For years now, whenever the royalists want a quick anti-Sussex headline, they dust off the “should Prince Harry and Meghan’s titles be removed” conversation. Nevermind that it never goes anywhere, nevermind that it would likely take a government intervention to remove the titles, nevermind that Harry actually offered to “give back” the Sussex titles when he and Meghan Sussexited in 2020. The royalists and the actual monarchy want to continue to hold the titles over Harry and Meghan’s heads, like removing the titles is some big threat or punishment. As I’ve said for a while now, the real issue is that the monarchy uses those titles as THEIR tie to Harry and Meghan, as their claim of ownership over H&M. In recent months, even the royalists acknowledge that the title-removal talk is a huge trap, but that hasn’t stopped King Charles and Prince William from talking about it constantly. Well, Ingrid Seward has some thoughts and she’s giving one explanation I haven’t heard verbalized before.

Meghan Markle would be known as Princess Henry if she loses her title as the Duchess of Sussex, according to a royal expert. Ingrid Seward, editor in chief of Majesty Magazine, told The Royal Beat that it’s unlikely Meghan, 42, and Prince Harry, 39, will be stripped of their royal titles by King Charles III, even though they quit their royal duties in 2020.

“I don’t think anything will happen to the titles because, if they lose their titles, Harry is still a prince of the blood and Meghan instead of being the Duchess of Sussex, [would] be Princess Henry,” Seward said, according to The Mirror.

“That really would [confuse the Americans],” she added. “I think [it’s] probably best just to leave it because it looks unkind, it looks unnecessary.”

Prince Harry was born Prince Henry Charles Albert David, but he obviously goes by Harry. So, if Meghan lost her title as Duchess of Sussex, she would technically be called Princess Henry, since it’s royal tradition that a princess takes an official title with her husband’s name. The same rule applies for Kate Middleton, who was technically known as Princess William — but is referred to as the Princess of Wales or the Duchess of Cambridge — when she married Prince William in 2011.

However, as Seward pointed out, Harry and Meghan will likely be known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex forever.

“The Queen gave them the titles, let them keep them – they’re going to be ‘H and M’ anyway,” she said. “I think the best thing is to leave them, ignore them, and let them get on with it – which is really what the Palace and the Royal Family are doing.”

[From Page Six]

“That really would [confuse the Americans].” I mean… she’s actually right, but I can’t believe Seward is admitting that “what will the Americans call H&M” is a factor in the monarchy’s discussions. People Magazine and other American outlets already conflate titles and create shorthand names for royal women, as we do on this blog as well, mostly as a space issue in headlines. “The Duchess of Cambridge” became Duchess Kate, then the Princess of Wales became Princess Kate. It’s easier to refer to them as “the Sussexes” too – less complicated, and it’s simply their “brand” and celebrity name.

Also, there’s a hidden reason for why the titles will not be removed – it’s an admission that the titles are arbitrary, that the Special Royal Blood Club isn’t real, and if titles can be removed on a whim, why have those whims never been extended to Prince Andrew, the Duke of York?

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.

Note: the photos in this post are from last November, during the South Korean president’s state visit to the UK. For that visit, Prince William and Kate were put on display and expected to behave as the dignified Prince of Wales and Princess of Wales. Kate showed up in a giant red cape and flashed everyone. There hasn’t been another state visit since then! There was some question about whether a planned state visit for Japan’s Emperor and Empress would go through later this month. Given the dual health crises for King Charles and Kate, and given the upcoming British general election, it felt like the Japanese state visit was on the fence. Well, Buckingham Palace just confirmed that the visit is going ahead with some adjustments, and at no point should we expect to see the Princess of Wales. This is like a blaring advertisement for “Don’t Expect to See Kate Whatsoever In June.”

King Charles and Queen Camilla are preparing for hosting mode! Buckingham Palace announced on June 4 (local time) that the Emperor and Empress of Japan will pay a state visit to the U.K. from June 25 to June 27. Emperor Naruhito, 64, and Empress Masako, 60, will be the guests of King Charles, 75, during the state visit to London, hosted by the monarch and his wife, 75.

The Emperor and Empress of Japan are due to arrive in England on June 22 and conduct a series of private engagements. The state visit will officially begin when Prince William takes on a key role: welcoming the couple at their hotel on June 25. The Prince of Wales, 41, will greet the couple on behalf of his father and travel with them to Horse Guards Parade in London for their ceremonial welcome.

