While Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace have mostly gone silent for a fortnight, the British media has been attempting to churn out some royal fantasies, mostly involving the Sussexes. Like, four years later, and the usual suspects are still talking about whether Prince Harry will visit and whether he’ll make peace with Prince William and Kate. I’ve noticed another weird side-story about how, according to royal experts, Harry is desperate to check on Kate’s health but Meghan is “stopping” him. Now another old favorite is being dusted off: Meghan “disrupted” Harry’s relationship with Kate. What?

The Duchess of Sussex Meghan Markle “disrupted” Prince Harry’s relationship with key royals, including his sister-in-law the Princess Kate, a royal expert has claimed. The Duke of Sussex and Princess Kate shared a close bond before Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, left their royal duties and exposed private information on the family in interviews, their Netflix documentary, and in Harry’s memoir, Spare.

A royal expert has now claimed that Meghan “disrupted” Harry’s bond with Kate, who previously had met and “approved” of his former girlfriends.

Ingrid Seward, editor in chief of Majesty magazine and author of “My Mother and I” explained to The Telegraph: “Every time he had a new girlfriend, the first person that would meet her would be Kate. And then Meghan came into the mix, and it was disruptive. It wasn’t like the other girlfriends.”

Harry and Kate’s relationship was once a close bond with Harry previously “longing for a sister” according to Seward. Yet after Harry and Meghan wed in 2018, things soured as Seward added: “I think that Meghan must have been incredibly envious and then jealous of Kate.”

[From The Daily Mirror]

“And then Meghan came into the mix, and it was disruptive. It wasn’t like the other girlfriends.” Why do we need C-word to royalsplain something which Harry already detailed in Spare? As soon as he saw Meghan on his friend’s social media, he knew Meghan was the one. THAT is what was “disruptive” to Kate and William: Harry fell deeply in love and immediately began planning to spend the rest of his life with a beautiful American woman. The “plan” was that Harry either needed to stay a bachelor forever (for Kate and William’s comfort and needs) or that he end up a chronic f–kup in love, divorced, broken and pliable to the Firm. Positioning Kate as Harry’s priority in any way is asinine, especially since we’re talking about his sister-in-law who was racist towards his wife and child! Kate found Meghan “disruptive” because Meghan was beautiful, successful, stylish and because Harry was clearly head over heels in love.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Instar, Backgrid, Cover Images.

How are you guys doing so far in this election year? I’m fine, mostly because I’m barely paying attention to the increasingly depressing sh-t coming out of the mainstream media. Those people want Donald Trump to win so badly because it will be “good for ratings” and they want the insanity of MAGA fascism. Meanwhile, it definitely feels like Trump’s support is dissipating, or maybe the MAGAts have just learned how to mask their bullsh-t. Anyway, we have seven months to go and y’all know that many “curveballs” are coming. We’re talking about foreign interference, lies, insurrection, treason and deepfakes. Speaking of, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s Archewell Foundation has teamed with The Future US to combat the deepfake and misinformation.

A bipartisan coalition with support from Hollywood power players and Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Archewell Foundation is working to prepare U.S. voters for a possible deepfake onslaught as the campaign year goes into high gear.

Why it matters: With federal agencies and social media companies barely talking to each other about AI-driven misinformation threats, “this is a disaster waiting to happen — no one’s doing the public inoculation,” warned Miles Taylor, chief policy officer of The Future US, which is coordinating the campaign. Taylor is a former DHS chief of staff — and author of a celebrated op-ed critique of the Trump administration from an “anonymous” insider — who wrote a tell-all book.

The big picture: Last September, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the White House, FBI and other federal officials likely violated the First Amendment by encouraging social media companies to crack down on COVID-19 misinformation. The Supreme Court, which is hearing a government appeal of that ruling, is skeptical that officials overstepped — but the case has already significantly reduced the contact between officials and big tech companies, including election-protection coordination.

