employed at the palace, paid for by us, Richard,
30:30paid for by the British taxpayer.
30:33But that was Mark Bolland, who, in my opinion,
30:37really kind of supercharged the PR offering at the palace.
30:42And when I say the palace, I mean, it was called Operation PB.
30:45The operation, the manoeuvres to rehabilitate Camilla Parker Bowles.
30:54And maybe that's what Harry means when he accuses Camilla of doing it,
30:58but maybe what he meant to say, it was Mark Bolland.
31:01But I think Mark was very, very canny,
31:04because he made relationships with newspaper editors, with proprietors.
31:08He knew that Camilla was also interested in the media.
31:11He set up meetings, and he famously,
31:16when they first appeared together, Camilla and Charles,
31:19it was leaving a party at the Ritz.
31:23And it was kind of, the photographers all knew that it was going to happen,
31:26but it did have that element of, it wasn't a setup,
31:29it was a setup, but it wasn't a setup.
31:31And it was kind of, they were just leaving and getting into their car.
31:33I think at the time, Charles was really worried about
31:38whether it would be okay, whether it would work.
31:42Even when they got married, they were worried about that.
31:44The other thing, of course, is nobody really knows anything.
31:47I remember talking to someone who was involved in the funeral of Princess Diana
31:51and talking about everybody kind of lining up outside Buckingham Palace
31:55as the hearse arrived to begin the long walk to Westminster Abbey.
31:59And there were millions of people.
32:00You remember how volatile that week was.
32:02Public opinion was here, public opinion was there.
32:04Everyone was crying.
32:04Everyone was over it.
32:06Imagine that, about having to set out on that particular journey,
32:10not knowing what the reaction of people was going to be.
32:13I just think that must be the most terrifying thing about that job
32:16is that you step out and you have no idea what the reaction is going to be.
32:20Do you think that the royals need disasters just as much as they need success?
32:25Because there's this sort of off-sighted anecdote within royal reporting
32:30that the royal family survives on births, deaths, and marriages.
32:34Because the level of interest in Princess Diana's death was even more than that of the late queen.
32:39Do you think the royal family need those disasters?
32:42Well, I think births, marriages, deaths, divorces, and scandals too,
32:46because it intensifies the interest, doesn't it?
32:49But it is the fuel which fuels the engagement of all our interests.
32:55And without that, is there such a thing as bad publicity?
32:58Well, I think perhaps recent royal interviews...
33:02Andrew McBatt and Windsor springs to mind.
33:04But that's probably for a different episode.
33:06Well, now, listen, folks, time for a break.
33:10We're going to be opening our royal red box to answer some of your questions.
33:13But before then, time for one last royal question.
33:17True or false, the royals aren't allowed to play Monopoly.
33:21Answer after the break.
33:22Dun, dun, dun!
33:32Welcome back to Catching Up With The Royals.
33:34Now, before the break, Richard asks you,
33:37is it true or false that the royals can't play Monopoly?
33:42And, go on, Richard, what do you think?
33:45It's hard to imagine them not playing Monopoly,
33:49but I can see how if there's delicate family politics happening,
33:53you might not want to get too stuck into a ballgame.
33:56And also, they already own Regent Street.
33:57Well, they already own Regent Street, exactly.
34:00So, it is absolutely false that they are not allowed to play Monopoly.
34:04Of course, they're allowed to play any board game they want.
34:06In fact, they do a lot of parlour games and board games at Christmas at Sandringham.
34:10But apparently, Harry once said that they don't play Monopoly too often
34:13because it gets very competitive.
34:15Interesting.
34:15I wonder if Prince Charles, as was, always said,
34:18he, as the Duke of Cornwall, had to have Regent Street.
34:22See if it's part of the duchy.
34:24I wonder if you were playing Risk, for example,
34:26those former parts of the British Empire,
34:28they might go for that a bit more than a normal person.
34:31Yeah, maybe the late Queen might have liked that.
34:33But I think maybe, I mean, I can't imagine Meghan,
34:35as the Duchess of Sussex, would have enjoyed that very much
34:38on her first Christmas at Sandringham.
34:42It would have been a very long weekend.
34:44And, very exciting now, Richard, we have viewers' questions.
34:48I love this bit of the show.
34:49And we've got a red box, look at that.
34:50We've got a red box.
34:51I somehow think this makes us more important than we actually are.
34:55My only thing I want in life is to be more important than I actually am.
34:58Our red box.
34:59Shall I tell you what questions we have today?
35:01Yes, please.
35:03So, Meghan from Montecito.
35:07I know, I know, I know, she's already emailing in.