Prince William similarly led the royal welcome with his wife, Kate Middleton, in November 2023 for the state visit of the President of South Korea, Yoon Suk Yeol, and his wife, First Lady Kim Keon Hee. Princess Kate, 42, has stayed out of the public eye for most of this year after announcing in March that she has cancer and is undergoing chemotherapy, and it’s unclear if she will participate in the upcoming state visit. Although Kate usually helps host state visits, she was not included in the itinerary. (The Princess of Wales will not take the salute at the Trooping the Colour rehearsal on June 8, Kensington Palace confirmed, and her attendance at King Charles’ birthday parade on June 15 remains unknown.)

King Charles and Queen Camilla will welcome Emperor Naruhito and Empress Masako to Horse Guards Parade with military pageantry, and the two couples will travel by carriage along The Mall to Buckingham Palace with Prince William.

That night, King Charles and Queen will reconvene with the Emperor and Empress of Japan for a state banquet at Buckingham Palace thrown in their honor. The diplomatic dinners call for a glamorous dress code, and royal women often slip on tiaras, meaning that Queen Camilla may pick a sparkling headpiece from the royal jewelry collection for the evening. Other members of the royal family are also expected to attend.

[From People]

There’s been so much focus on whether Kate will appear at Trooping the Colour (June 15), meanwhile Buckingham Palace is making it clear that Kate will not be seen at all during a state visit one week later. They’re not even playing the “maybe she’ll come out for a state dinner or the official greeting.” I wonder if we’ll still be getting all of those ridiculous reports of “Kate sightings” and assurances that she’s absolutely running errands and out and about. Hm. Also: if there’s a state dinner, you know Rose Hanbury and David Rocksavage are invited.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

Last Friday, Jennifer Lopez announced the cancelation of her This Is Me… Live Tour, which was supposed to start this summer. Jennifer has been in the dance studio for months, working out the show, so it came as a surprise in a narrow way – Jennifer is a workaholic and it felt like she would just barrel through with the tour, even as her life was falling apart. Now, that being said, I’m sure she was hurt by the poor ticket sales and the general ambivalence towards the album and the tour too. It was going to be a flop tour to support a flop album and the optics would have been awful. Jennifer spent the weekend being seen out and about in LA, going to the farmer’s market with Emme and going to her stepson’s basketball game. According to People Mag, J.Lo’s life is “a lot right now.”

Jennifer Lopez is taking time to recalibrate her life after canceling her upcoming tour. A source close to the singer-actress tells PEOPLE that Lopez is “devastated” to call off her summer concert tour but understands the extra time to dedicate to herself and her loved ones is key.

“Life is a lot right now. As sad as she was to cancel the tour, she’s also relieved. She needs to take care of herself,” says the source.

“The decision was something that her team encouraged,” the source adds. “Everyone is supportive of her focusing on family right now.”

Lopez’s This Is Me… Live tour, in support of her latest album but also rebranded to be a greatest hits concert, was set to kick off June 26 in Orlando, Florida, and travel for shows in Austin, Dallas, Las Vegas, Miami, Toronto, New York City, Boston and more. It would have been her first tour since 2019’s It’s My Party Tour.

The news comes as sources told PEOPLE that Lopez’s marriage with husband Ben Affleck is “not in the best place at the moment.” The two, who famously rekindled their decades-old romance before marrying in 2022, have been living under different roofs while both in Los Angeles.

[From People]

It feels like no one is capable of giving both Jennifer and Ben the benefit of the doubt here. I think it’s more than possible that Ben gave her an ultimatum: it’s our marriage or this dumb tour. As in, you need to stick around this summer and we need to spend time as a family, or else it’s over. Now, was Ben also following the fact that the concert tickets weren’t selling and the whole thing was going to be a disaster? For sure. Anyway, I genuinely hope that Jennifer spends the summer… chilling out with her kids and stepkids and working on her marriage.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

From what we can tell, five out of six Jolie-Pitt kids do not want anything to do with Brad Pitt. Maddox and Pax, the two oldest, were able to immediately distance themselves from Brad following the 2016 incident and I don’t believe Pax and Maddox have had anything to do with Brad since then. Zahara, the next oldest, seemingly dropped “Pitt” from her surname as she attends Spelman College. Then in the past week, we learned that Vivienne dropped “Pitt” from her name in a playbill credit. And finally, Shiloh filed to remove “Pitt” from her legal name on her 18th birthday (May 27). Apparently, she went out and hired a lawyer and paid for it herself. Remarkably, there seems to be a lot of support for Shiloh, an 18-year-old who is taking pains to remove the name of the man who abused her mother and siblings. But of course Brad Pitt had to chime in:

One week after Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s 18-year-old daughter Shiloh filed to drop “Pitt” from her last name, a source close to Pitt tells PEOPLE that the father of six is “aware and upset” about the change.