Federal agencies have faced a parallel wave of litigation and pressure from Republicans, led by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), to cease efforts to study misinformation on social media around both election and health topics.

Driving the news: The Future US shared two prototype ads that the group is using to gin up interest among Hollywood screenwriters, ad executives and influencers for what it hopes will be a massive earned media campaign, supplemented by an initial $5 million of paid advertising in swing states. One ad shows a woman in Arizona picking up the phone on Election Day, and hearing a voice on the other end that tells her to stay away from the polls because of threats from militant groups. The AI-generated caller, impersonating a poll worker, holds a “real” conversation with the voter.

[From Axios]

According to Axios, Archewell “is also helping brainstorm new content,” hoping to inform voters (especially seniors) not to fall for AI or deepfake voter suppression tactics. The ad campaign will begin airing in swing states (Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan and Wisconsin) later this spring. This is completely keeping with Harry and Meghan’s political energy these days, especially as they’ve been vocal for years about the proliferation of distortion and misinformation on social media. That being said, the fact that the Sussexes are part of anti-AI/deepfake campaign at the same time as the Windsors’ credibility is in the toilet for their photo manipulations… well, it’s funny. Hilarious, even.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Archewell.

The first Bridget Jones film, Bridget Jones’s Diary, is so good. It’s everything you want from a romantic comedy – it’s genuinely funny, it’s comforting, it’s delightfully weird in some places, and it has an extremely likable heroine and a very good Mr. Darcy. The second film – Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason – was not particularly good but still somewhat enjoyable, and they mostly kept to the source material (Helen Fielding’s second book). The wheels well and truly came off for the third film, Bridget Jones’s Baby, in which Bridget tried to choose between Patrick Dempsey and Colin Firth… all while she was close to 50 years old and pregnant. It was a complete mess and it should have killed the franchise. I thought it did! And then we started hearing rumors about a fourth Bridget Jones movie in the works. Well, it turns out that Renee Zellweger is still interested in milking this dead-and-buried franchise, because she’s officially signed on. It will be an adaptation of Fielding’s Mad About the Boy.

Renée Zellweger (Judy) has closed a deal to reprise the role that brought her her first Oscar nomination in Universal Pictures and Working Title’s Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, Deadline has learned.

Others set to return in the film, from director Michael Morris (To Leslie), include Hugh Grant (Wonka) and Emma Thompson (Good Luck to You, Leo Grande). Newcomers to the cast will include Chiwetel Ejiofor (Rob Peace) and Leo Woodall (The White Lotus).

Based on the third book in Fielding’s series, Mad About the Boy picks up with Bridget in her early fifties, as she navigates the challenges of modern life while juggling the responsibilities of motherhood. No word yet as to who Ejiofor and Woodall will be playing.

[From Deadline]

I’m sad to report that I have read Mad About the Boy and I think I know which characters Leo Woodall and Chiwetel Ejiofor are playing. While it will be cute to see Chiwetel as a traditional romantic lead, I wish it was not in a Bridget Jones movie! My God. Leo is definitely being cast as the much-younger man she dates for a few months, right?

Major Spoilers: if we’re going with the Bridget Jones Cinematic Universe, I would assume that Mark Darcy and Bridget get married after she gives birth to their son (at the end of Bridget Jones’s Baby) and then the fourth film will pick up using Mad About the Boy as the source material – the book picks up about a year or two after Mark Darcy’s death. That’s why Colin Firth isn’t “returning” to the franchise – because Helen Fielding killed him off in the book, which is all about Bridget getting back into the dating scene (and as always, losing weight) as a widowed single mother.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Last September, Prince Harry was in England for less than 48 hours before traveling to Germany for the Invictus Games. Harry’s priorities were: attending the WellChild Awards, which had been specifically scheduled around his visit; and paying his respect to his late grandmother on the one-year anniversary of her death. He managed to do both with little drama, only being seen at St. George’s Chapel (where he visited QEII’s crypt) by tourists. Weeks later, we learned that Harry actually did contact his father, who was staying in Scotland at the time. Harry requested a room in Windsor Castle for the night and his father refused, but King Charles apparently tried to hijack Harry’s trip and asked Harry to come up to Balmoral for a day. Harry did not take him up on the offer, and Buckingham Palace did wall-to-wall briefings about it just after the Invictus Games (which BP ignored).

