Body language expert shares details you missed in Prince Harry’s TV interviews

Prince Harry has been described as an “angry, bitter machine gun”, as a body language expert reveals the details you may have missed in his TV interviews.

One of Australia’s leading body language experts has described the Duke of Sussex as “Prince ‘machine gun’ Harry” for the way he conducted himself in raw TV interviews to promote his memoir Spare.

“The continuous explosive ‘s’ consonant, the clipped ends of sentences with the mouth slammed shut, and the flow of air halted sharply between the repetitive short sentences. It’s like a machine gun in battle and its angry and bitter,” Dr Louise Mahler said.

Dr Mahler said Duke displayed signs of anxiety during the interview.

“We know from research that childhood trauma can manifest physically, and one senses that Harry’s trauma over the loss of his mother has now embedded in a stiff neck and overbite with his lower jaw extending and his chin jutting forward,” she said.

“Licking the lips is often seen as a sign of attraction, but Harry intensifies his approach with lip licking as a sign of anxiety. It’s restless and like a teenager testing their strength and being cocky with the Grade 10 English teacher, he has a childish unswerving belief in his own ‘narrative’.”

Prince Harry said his family were “in bed with the devil”.

It comes after Prince Harry blasted the royals for being “in bed with the devil” as he explained why he wrote his tell-all book that has rocked the royal family.

“Thirty eight years of having my story told by other people with spin and distortion, I want to tell my story myself, it’s my story to tell,” he told ITV news presenter Tom Bradby in Harry: The Interview.

“There has been a family motto ‘never complain, never explain,’ but for me, I have spent the past six years trying to get through to my family, it never needed to be this way, the emails I wrote, letters … everything was ‘you’re imagining it’.

“I love my father, I always have, I always will.

“This has never been an intention to hurt or harm them, but after many years of having lies (members of his family) told about me, those certain members of the family have decided to get in bed with the devil to rehabilitate their reputation – which comes at the detriment of others.

“I want reconciliation but not without accountability.”

Dr Mahler said Prince Harry’s “narrative” sounded like someone had done “one too many counselling sessions”.

“He keeps asking himself inartistically ‘how he feels’ with his therapy leading him to the conclusion that ‘the rich and powerful’ are policing a society that has been built on ‘cronyism’, ‘lies’, with ‘certain members’ of his family being in bed with the devil as they deliver a distorted narrative of his world,” she said.

FAMILY ‘COMPLICIT’ IN CONFLICT

The Duke insisted he was “at peace’’ with his father having married Camilla, revealing the two of them “are very happy together” but initially he pleaded with Charles not to marry his mistress.

“Forgiveness is 100 per cent a possibility. I want my father back, I want my brother back, but we’re not just talking about family relationships, but the British press trying to create as much conflict as possible but certain members of my family are complicit in that.” he said.

Prince Harry told Tom Bradby of his disbelief his mother had been killed in a car crash.

Dr Mahler said Prince Harry lacked perspective.

“He is humourless, lacks perspective and what is interesting is that nothing here is substantial, but Harry seems to feel these are revelations to us all. If this is counsellor speak, one might suggest that he needs a change,” she said.

“As for the ball now being in the family’s court, I ask: What ball? What court? Says whom? And ultimately, who cares?”

SHOCK OVER DIANA’S DEATH

The Duke of Sussex told of the compassion he felt for the King when he delivered the heartbreaking news that his mother Diana had died in a car crash and pleading, “Pa no, no, no,” in a British televised interview promoting his bombshell memoir.

In an at times emotional and staggeringly frank interview with ITV, Prince Harry said ahead of the official launch of his memoir Spare, that he cried only once over his mother at her burial and how King Charles struggled to relay the news to his youngest son.

“I don’t ever want my children to go through that, that’s partly why I fled the UK, I love my mother country, I always will, but I have to put my family first,” he said.

Prince Harry during his ITV interview.

He divulged his ‘“numbness” at later seeing reflections of the paparazzi in the window of her car mangled in the Paris tunnel, saying: “I saw those men who chased her, they never stopped shooting at her when she lay in the car, they were just shooting, shooting, shooting pictures of her … Their reflections, even when she lay in the car, her blonde hair, I saw in the back of the car.”

Prince Harry said he was “looking for evidence, that it was true, but also something to show it was her”.

The Duke of Sussex questioned when Charles had the “patience” and “time” for parenthood.

“He’d always given an air of not being quite ready for parenthood: the responsibilities, the patience, the time,” he said.

“Even he, though a proud man, would have admitted as much. But single parenthood? Pa was never made for that. To be fair, he tried,” he said.

Prince Harry has revealed how his mother, Princess Diana’s death left him and Prince William unable to show emotion. Picture: Supplied

Dr Mahler highlighted some body language cues that arose around the conversation of Princess Diana.

“On being asked if he insisted on being driven through the tunnel where Diana died at the same speed as her accident, he nods sharply and quips “yep”,” she said.