“He’s aware and upset that Shiloh dropped his last name. He’s never felt more joy than when she was born. He always wanted a daughter,” says the source.

“The reminders that he’s lost his children, is of course not easy for Brad. He loves his children and misses them. It’s very sad,” adds the insider.

“He’s still happy with Ines [de Ramon],” the source continues, but the distance from his children “pains him.”

“He still loves all of his kids tremendously,” another source close to Pitt tells PEOPLE. “This whole process has been very hard for the whole family.”

As previously confirmed to PEOPLE by someone familiar with the matter, Shiloh’s documents were filed on Monday, May 27, which also happened to be her 18th birthday. The teenager is requesting a new legal name, hoping to go by simply “Shiloh Jolie.”

[From People]

While there are dog-whistles in there which Brad hopes will spur support for cries of “parental alienation,” notice the “insider” stops short of being too strident. This is not another laundry list of recriminations against Angelina. Something has shifted – Brad realizes that he can’t keep lying about Angelina and the kids nowadays. Four out of the six kids are over 18 – they can speak out and clap back whenever they want, and I hope they will. Also: “He’s never felt more joy than when she was born. He always wanted a daughter.” When Shiloh was born, Brad was already father to a daughter: Zahara. Brad and Angelina adopted Zahara the year before Shiloh was born.

And another thing – “He loves his children and misses them. It’s very sad” is the kind of thing King Charles throws out there about the Sussexes, especially the “it’s very sad” while taking zero ownership for who created the “sad” situation.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

Princess Lilibet turns three years old today! Prince Harry and Meghan haven’t released any new portraits of Lili, which is fine and I wasn’t expecting them to do so. We haven’t gotten any family portraits or portraits of the kids in a couple of years, really. I think that will be the norm going forward, although I also wouldn’t be surprised if, at some point (maybe for Harry’s 40th birthday later this year), they released a family portrait. According to People Mag, the Sussexes celebrated Lili’s birthday over the weekend, with a small party at their Montecito home.

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s little princess is turning 3!

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will mark the third birthday of their daughter, Princess Lilibet, on June 4, but they got the festivities started early with pre-birthday bash. The family celebrated over the weekend with a party at home in Montecito, California, PEOPLE confirms. Among the guests were close friends and family as well as some of Lili’s friends.

Lilibet Diana Mountbatten-Windsor was born in California after Prince Harry and Meghan stepped back from their royal roles and moved to Meghan’s home state in the U.S. with their son, Prince Archie, now 5, in 2020. Lilibet’s birth announcement, shared on the Archewell Foundation website, said that she was named after Queen Elizabeth’s family nickname while her middle name, Diana, “was chosen to honor her beloved late grandmother, the Princess of Wales.”

The birth announcement also referred to the newborn as Lili, a nickname that Prince Harry and Meghan have continued to call their daughter.

[From People]

They invited Lili’s friends too! I would imagine that means her playgroup friends or nursery school friends? Did Meghan make a cake? Did Harry grill? Give us party details! Was Tyler Perry there for his goddaughter’s birthday party? Anyway, I hope the Sussexes keep winning and keep driving the British media crazy by refusing to give them access to the kids.

Meanwhile, King Charles is a dogs-t grandfather who has only met his redheaded granddaughter once and made zero effort to see her again. Speaking of, “royal expert” Phil Dampier claimed: “It is amazing that she’s already three but there is this underlying sadness of course because of the rift that the King is not seeing his grandchildren.” Again, Charles can’t continue to play this card – he was “too busy” to meet Harry last month, and Charles has shown that he goes out of his way to put Harry in dangerous situations. Harry will not bring his children to see Charles, nor does Charles want to see them.

Photos courtesy of Netflix and Misan Harriman for the Sussexes.

Co-stars and besties Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds appear on dual covers of the most recent edition of People to promote Deadpool & Wolverine, which hits theaters on July 26. They interviewed each other about working together, fatherhood, their longtime friendship (and faux feud), and getting in shape for their superhero roles. One of the most well-known things about Jackman playing Wolverine was his insane fitness and diet regimen. I still vividly remember reading about how he would get up every few hours at night to make sure he ate hard boiled eggs or whatever. Well, Hugh went back to his 8,000 calorie a day diet while training to get back into Wolverine shape. As it turns out, eating all day to bulk up muscle is really tough.