There’s obviously a long and extensive history with the Windsors’ attempts to isolate Harry at Balmoral, and I honestly appreciate the fact that Harry has mostly avoided their Scooby-Doo-esque plots. Speaking of, Page Six’s sources claim that Charles plans to invite the whole Sussex clan to Balmoral this summer. Wait, I thought Charles decreed that no Black folks are allowed at Balmoral?

King Charles may extend an olive branch and invite Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to Balmoral Castle this summer in a bid to be reunited with his grandchildren, sources tell Page Six. The cancer-stricken monarch has seen Prince Archie, who turns 5 next month, on just a few occasions — and only seen Princess Lilibet in person once. However, there is buzz that Charles, 75, will invite the Sussexes to the royal family’s beloved retreat.

The monarch likes to retire to the Scottish countryside every year and is joined by members of the family, from the Prince and Princess of Wales — who is fighting her own cancer battle — to his own siblings.

A well-placed society source told us, “I can see Charles desperately wanting to see the children, and extending this olive branch to Meghan and Harry. He may decide that life is just too short. Balmoral is truly the perfect, restful place for a reunion. If he does issue an invite, then Harry and Meghan should surely agree to the visit.”

Charles only met Lilibet — nicknamed Lili — for the first time during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations for the late Queen Elizabeth in June 2022. It was confirmed that Charles spent time with the children during a vist that a royal source later described as “fantastic” and “very emotional.”

[From Page Six]

A few things – spare us the “Charles wants to see his grandchildren” narrative because that man has done everything he can to shun those children and put them in danger. He even evicted the Sussexes from Frogmore Cottage, their family home to which they had a valid lease (sidenote: we still haven’t heard who moved into Frogmore, btw – they way the Windsors spoke about it, it was a crime to have this small cottage sitting vacant). Anyway, I feel like this is a preview of the Windsors’ summer storyline – will Harry and Meghan come to Balmoral, no, Meghan can’t come because she wasn’t invited, Charles is snubbing Lili from the invitations, etc. I guess the whole “Invictus Games church service” storyline is going nowhere.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Remember Tatler’s infamous “Catherine the Great” cover story? That happened in May 2020, as the world was mostly locked down during the pandemic. Tatler hired “royal writer” Anna Pasternak to write a gossipy piece which worked as a straight-forward “embiggening Kate” article and also worked as a hilarious parody of those kinds of “Kate walks on water” stories. There were so many amazing quotes and insights, like “friends of Kate” wailing: “She feels exhausted and trapped. She’s working as hard as a top CEO, who has to be wheeled out all the time, without the benefits of boundaries and plenty of holidays.” Pasternak also got quotes from people who said outright that Carole Middleton ran William and Kate’s household and bossed around staffers. What else? It was a portrait of William and Kate as completely furious that the Sussexes walked away and there was even a cryptic mention of Rose Hanbury.

When the Tatler cover story came out, it landed like a bomb in royalist media. Kensington Palace threatened Tatler and there was some talk about whether they would sue. Over the course of four months, Tatler began removing sections from the online story, eventually culling the whole thing down to bare bones. Pasternak has never really addressed what happened in 2020… until now. She recently chatted with the Infamous podcast, and you can hear the whole episode here. Here’s one section making the rounds:

Worthless backstabbers William and Kate are. pic.twitter.com/I1eKXYG7CW

— Coyote Fan (@Coyoteband2) April 9, 2024

Throughout the whole episode, the hosts are being rather snotty about the Duchess of Sussex, but Pasternak spends most of the interview saying no, I completely understand why the Sussexes walked away and the British media and the royal institution would have destroyed them. Pasternak calls out the “invisible contract” between the monarchy and the print media, saying that there is an explicit and implicit editorial stance that William and Kate must be lavished with praise at all times while nothing positive can ever be written or published about the Sussexes.

