The British royals have long been a fascination. The wealth, pomp and ceremony surrounding them have placed them apart from the majority of us. It is hard to imagine the luxury of a 775-room palace with servants and chauffeurs being integral to everyday life. Their privilege brings a sense of mystique to those belonging to the House of Windsor and yet beyond it, they are human and they are flawed and, occasionally, they tell us that in their own words.
The most recent and shocking example of this is Prince Andrew who, in an extraordinarily unusual move in 2019, was interviewed by the BBC’s Emily Maitlis. This Newsnight interview wasn’t about his work as a royal, but about his relationship with American financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and the allegations made against him by one of Epstein’s victims.
The interview was an unmitigated disaster for the royals, one which, five years on, shows no sign of going away. Earlier this year Netflix released the film Scoop and now Amazon Prime has its own offering, A Very Royal Scandal, executive-produced by Maitlis. Two versions in five months might seem like overkill, but both offer different perspectives on the debacle.
Scoop focuses on the producer who secured the interview for Newsnight, Sam McAlister (Billie Piper). While A Very Royal Scandal – with Prince Andrew played by Michael Sheen and Maitlis by Ruth Wilson – offers new insights into what happened, informed by Maitlis’s involvement in the production, according to early reviews.
It seems our appetite for royal intrigue and scandal is huge, as the two dramatisations in quick succession show, but this is by no means the first to capture the public’s imagination.
Royal scandals pastThe cultural connections people from around the world feel to the monarchy means “brand royal” is big business, yet it divides opinion.
Americans in particular can’t seem to get enough of them, and in the UK questions about their role and relevance remain. And, like every famous family, some royals are more popular than others. The latest Ipsos poll reveals the Prince and Princess of Wales, William and Kate, are favoured ahead of King Charles, with Prince Andrew, unsurprisingly, the least popular.
The current royal lineage began with the creation of the House of Windsor by King George V in 1917, dispensing with the historical family name of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. Infamously, his son and heir Edward VIII abdicated the throne in 1936 after less than a year because he had fallen in love with a married woman, Wallis Simpson, an American who had already been twice divorced.
In October 1969 the BBC’s Kenneth Harris interviewed the controversial couple, who offered their side of the story that rocked the monarchy. It was first broadcast in March 1970 and is still available on YouTube, where it’s been viewed millions of times.
Fast forward 25 years and Diana, Princess of Wales spoke to Martin Bashir for the BBC’s current affairs programme, Panorama. It followed a revelatory interview her husband, Charles, then heir to the throne, had given a year before, in which he had admitted adultery with Camilla Parker-Bowles, now the queen.
More than 23 million people watched Diana share hugely personal details about the state of the royal union, including the much-quoted insight: “There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”
From a public relations perspective, Diana’s interview generated a media storm but amassed a great deal of sympathy. Her husband’s revelations, less so. Popular UK tabloid The Daily Mirror wrote at the time: “He is not the first royal to be unfaithful. Far from it. But he is the first to appear before 25 million of his subjects to confess.”
Whether it was naivety or arrogance or a combination of both that led the future king to make his confession, we’ll never know. Scrutiny of his interview with broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby was limited to the media and everyday conversations between people who, pre-internet and social media, had no means to share their views with the masses. What impact they would have is pure speculation, but his younger brother, The Duke of York, was to find out years later.
The self-destructing princePrince Andrew was widely acknowledged as Queen Elizabeth’s “favourite son”. He courted controversy early when, in 1986, he married Sarah Ferguson, a flame-haired commoner. The couple divorced a decade later, though they now live together in the controversial 30-room Royal Lodge.
However, previous controversies were nothing compared to the Duke’s relationship with the convicted sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. While the pair had met in the 1990s, their relationship started making headlines and garnering criticism in 2011. Later, one of Epstein’s accusers alleged to have had sex with Prince Andrew in early 2000s when she was 17. In the face of global scrutiny, the prince decided to face the cameras.
Like his brother and sister-in-law before him, the Duke of York would have anticipated the interview to be an air-clearing move to set the record straight. Yet it offered a jaw-dropping insight into this particular royal mind, which five years on, is still the subject of scrutiny and fascination.
His lack of remorse at being friends with a convicted sex trafficker and failure to either mention or show empathy for Epstein’s victims, as well as the claims he made about Virginia Giuffre’s accusations, have damaged his already flawed reputation, seemingly beyond repair.
The fallout was catastrophic for Andrew, leading to a chain of events that in January 2022 saw him stripped of his military titles and patronages. Later that year he paid what is widely presumed to be millions of dollars to Giuffre, who he claimed he had no recollection of meeting, to settle a sexual assault case she brought against him in the United States. The out-of-court settlement accepted no liability and Prince Andrew has always strongly rejected claims of wrongdoing.
Surely, Prince Andrew would have been better heeding 19th-century commentator Walter Bagehot’s warning to “not let in daylight upon magic” and instead preserve the mystique of the monarchy by avoiding the spotlight. However, there is no doubt that A Very Royal Scandal will force him back into its glare.
Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.