Hugh Jackman has opened up about the “hardest” adjustment he made while gearing up to play Wolverine again this summer. The 55-year-old actor — who stars alongside Ryan Reynolds in the upcoming superhero film “Deadpool & Wolverine” — told People magazine that he was pumped to prepare for his big screen return as the iconic mutant.

“My body was a little sore at the beginning, but I was thrilled that my body was still responding. And I realized how good it is for your brain. But the hardest bit…the food,” said Jackman, who initially decided that he’d retire from playing Wolverine after “Logan” in 2017.

Jackman, who shared a snapshot of his apparent 8,000-calorie diet days on social media early last year, acknowledged that he had to “eat a lot” for the role.

“For me, for my body type, I’m naturally skinny. To get the size on, that’s the hardest bit. That’s the bit that does my head in,” said Jackman, who previously told CNN’s Chris Wallace that he’d make it his “job” to train for the part in “Deadpool & Wolverine.”

Reynolds noted that five or six meals a day might sound “great” to some people.

“But it’s not like the type of food that you would really necessarily enjoy,” he said. Reynolds, who is set to star in his third “Deadpool” movie, told People that he “couldn’t believe” Jackman’s change in physicality.

“Just the sheer relentlessness that you dedicated yourself towards stunts, choreography. It was the first time I’d ever seen how invaluable a background in song and dance is when you are doing an action movie,” he said.

He continued, “You hit your marks in those fight scenes with speed and confidence, the likes of which I have never seen. I don’t care if you were 25, 35, 45 or 55. It was lightning.”

[From HuffPo]

“My body was a little sore at the beginning, but I was thrilled that my body was still responding.” No joke, Mr. Rosie and I climbed a mountain over Memorial Day Weekend and even though I walk/hike on hills several times a week, I was still having trouble walking down stairs for a full five days afterwards. It was one of those, “Okay, well, #ThisIsActually40” moments for me. So, I have to give mad props to Hugh and his commitment and dedication. I would have a hard time eating that much, too, though. I have a healthy appetite, but really nowadays, pizza and brisket are the only two foods that get my dopamine inhibitors up, and I’m pretty sure neither of those were on Hugh’s list of approved non-cheat-day foods. I know, I know; he gets paid millions of dollars to eat chicken burgers and grass-fed sirloin, which is #goals, I guess. Kudos to him for sticking with it and not being like, “It’s okay if I sneak this bag of chips or one-half of a Crumbl cookie,” because even getting paid millions of dollars, that’s the exact argument I would be having with myself.

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Photos credit: Michael Stewart/INSTARimages.com, JosiahW/Backgrid, celebrityphotos uk / Avalon

Over the weekend, the Times decided to do a revival of the “King Charles wants evict Prince Andrew from Royal Lodge” story. The same story has been around for the better part of two years, and the latest version is that Charles is threatening to withdraw his funding of Andrew’s lifestyle and security, something around $5 million annually. The money comes from the Duchy of Lancaster, which is the monarchy’s “personal” piggy bank. This was the deal worked out by Charles and his mother – when she died, Charles would continue to bail out and finance Andrew, and in exchange, QEII gave her blessing for “Queen Consort Camilla.” Charles promises that he will still fund Andrew’s lifestyle, just not to this degree – Charles wants Andrew to move into Frogmore Cottage, the home which the Sussexes renovated at great personal cost, then they were promptly evicted.

As this story goes on and on, I have to think that Andrew is waiting for his brother to make him a good offer. “Eviction and a downgraded house” is not a good offer, especially given that Andrew has a valid lease with the Crown Properties or whatever. The more I think about it, I genuinely believe Andrew is telling Charles to buy him out of the lease with an eight-figure settlement and Charles has balked. I would too, in Charles’s position, quite honestly – the Duchy of Lancaster provided the money for Andrew to settle out of court with Virginia Giuffre, and Andrew still hasn’t “paid back” that money either. Still, Charles doesn’t want Andrew making a horse’s ass out of himself or selling out the family secrets, so some deal will eventually be made. That’s also what Andrew is holding over Charles’s head: Andrew knows where the bodies are buried, etc. Andrew knows that ultimately, Charles isn’t going to do jacksh-t. Which is probably why Andrew has been photographed a lot in recent days, looking like he doesn’t have a care in the world:

Smiling Prince Andrew seen horse riding around Windsor Castle after King Charles ‘threatens to sever all ties’ with duke unless he leaves the Royal Lodge for Frogmore Cottage https://t.co/wW8N3WRCgR pic.twitter.com/VVPeW3Qreb

— Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) June 3, 2024

Meanwhile, there continues to be a weird focus on Frogmore Cottage, which has apparently been standing empty for a year. If you believe that, if you believe that *someone* hasn’t quietly moved in already. The Mail ran this piece over the weekend: “Andrew WON’T move out, much to brother Charles’ frustration – which means that William CAN’T move in….so WHO will end up living in Harry and Meghan’s Frogmore Cottage?” That piece is just a history of the three properties (Royal Lodge, Adelaide Cottage and Frogmore) and a summary of what is already known, including the fact that Prince William is the one really pushing for Andrew’s eviction from Royal Lodge.

One of the wildest parts of this whole thing is that everyone involved is behaving like Frogmore and Royal Lodge are the only two homes in the Royal Windsor estate. Like… there are several mansions, castles, forts and palaces on the larger estate. These people are just obsessed with gloating about how they evicted the Sussexes and now the king is going to force a human trafficking dumbass in that home. I still don’t understand why Prince William won’t move into any of the other properties either??

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

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Last week, we talked about how Lily Allen and David Harbour are handling phone addiction. Their solution is to put a parental app on their phones and each make the other person the “parent” who controls what apps get downloaded. County music singer Morgan Wade, who you may remember as a possible third party during the Kyle Richards/Mauricio Umansky split, handled that issue in a completely different way. She did something that I’ve thought about but could never actually do: a 30-day “digital detox.” Morgan is now a brand ambassador for Brooks Running, and did an interview with People about taking a phone and social media break for the good of her mental health, as well as what she’s doing instead and how much taking a screen break has helped with her creativity.

Reading, not scrolling: “I look at this as a digital detox because it’s like, I’m not sitting there playing on my phone. I’m not scrolling, I’m not doing all that,” Wade says. “I put my phone on Do Not Disturb. I try to not be on social media very much. I haven’t logged into anything in a month. I’ve just been reading. I’ve read so much in this last month that I’ve not been picking up my phone every two seconds to just mindlessly scroll.”

Big results: “I’ve seen a big change in the last 30 days by getting rid of distractions.”

Forming a new routine: “I like to read and I journal. I just try to write down a few things that I’m grateful for and start my day off right. Then, I go into the gym. … I’m in there for a couple of hours, and I’m trying to make sure I get my vitamins in and do all this stuff.”

She looks at life differently now: “I have to sit back and be like, ‘Hey, are you doing the things that actually [matter]? Because I know the things that make me feel better, so it’s pushing myself to do those and just trying … to set the tone for my day.”

Running plays a big part on her mental and physical health: “It’s good for me to have that to focus on, outside of the music and everything else,” details the star, who recently ran an ultramarathon and plans to take part in more. She notes that running also inspires her creatively as an artist.

Her creativity is soaring: “I come up with all kinds of ideas,” Wade explains. “Sometimes I’ll stop and be like, ‘All right. You definitely have to put this in your phone. You have to make a voice note or something, so you remember this.’ “

[From People]

Like I said, this is awesome. I (shamefully) still scroll Twitter when I am bored in the car or waiting in line at a store, but I find myself checking social media less and less these days. It started with me cutting down my Facebook usage during the sh-tshow that was 2020, which made me realize that I wasn’t missing out on anything by only checking it once or twice a day, tops. It also helps that I don’t really like watching videos on my phone, so I never got into watching TikTok or Instagram Reels. My husband often sets his phone on DND and we’ve both gotten good at not checking our phones constantly, which feels like another small step in the right direction. Our golden handcuffs lie in that we get our news digitally, through online newspaper subscriptions, websites, and blogs.

I love that Morgan mentions how much her creativity has prospered since her digital detox. I try to walk or hike three or four days a week (I live next to a state park and can walk there from my house) but even then, I’m not fully unplugged because I listen to podcasts. I find that when I go for walks or runs and manage to unplug, I fill that head space with ideas of my own. It’s tough to completely shut off because so much of what we do to unwind is tied to a screen of some sort. What does everyone else do when they want to cut down on screens? IDK, whenever I hear someone talking about how great it is to cut the cord, it makes me want to really make an effort to loosen the cord just a little bit further.