Pasternak also dishes about what happened behind the scenes during the Tatler fiasco. Basically, Tatler’s lawyers told her not to say anything and not to do interviews until they worked something out. By September 2020, they worked out a deal to avoid being sued by William and Kate… and Kensington Palace (William) leaked the deal to the Mail on Sunday. What’s interesting about that is that all Tatler really did to avoid being sued was… remove the bulk of the article from its online archives months after the fact. Thousands of outlets had already repeated and archived those now-deleted sections. Tatler got the last laugh – it was a rare moment where a British outlet made Kate sound like a lazy, self-absorbed dumbass and it took Kensington Palace four months to figure out how to handle it.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, cover courtesy of Tatler.

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Two weeks after announcing that she and her husband had separated, Gypsy Rose Blanchard has formally filed for divorce. According to People, the paperwork was filed at the Lafourche Parish Courthouse in Louisiana. Gypsy and Ryan Anderson got married in a small jailhouse ceremony in July 2022, and have been living together since her release from prison back in December. Gypsy originally announced their separation via Facebook in late March.

Last week, Anderson told The Daily Mail that their split “came out of the blue” and that the public would see it all unfold on their upcoming Lifetime docuseries, titled, Gypsy Rose: Life After Lockup, which will air in June. Gypsy, for her part, got a nose job last week and has been seen holding hands with her ex-fiance, Ken Urker. People has a pretty interesting breakdown of what’s going on with GRB at the moment, which includes an interesting quote from a friend about what made Gyspy end the marriage and a soundbite from Urker’s mother, lol.

Confirmation of the filing: “The filing has been sent to the assigned Judge for review and to schedule any hearing dates if necessary,” Annette M. Fontana, Lafourche Parish Clerk of the Court, says.

GRB’s Facebook announcement: “People have been asking what is going on in my life. Unfortunately my husband and I are going through a separation and I moved in with my parents home down the bayou. I have the support of my family and friends to help guide me through this. I am learning to listen to my heart. Right now I need time to let myself find… who I am,” the post read.

Ryan “screamed” at her: Blanchard’s close friend and tattoo artist Nadiya Vizier, 22, told PEOPLE exclusively that the pair got into a heated argument the night Blanchard decided it was time to end her marriage. “He got in her face and screamed,” Vizier said. “Gypsy said that she was afraid he was going to hit her. He didn’t — but that happened in the past with her mother. So, her first instinct was to tighten up and be prepared. But she got to safety and called her lawyer, too. Ryan is a big guy, and she told me it was really scary.”

Chilling and tattooing with the ex: In the days after her separation, Blanchard was spotted with her ex-fiancé Ken Urker, who joined her in getting matching tattoos. The pair were engaged in the years before Blanchard married Anderson. “They’re very cool,” Urker’s mother Raina Williams previously told PEOPLE of the pair, after confirming they’d reconnected following Blanchard and Anderson’s split. “Ken is just being a supportive friend to her.”

Her dad thought she married too soon: “I wish she would have came home here and when her being on parole was over, live with him, just live with him, learn him,” Rod Blanchard said [in a 2023 interview with PEOPLE]. “She’s grown, and she was told what to do all her life. We wish she wouldn’t have, but like I told her, if it doesn’t work out, I’ll be there to help pick up the pieces. I really do hope it does work out. Ryan’s a great guy. He loves her for all the right reasons.”

GRB on deleting her socials: In March, Blanchard removed herself from the spotlight by deleting all of her public social media accounts. A source explained to PEOPLE at the time that she deleted her accounts “at the advisement of her parole officer, so she won’t get in trouble and go back to jail.”