35:10No, I think it's Meghan without an H, thank goodness.
35:13Otherwise, can you imagine?
35:14Although I do know that Meghan did used to read a lot.
35:18Anyway, more of this in a minute.
35:19So, Meghan without an H, but we don't know from where,
35:22Meghan is emailing, asks,
35:23do the Royals have normal day-to-day hobbies like the rest of us?
35:27Well, actually, yes, they do,
35:29although their version of normal might be a bit different from us.
35:31For example, shooting pheasants, for example.
35:35Straightforward shooting weekends.
35:36Well, that kind of thing.
35:37But there are other interesting ones.
35:38I mean, Prince William, interestingly, is into motorbikes.
35:41Really?
35:42The Princess of Wales.
35:44What do you call her?
35:46Kate or Catherine.
35:47What do you think?
35:48I don't know.
35:50Kate, Catherine.
35:51Kay Middy.
35:52Kay Middy.
35:53Kay Middy.
35:54I think we, yeah, Kay Middy.
35:56Her Royal Highness, the Princess of Wales.
35:58Whatever.
35:58Wild water swimming.
36:00But where do you do,
36:01I suppose if you're in North Norfolk,
36:02you can get to the sea there.
36:03But can you imagine the palaver?
36:06I mean, maybe they have to have like a mini submarine with security people.
36:09Sort of the periscope goes up just to check.
36:12The Queen apparently likes Wordle,
36:15which sort of fits with what we know of her love of literacy and everything.
36:18She likes a bit of Wordle.
36:20I mean, there have been some famous hobbyists.
36:22I mean, George V,
36:24he was a great stamp collector,
36:27which is a very kind of typical of that era.
36:29You know, we're talking about the early 20th century.
36:32Did I, who came along and related to it,
36:34did I have a stamp collection?
36:35It was a big thing.
36:36Did you?
36:36As a kid or as an adult?
36:38Even I'm not that nerdy.
36:40Although I have got a thing for World War II fighter planes.
36:44And for Christmas,
36:44my partner gave me a schematic of a Mark I Spitfire.
36:47Don't start me on that.
36:48Wow.
36:49So yeah, nerdy.
36:49But I don't have a stamp collection anymore.
36:51But the Royal Stamp,
36:52because this is an interesting thing,
36:53their hobbies,
36:54because you know everyone collected stamps.
36:55The Royal Stamp collection is worth in excess of 100 million pounds.
36:59Because if you are King George V,
37:02you can, you know.
37:03Well, the Royal Mint will just send you,
37:05you know, a whole first,
37:07what do you call it?
37:08Is it called the first edition?
37:09Is it a first?
37:10First day cover thing.
37:11First day cover, that's it.
37:13Well, I mean, he just sent also some of the rarest,
37:15in fact, the rarest stamps are in the Royal Stamp collection.
37:18I just like the thought of them getting into a sort of,
37:20like cabbage patch dolls or trivial pursuits.
37:24I mean, I suppose one of the things you,
37:25I remember going to Sandringham once,
37:27and in the sort of drawing room there,
37:31somebody opened a little cupboard-y thing,
37:33and inside there was a telly.
37:36And so apparently the Queen Mother used to watch the racing.
37:39Yes.
37:39And the late Queen, Queen Elizabeth,
37:42loved a bit of TV.
37:44Apparently she used to watch Coronation Street.
37:46And one year there was some Coronation Street special,
37:49and maybe she was doing her day job,
37:51which was going to church on Christmas Day at Sandringham.
37:54Quite right to.
37:55And, you know, addressing the nation at 3 p.m.
37:58But apparently she knew that she was going to miss
38:00the scheduled Coronation Street Christmas special.
38:04So she got one of the flunkies, sorry, courtiers,
38:07to videotape it for her.
38:09And then she had it sent up to Balmoral when she went up there
38:13so that she could watch it.
38:14I was in a pop band in the 80s.
38:16We used to have Brookside tapes and couriered out to us.
38:20Did you?
38:20When you were touring?
38:21Yeah.
38:22Had to keep up with Brookie.
38:23Yeah.
38:23And the other thing I heard is that the Queen used to vote on Strictly.
38:27Really?
38:27Yeah.
38:28Do you think she voted for you?
38:30Doubt it very, very much.
38:31I bet she did.
38:32I bet she did.
38:33I'm sure she didn't.
38:35So everyone seems to think,
38:36oh, are they just like us, really?
38:37Well, yes and no is the answer.
38:39I mean, lots of the kind of things that we like to be swashbuckling.
38:42Polo, for example.