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Jessica Madsen, aka Bridgerton’s Cressida Cowper, announced on the first day of Pride Month that she is in love with a woman.[Buzzfeed]
First the street-TikTokers didn’t recognize Chloe Sevigny & now they don’t recognize Baz Luhrmann? Open the schools! [OMG Blog]
Jason Sudeikis asked Travis Kelce if he plans to marry Taylor Swift. [Just Jared]
Savannah Chrisley is MAGA. [Starcasm]
Ryan Serhant has a new reality show, Owning Manhattan. [Socialite Life]
Blake Lively is filming A Simple Favor 2 in Rome. [LaineyGossip]
People are raving about the Under the Bridge finale. [Pajiba]
Michelle Dockery is Emilia Wickstead’s muse??! [Go Fug Yourself]
The state of modern menswear really is a mixed bag. [RCFA]
Mike Tyson & Jake Paul’s fight was postponed. [Seriously OMG]
Caitlin Clark is being hazed, big-time. [Hollywood Life]

Prince William’s 42nd birthday is coming up on June 21st. He’s still being called a “boy” in the British media, and they’re still treating him like he’s new to the “job,” like “how can a boy of 42 be expected to have a longterm vision for his role as Prince of Wales and king?” It’s always been insane to watch the media’s willingness to infantilize both William and his wife. Well, I think this new BBC piece is some birthday keenery for Huevo: “Prince William’s role is changing – what does he really want to do with it?” There are several mentions of Prince Harry and Meghan, who have f–k all to do with “William’s role,” except to show that the man is full of violent rage constantly. Some highlights from the BBC:

William’s 2024 struggles: “There can’t be too many people whose wife and father have been diagnosed with cancer so close together. It must feel as if he is in a lonely place at times,” says royal commentator Richard Palmer.

Sharing the burden with his father?? While the King has returned to work with a burst of energy, it’s unavoidable that there will still need to be adjustments for his health. That’s going to mean Prince William being pushed ever more clearly into the role of heir, sharing the burden. “It must feel like the weight of the world is on him. The future of the monarchy rests on his shoulders,” says royal author Prof Pauline Maclaran.

Family problems: It doesn’t help that there’s an ocean-wide gap between Prince William and his brother Prince Harry. And swirling around the Princess of Wales’s illness, as she continues with cancer treatment, has been a toxic swamp gas of social media gossip and crazy speculation.

What does William actually want? At the centre of this storm, what does Prince William himself want to achieve? If you turn off all the background noise about the royals, what does he want to do with his role? The key word, according to sources close to the prince, is “impact”. Rather than ribbon-cutting, photo opportunities and easy gimmicks, he wants to deliver projects that make a tangible, measurable difference. “He’s asking: ‘How can I use my platform for good, to create positive change,” says a royal source. “He has big ambitions for what he can deliver.”

Community Impact Days: In practice that means his projects to reduce homelessness, promote mental health issues and support environmental business through his Earthshot project. Prince William has described his role as “social leadership” and his visits have been labelled as “community impact days”.

Criticism of William’s projects: The anti-monarchy group, Republic, called his homelessness projects “crass and hypocritical… given the excessive wealth we gift him”. There’s also the accusation that any ambition to tackle housing problems will always ultimately depend on political interventions which are outside his remit. “It’s a tall order and it’s not entirely clear how he’s going to achieve it. But many people will think he should be applauded for trying,” says Richard Palmer.

The rival California court: Another nagging friction is the tension between Team William and Prince Harry and Meghan, who can almost seem like a rival Californian court. While William was digging away in Cornwall, they were getting the rock star treatment in Nigeria. Prince William has the challenge of getting serious ideas across, when he’s caught up in an improbably scripted soap opera.

Finding his voice??? “The next few years will see him thinking through what kind of monarch he wants to be and what kind of monarch the country will need to have in the mid-21st Century,” says historian Sir Anthony Seldon. “He has been defining his own agenda, much of it overlapping with his father’s interests and passions.” But it’s at a time of so many unknowns for Prince William, who has such a big public platform but now has to find his own voice.

[From BBC]

The wider view is that a nearly-42-year-old man, the current Prince of Wales and future king, still hasn’t found his own voice and that he’s being overshadowed constantly by his younger, more charismatic brother. The same brother who was supposed to do all of the work and credit William, the same brother who was supposed to stick around forever just so William could hide behind him. I like how there’s not even a mention of Earthshot either – that was supposed to be William’s big thing, it was organized by his staff and given to him fully formed… and he’s already bored with it and few people give a sh-t about it.

Also: those “community impact days” are so funny – William and Kate were in their 40s before they realized that they should give money to local groups when they were visiting various British towns. And even then, they’re only giving away a few thousand pounds and attaching all of this bureaucracy to the money.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.