[From People]

I think Gypsy’s dad, Rod, spoke the most sense here. She and Ryan should have waited to get married, especially given her history. I can imagine the mindset behind someone with Gypsy’s history and circumstances wanting to rush down the aisle, but that was clearly a mistake. If the straw that broke the camel’s back was Ryan screaming at her, which triggered flashbacks to her mother’s physical and emotional abuse, then I can understand why she’d nope out of that marriage so abruptly. I also feel very confident saying that running back to her ex and getting a tattoo is not the right move here either. I know that there are mixed feelings out there about Gypsy, but my read on her is that she’s a very troubled woman who still has years of trauma to unpack and come to terms with through intensive therapy. In short, she needs to step back out of the spotlight, be single for a while, and take some time to heal and figure herself out.

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photos credit: Getty and via social media

To wear underwear to bed, or to not wear underwear to bed, that is today’s question. Whether ‘tis healthier for the body to suffer the confines of further nether-region constriction, or to take off all undergarments at night and by undressing, enjoy freedom? Only this time instead of consulting The Bard, we have a field of experts weighing in. Like Dr. Aaron Spitz, who we all know from penning the seminal tome The Penis Book: A Doctor’s Complete Guide to the Penis. While Dr. Spitz and his colleagues note that there is a dearth of scientific research on the topic (I smell an opportunity for young scientists out there!), the consensus seemed to be to do what feels right for your own body. A few highlights:

No ‘erudite studies’ on underwear sleeping, it’s a matter of choice: First, know that the underwear versus no-underwear debate is not one that’s back up by much research, said Orange county, California, urologist Dr. Aaron Spitz. “The topic of going commando under the sheets is not routinely discussed in academic conferences, and a literature review will not turn up any erudite studies on the topic,” Spitz, author of The Penis Book: A Doctor’s Complete Guide to the Penis, told HuffPost. Dr. Sherry Ross — an OB-GYN and the author of She-ology: The Definitive Guide to Women’s Intimate Health. Period. — said that it really comes down to personal choice.

Different needs for different body parts: If you’re someone who has a lot of vaginal discharge or you’re on your period, sleeping in undies “may be your best option to prevent a nighttime mess in the morning,” Ross said. Those with male genitals, on the other hand, may experience discomfort — particularly in their testicles — if they go commando “due to compression that may occur from their thighs or the mattress while they toss and turn in their sleep,” Spitz said.

The laundry of it all: Wearing underwear to bed means your genitals aren’t making direct contact with your pajamas or your sheets. So you can wash these items a little less frequently — which is a plus if you hate doing laundry. Sleeping in underwear can also protect the urethra, the tube that connects the bladder to the outside of the body, from irritants or infection, Spitz noted. For instance, “bed sheets in hotels and friends’ houses may be washed with detergents that may cause irritation to the urethra of some individuals,” he said. “Underwear, even the loose-fitting kind, will serve as a protective barrier to the urethra.”

Keep it clean, folks! And hopefully this goes without saying, but if you’re sleeping in underwear, make sure it’s a clean pair — not the one you went for a jog in earlier or a pair you pulled from the hamper. “Since underwear comes in close contact with the skin, it is exposed to sweat, oil, dirt, microorganisms like bacteria or fungus, and even bodily fluids,” dermatologist Dr. Joshua Zeichner, associate professor of dermatology at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, told HuffPost. “Sleeping in soiled underwear can contribute to skin irritations or even infections.”

Ditching the undies? No sweat: If you sweat a lot in your sleep or are prone to certain skin or genital conditions, then it may be better to sleep sans underwear to keep things drier and more comfortable below the belt, [dermatologist Dr. Aanand] Geria explained. Wearing tight or nonbreathable underwear can trap moisture in the genital area, creating a damp environment where bacteria and fungi thrive, he said. … And if you have a history of vaginal infections or itching, then “you are better off sleeping commando to allow the skin of the vulva and vagina to breathe,” Ross said.