38:44Harry, William, Charles always likes a bit of polo,
38:47which is not what we call a regular sport, I guess.
38:50I mean, you have to have the big bucks, I think, don't you?
38:53A, to have the horse rising lessons in the first place,
38:55and then B, to even be part of a polo team,
38:58to have the polo ponies.
38:59Because I think it's got a chukka, a chukka,
39:03the length of time that they play.
39:05And then I don't think they have like seven or eight chukkas,
39:07and they're changing their polo ponies all the time.
39:09I mean, that's a lot of equine money, isn't it?
39:12I don't think you get to do it in a comprehensive.
39:14I don't think you do.
39:15Not really, do you?
39:16I don't think you do.
39:17But I mean, they must do things like Prince George,
39:20or Prince Louis, or Princess, I've forgotten her name,
39:23Charles, Prince George, Prince Louis, Princess Charles.
39:25They play video games like everybody else, don't they?
39:28Do you know what?
39:29That's a really interesting thing,
39:30because recently Prince William said that all three of their children
39:33weren't allowed mobile phones.
39:36And I wondered then, were they allowed on gaming devices,
39:41like a Switch or an iPad?
39:43And I think that they are,
39:46but their parents really kind of regulate the screen time.
39:49But what I thought was really interesting,
39:50I saw a picture recently of William landing at Kensington Palace
39:55with George and Charlotte coming off a helicopter.
39:59So I think they just come back from Norfolk
40:02and they chop it into London.
40:03And George was carrying a book.
40:05And I thought, how great was that?
40:0813-year-old boy reading a book?
40:10And that they have very normal hobbies, I think, the kids.
40:13There's any, you know, the normal, and you're right,
40:15they have the extraordinary ones
40:17that only the very rich can buy for their children.
40:21George is learning to fly.
40:23So he's getting his, I don't know how old you have to be
40:25to have your pilot's license, but whenever he's old enough,
40:28he's learning to fly.
40:29Yeah, he's had flying lessons.
40:31Well, I guess his dad is a very keen flyer.
40:33I mean, William has kept up his pilot's license.
40:36And in fact, the late Queen used to get very irate with William
40:40because he used to pilot the helicopter of his family
40:45with Kate and the kids.
40:46And so she was very worried that if there was an accident,
40:50that would mean all five of them, but he liked, would go.
40:55But he kept up and has kept up his pilot's hours
40:58by being their taxi driver, so to speak.
41:01But yes, George has been having flying lessons.
41:03So there are those hobbies or sports that only the very,
41:08very rich can afford, which that's one.
41:10But then also George likes to do triathlon.
41:12And so, you know, that's a bit more, you know.
41:15It's good going with his dad to watch Villa as well, hasn't it?
41:17He goes with his dad.
41:18Oh, yeah, cool, football.
41:19Yeah.
41:19We didn't even talk about football.
41:21I think it's interesting.
41:22I'm a Brummie.
41:23And, you know, you're either a...
41:25Are you Villa?
41:26Yes.
41:26Well, I went to a Villa school.
41:28I went to a Villa school.
41:29You're either Villa or you're Birmingham City.
41:31My mum's a blue nose, Birmingham City.
41:33I'm Villa.
41:34I think it's interesting that William takes George to the Villa games
41:38because he's so protective of his children's privacy.
41:41But it's obviously something that they love doing together.
41:46It's a hobby.
41:47Yeah.
41:47Doesn't everyone love football?
41:49We've got a prime minister who loves Arsenal.
41:51I know.
41:52Whilst it's a really nice thing for them to be able to do together,
41:56is that also not part of their brand?
41:59Is that not, look at what a great dad I am.
42:01I'm hanging out with my son.
42:03I mean, you couldn't...
42:04I'm a Chorley fan.
42:05And I'd love there to be a royal fan at Chorley,
42:08but it's not really set up for that kind of security operation.
42:12I mean, you would have to be...
42:14Because Cape Photography.
42:16Yes, famously.
42:18Well, that was a good one, wasn't it?
42:20I'm enjoying these questions.
42:21There'll be more of them, please.
42:22Don't forget, you can send your questions to royals at spirit-studios.com.
42:29That's all for today from the show that never complains,
42:32but always explains.
42:34And don't forget, we're with you every Thursday,
42:36wherever you get your podcasts,
42:38over on our YouTube channel and to stream on 5.
42:41And if you like what you hear, please do follow and subscribe.
42:44It's completely free and helps us ensure
42:47that we can bring you the best possible
42:49royal news, views and analysis.
42:52Same again next week, Richard.
42:54Same again next week, Emily.
42:55It's a date.
43:15That's a date.
43:16You
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