“On being told his brother did the same thing, you see his smile and the mouth curl on one side, this one-sidedness is a sign of contempt, with the brotherly competition and bodily aggression is evident in one small clip.

“In the ‘Bike chain’ of events mentioned, one imagines the speed, the alcohol and the lack of seat belts were all part of that chain, but Harry grabs at the media. He tells is what the media should have said and how his father should handle his relationship. He tells us his truth, whilst everyone else’s are mistakes and lies.”

‘THEY DIDN’T GET ON’

Speaking about the “love and separation” he has felt over his brother, the Prince of Wales, he said he was sick of reading about the “sibling rivalry” in the papers.

“He didn’t want to know me at Eton, that hurt at the time but now I get that, how irritating the younger sibling can be to the older one – I see it in my children,” he said.

“I’ve always loved my brother, we dealt with the trauma over our mother in different ways, but there was competition, Africa was my thing, William can’t have it.”

Revealing why William and Catherine, Princess of Wales, do not get on with his wife, he said, “I introduced them and they were Suits fans, who would have thought?

“But they didn’t get on, I thought the four of us could do a lot of work together, but they weren’t expecting me to get in a relationship with someone like Meghan, who had a very successful career.

A poster advertising the book 'Spare' by Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex. A leaked copy of the book contains shocking revelations. Picture: AFP

“You know, an American actress, divorced … if you’re reading the British press and tabloids, there’s a tendency you can live in the tabloid bubble rather than reality,” he said.

He went on: “If you are the new kids on the block and you’re stealing the limelight the press has put you in, just as much as William and Cate once suffered, that happened to us.

“My brother did not try to dissuade me from marrying Meghan, but he said ‘this is getting very hard for you’. He probably predicted what the British press reaction would be.”

He divulged how the brothers fought as children but as adults, when William told him Meghan was “rude, she’s abrasive, she’s alienated half the staff,” he said William goaded him to hit back after pushing him to the floor where he landed on the dog bowl.

PRINCE HARRY ‘DIDN’T BELIEVE’ WILLIAM LOVED HIM

At their grandfather’s funeral, he said William tried to mend their rift, telling him, ‘Listen to me Harold, I love you, I want you to be happy, I swear on mum’s life.’

“He used the secret code, ‘mummy’s life’. We vowed that we would only use that when one of us needs to be heard. It stopped me cold. I didn’t believe him.

“This whole thing is heartbreaking, it’s incredibly sad, there’s a way through it.

“I don’t think my father or brother will read the book, or watch this interview.

“The last moment we were together was at the Queen’s funeral, a good opportunity to bring the family together, but the day she died was a horrible reaction from my family members.”

The book reveals the causes of the ongoing feud between Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle. Picture: Getty Images/Netflix

He denied he accused the royal family of racism, but said that they suffered instead from unconscious bias.

He said of Lady Susan Hussey, who served as Queen Elizabeth II’s lady in waiting for more than 60 years before she resigned in an alleged row: “Meghan and I love Susan Hussey, we think she’s great, she never meant any harm.

“But there were comments of concern by the palace made about what our kids were going to look like.

“They need to make that (unconscious bias) right.”

Prince Harry said he is not permanently at war with the media and “let the fight go” when he quit the UK, but living in California in lockdown and still having stories still published in British newspapers, means it “never ends for me”.

He said if the King asks for his and Meghan’s support across the Commonwealth, they would consider it.

“I’ve got two amazing kids and a beautiful wife, the happiness I have felt now I have never felt anywhere else before,” he said.

“My family feels safe here (California). It’s difficult going back but I’m in such a good space, if there is reconciliation, I’m in a good place to have those conversations.”

The tensions between Prince Harry and Prince William are further revealed in the new book. Picture: Max Mumby/Getty Images

Prince Harry said his beard is a “shield to my anxiety” and described an alleged row with his brother over keeping his beard for his own wedding.

He claims he asked the late Queen for permission to keep his beard for his wedding, which she allowed, but his brother the Prince of Wales was unhappy.

Asked what the disagreement was actually about by Bradby, Harry said: “I think a lot of it is to do with – I mean I refer to it as heir/spare but also older brother/younger brother – there’s a level of competition there.

“And again, writing this, I remembered that William had a beard himself and that granny and other people, told him that he had to shave it off.

“The difference for me, if there was a difference, was, as I explained to my grandmother, that this beard – that I’m still wearing – felt to me at the time like the new Harry, right. As almost like a shield to my anxiety.

“I think William found it hard that other people told him to shave it off, and yet here I was on my wedding day wearing military uniform, no longer in the military, but believing as though I should shave it off before my wedding day.

“And I said ‘well I don’t believe that Meghan’s going to recognise me if she comes up the aisle and sees me’.”

Prince Harry has spoken to three TV networks – Anderson Cooper for 60 Minutes on CBS News on Sunday night, Michael Strahan of Good Morning America on Monday and Stephen Colbert on the Late Show on CBS on Tuesday.

Originally published as Body language expert shares details you missed in Prince Harry’s TV interviews