Freedom from fabric: Even if you’re not prone to skin or genital issues, you may find it just feels nice to sleep without underwear, as it gives this sensitive area of the body a break from being covered by fabric all day long. Plus, doing so can prevent bacterial buildup that may lead to pimples or unpleasant odors down there, Ross said. “The sweat glands and hair follicles are prone to direct buildup just as any other area of the body with hair and sweat,” she explained.

[From BuzzFeed]

Since this is a safe space where people of all nocturnal underwear preferences are welcome, I’ll start out by sharing that I’ve swung both ways in my life. Yes, the rumors are true! As a younger person I strictly adhered to bedtime undies. Even in my own bed it somehow felt improper not to have them on. But those days are long gone, baby! I’m so flipping hot all the time that unless it’s a the-heating-is-broken-during-a-blizzard situation, I’m not wearing bottoms of any kind. And probably not a top either, if we’re being honest. (Yes, I realize all you’ll be thinking about for the rest of the day now is a nude Kismet. You’re welcome.) For the sake of hygiene, and since my sense of time is ephemeral, I mark on my calendar when I put new sheets on the bed so I can keep track of when they need to be changed. Adulthood really is a series of never ending chores, isn’t it?

Photos credit: IMAGO/RW / Mediapunch / Avalon, MHD / Avalon, Backgrid, Vlada Karpovich on Pexels

I loathed the 2019 movie Joker. It made over a billion dollars worldwide at the box office and Joaquin Phoenix won his first Oscar for the stand-alone villain origin story. Obviously, I misjudged the tastes of the film-going public. White dudes were especially taken with the story of an abused and mentally ill “Joker” who ran around, killing people. I found the story to be incel-adjacent and I guess that was a major selling point. Anyway, with a film that successful, of course they made a sequel, and the first trailer for Joker: Folie à Deux has just been released. The sequel features the introduction of Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn – we’d already seen her Harley makeup and costumes in paparazzi photos taken last year, so there’s no big “wow, look at that.”

We heard, months ago, that Folie a Deux would be some kind of musical, and it looks like the plot will revolve around Harley and Joker doing music therapy together as they’re both in the same institution, maybe. While Gaga looks interesting in this role, the whole thing just looks so f–king depressing. If the entire plot takes place within Joker’s delusions… lol. Honestly, the way this is filmed and the way the trailer is cut, it reminds me of Rob Marshall’s Chicago?? Joker = Roxie Hart.

Photos, posters and promotional images courtesy of Backgrid and Warner Bros.

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Gwyneth Paltrow posted a photo of her son Moses Martin on his 18th birthday. People are talking about how Moses looks like a copypasta of his dad, but I see some Paltrow in him too. Both of those kids got Chris Martin’s eyes. [Hollywood Life]
Donald Trump told a lot of lies about abortion this week. [Buzzfeed]
Noah Cyrus responds to haters/gossips. [JustJared]
Beyonce put a spotlight on Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, Reyna Roberts, and Brittney Spencer, and they presented at the CMTs. [LaineyGossip]
I regret to inform you that the cicadas have an STD which makes them hyper-sexual zombies. Yes, this is really happening. [Jezebel]
A rave review of The First Omen, a prequel to The Omen. [Pajiba]
Interview with Monet X Change. [Socialite Life]
Guess the woman behind the weave. [Seriously OMG]
This Lewis Hamilton look is so 1990s. [RCFA]
Reese Witherspoon is developing a Legally Blonde series. [OMG Blog]

It’s been interesting to watch everything around Scoop, the Netflix movie about what happened behind the scenes of Prince Andrew’s infamous 2019 Newsnight interview. If we were talking about The Crown, the Windsors and the royalist media would have thrown a weeks-long tantrum about how much they hate Netflix. But the royalists just sort of ignored everything about Scoop for the most part. There was some chatter among the royal commentators, but no big Daily Mail excoriating Andrew OR Netflix. I think part of it is because the film is pretty straight-forward and it makes everyone involved look bad, including the BBC (unintentionally, which is even funnier). And the performances are actually quite gentle – I thought Rufus Sewell did a perfectly adequate job as Andrew, and I would even say all of the interview scenes are really very good and he’ll probably get nominated for some awards. As Sewell has promoted Scoop, he’s tried to avoid saying anything too bad or too pointed about Andrew or the Windsors, but he code-switched a little bit while chatting with the NY Times:

