David Pougher: Fergie may have found her footing at last

TOE-SUCKING, Weight Watchers and the royal reboot of It’s a Knockout. Sarah Ferguson has tirelessly tried to stay relevent, but has she now found a role that fulfils her?

THERE was a feeling of suppressed excitement in the London newsroom of the Daily Mirror late on the afternoon of August 19, 1992. Something big was going down but nobody who knew was talking. That was odd in itself — journalists are hopeless at keeping secrets — and the lack of any leaks encouraged speculation. A footballer caught with drugs or a teammate’s girlfriend? Highly likely. A government minister hanging out with rent boys? Very strong chance.

But the sport chief sub-editor, Mike Honey, chuckled and said: “No boys, if it’s this secret, it’s the royal family.”

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The front page of August 20, 1992 was dominated by a picture of Sarah Ferguson lying topless by a pool in St Tropez embracing her ‘financial adviser’. Picture: Supplied

He was right. The front page of August 20 was dominated by a picture of Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, lying topless by a pool in St Tropez embracing her “financial adviser” Johnny Bryan. Other pictures showed him sucking her toes while playing nearby were the Duchess’s daughters — the Queen’s granddaughters — Beatrice and Eugenie. We were astonished, but not by Fergie’s conduct. She was separated from Prince Andrew but there had been talk about her lifestyle for some time. The rumours had involved the Texas oilman, Steve Wyatt. Who was this Bryan?

But surely this was social death for Fergie. There is no redemption for anybody who humiliates the royal family from within.

And yet it hasn’t quite turned out that way. As the Duke and Duchess of York prepare to celebrate Eugenie’s wedding to Jack Brooksbank later on Friday, it’s clear that Fergie, while not loved or respected by the British public, is still a part of the royal reality show.

Prince Andrew, Duke of Yor, Jack Brooksbank, Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York and Princess Eugenie. Picture: Getty Images

Of course, it was a reality show that many believe marked the start of the royal family’s dark period, a time that included the divorces of Charles and Diana and Prince Andrew and Sarah in 1996 and Diana’s death in August 1997 (an event handled so miserably by Buckingham Palace that for a time it threatened the future of the royal family itself).

In early 1987, the Queen’s youngest son, Edward, had devised a plan for a royal version of the British game show, It’s a Knockout, to raise funds for charity. It would include four teams of celebrities, captained by a royal, competing in challenges around what looked like a medieval theme park. Edward, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Fergie were in charge of 40 celebs including John Travolta, Meat Loaf, Christopher Reeve and Cliff Richard and, while it was a ratings success and raised about $3 million for charity, it had all the dignity of a food fight at a backyard barbecue. And a royal family without dignity is in trouble.

The Queen and Prince Philip were appalled and Edward threw a tantrum at a post-show press conference when journalists questioned the wisdom of the idea. But while the plan was Edward’s, it was Fergie who had taken the idea and run with it and wore, perhaps unfairly, much of the criticism.

Diana used her fame shrewdly but was never entirely comfortable with it. Fergie adored fame and wanted more. Picture: Getty Images

Presenter Stuart Hall defended her: “Fergie is a boisterous, red-haired girl out to have fun.”

Which she was, and is, but she was also the Queen’s daughter-in-law and seemed not to understand that there are limits.

It’s a failure that has dogged her since. No longer a royal since her divorce, she retains the title Duchess as long as she remains single — and it’s a title she has traded off successfully, mainly in the US.

BUT her post-royal life has been one of peaks and troughs and at the heart of her troubles seems to be a disconnection from reality, something that has allowed her to admit that she’s flawed but not that she is to blame.

In 2001, it was revealed that she had debts of at least $8 million, despite have a contract with Weight Watchers worth roughly $2 million a year, another with Wedgwood for just under $1 million and significant income from TV ads and publishing.

Perhaps Diana played a role in Fergie’s yearning to be loved, elegant, rich, famous and feted. Picture: AP

Many of those debts were cleared but in a 2010 sting she was caught offering access to her husband in return for cash. It emerged that she again owed millions, was close to bankruptcy and drinking heavily, something on which she blamed her behaviour.

Not long after the sting, when most people would have been keeping their head down, she released a book detailing her life and ideas on happiness. Sarah Ferguson — A Duchess’s Journey To Find Herself again ignored reality in favour of syrupy platitudes and warm recollections of her time as a royal.

For instance, she claimed Diana had been her soulmate. In fact, Diana had cut her off after Fergie wrote in an earlier book that she had borrowed a pair of the princess’s shoes and caught verrucas from them. Diana never spoke to her again. But perhaps Diana played a role in Fergie’s yearning to be loved, elegant, rich, famous and feted. Diana did all of that apparently without effort, while the harder Fergie tried, the more she failed.

Diana was as flawed as Sarah, but was forgiven her affairs, moods and inconsistencies. Fergie wasn’t. Diana used her fame shrewdly but was never entirely comfortable with it. Fergie adored fame and wanted more. When the spotlight moved away, she chased it and that desperation, both horribly fascinating and deeply sad, denied her the public acclaim she craved.

But who knows? She has a warm, civilised relationship with her former husband, which is in itself an achievement. Perhaps she’ll find peace in being a loving mother, mother-in-law and grandparent.

David Pougher is the Herald Sun opinion editor