[Sewell] said he was aware of the risks inherent to this type of role. “I have a kind of nightmare version of the performance that I’m giving that I run madly from,” he said. “In my head it was this weskit-wearing prince regent, a parody, you know, that I was frightened of.” The right performance, he added, was in “the uncanny valley between me and him.”

Becoming the duke the right way, Sewell said, began with studying Andrew, “which really was just obsessively watching and trying to get behind what I could see.” Though he insists he is “not a natural mimic,” he came to learn Andrew’s interview at the most granular level, memorizing every stutter and every hesitation, scrutinizing them for some deeper meaning. “I obsessed to the point of driving myself insane,” he said. “And then when I thought I’d got it, I’d watch the original again and be struck by something I’d missed. That can go on forever.”

The interview itself is notable for its apparent civility, even courteousness. The duke isn’t grilled or antagonized; Maitlis isn’t especially confrontational, simply giving her subject enough rope to hang himself. The film’s director, Philip Martin, noted that the interview “doesn’t have that ‘A Few Good Men’ or ‘Frost/Nixon’ moment where there’s some factual smoking gun, or some line of dialogue that does it.” Instead, he said, “We got a portrait of a person through the interview. That’s why it’s had the impact that it has.”

It was also an astonishingly far cry from the royal family’s media-savvy approach of prior decades, and its longtime motto “Never complain, never explain.” Rather, the duke’s BBC appearance is an hourlong exercise in complaining and explaining. In the film, the duke’s private secretary, Amanda Thirsk (Keeley Hawes), urges the duke to speak to the BBC because she believes an open conversation will endear him to the British public. But the public is outraged.

Sewell said he saw all this as symptomatic of a kind of hereditary delusion in the royal family. Why would the duke, who is Queen Elizabeth II’s second son, think it’s OK to fraternize with Epstein? Because he likes Epstein. How could he possibly think people would believe such lame excuses? Because he thinks he’s convincing, or else that people are stupid. “He’s been lead to believe that he’s shockingly inappropriate in a hilarious way, a lot of fun, naughty, sometimes just devastatingly handsome,” Sewell said.

The power of the BBC interview, Sewell said, came from Maitlis refusing to be charmed. “His mouth gets drier and drier. His breathing becomes labored under the bonhomie,” Sewell said. “All you have to do is not play along, and he’s gasping for air.”

[From The NY Times]

“His breathing becomes labored under the bonhomie…All you have to do is not play along, and he’s gasping for air.” I disagree! I think Prince Andrew and most of the Windsor clan live in their own little world, to the point where Andrew truly didn’t even realize that the interview went poorly until days after it aired. I remember it well, even if the British media wants to pretend to have a selective amnesia about it – Andrew reportedly told his mother that the interview went well after it aired (she didn’t watch it) and QEII’s courtiers were completely fine with it for days until the public pressure became too much. Then-Prince Charles basically had to call his mother and tell her that she couldn’t protect Andrew this time, that something had to be done. The fact that it took days for the “fallout” to reach Buckingham Palace tells you all you need to know about how Andrew had no idea what he had done or how he came across.

“He’s been lead to believe that he’s shockingly inappropriate in a hilarious way, a lot of fun, naughty, sometimes just devastatingly handsome” – I believe this, that Andrew’s view of himself has never been that he’s a degenerate human trafficker who pals around with pedophiles. I’ll make a somewhat unfair comparison – Prince William must think that he’s a witty raconteur whose jokes always land. He doesn’t realize that he’s seen as a very awkward egg.

Photos courtesy of Netflix, Avalon Red.