Feuding princes William and Harry set to face off in the UK within weeks

Feuding royal brothers the Duke of Sussex and the Prince of Wales are about to be spectacularly pitted against one another.

COMMENT

I’ve started to wonder if whatever higher power there is in the universe (God? Gaia? The almighty She-Ra?) is just as addicted to the mythical melodrama of the British royal family circa 2023 as the rest of us.

How else to explain that in a couple of weeks, brothers-at-arms Prince William, the Prince of Wales and Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex – two men divided by an ocean, a throne, a best-selling book and entirely opposing moral, personal and emotional frameworks – are about to be forced to go head-to-head?

Oh, I don’t mean on some muddy field somewhere or that Queen Camilla is going to lock them into the Clarence House wine cellar to let them work out their differences – again.

Rather, that wily old fox fate or the She-ra or whoever has seen fit that each brother is about to have a very big career moment – moments that will entirely coincidentally take place within 24 hours of one another.

On September 7, Harry will descend on London for the Wellchild Awards, an organisation of which the duke has been patron since 2007.

The following day, September 8, is the first anniversary of the late Queen’s death, an occasion that will be marked by every British newspaper and TV station churning out special coverage full of stock photos and really dialling up the pathos to 11.

Relations between the brothers are at an all-time low. Picture: Loic Venance/AFP

While King Charles will spend the day privately at Balmoral, continuing the tradition of his mother, who likewise spent the anniversary of her accession day at Sandringham where her father George VI died, it will be William and his wife Kate, the Princess of Wales who will be carrying the royal can.

And carry it they will, with the Mirror reporting that they will lead the tributes to Her late Majesty with a visit to St David’s cathedral in Cardiff. There, according to the Mirror, which sounds a tad like they are reading from a press release, the prince will pay “homage to the life and legacy” of his grandmother – however, the overarching message will be of family “[looking] to the future”.

That William and Kate will be the Crown Inc standard bearers on this important day is a big deal.

Then, the following day, on September 9, Harry will be in Dusseldörf for the opening of the Invictus Games, the sporting event that the duke created nearly a decade ago for wounded and sick service people (both serving and veterans).

Bottom line – for William and Harry, the timing of all of this could not be worse.

While there is about as much chance of William and Harry seeing one another as of the King letting Damien “let me pickle a shark” Hirst through the Buckingham Palace front door, still.

In the space of 48 hours, the world is about to get hit, and hard, by both the Sussex and Wales shows, both men being given prized opportunities to set out their stalls and really push their statesman barrows.

One would have to assume that neither William or Harry would be happy about this coincidental timing.

Prince Harry pictured with the late Queen Elizabeth II in happier times in 2013. Picture: Chris Jackson/Getty Images

Right when William and Kate are gearing up for their big moment, having been deputised by Charles to be the public face of the monarchy on such a historic occasion, Harry will be back in the UK, trailing his hurt feelings and vague whiff of essential oils.

Right when the elder prince is preparing for his dignified, good boy close-up, his brother’s presence will remind everyone of that time he clocked Aitch and that Willy was, according to the duke’s telling in Spare, jealous and self-serving and tried to make him shave off his beard.

Nor is this situation any better for Harry.

Right as he is back in the UK and then in Europe swanning about the place with wife Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, them doing their ersatz royal thing (look, red carpets and some flashing police lights!), their excision from the heart of the royal family will be on full display.

This year, His Majesty has moved to push the Sussexes even further out into the cold, dark edges of the royal universe, having essentially turfed them out of their home on the Windsor Home Park estate and approved their stylings as His/Her Royal Highnesses being stripped from the official royal website. (Suddenly I’m imagining Charlie, half-moon glasses propped on the end of his nose, doing battle with Wordpress in his study late at night, heavy-handedly prodding the delete key as he tidies up on the Sussexes’ and Prince Andrew’s entries).

So, when Harry and Meghan are back in Europe, even if, momentarily, they can do a bit of quasi-royal swanning, still, their leper-like status will be impossible to ignore.

William and Harry are headed for a showdown.

Making this trip even more of a tricky one for the Sussexes, podcasters sans platform, is that they have nowhere obvious to stay. Will the duke and duchess bunk with friends or will Harry have to settle for the ignominy of having to find himself a hotel room in his hometown?

(In May, when the couple were caught in a “near catastrophic” chase with the paparazzi in New York, a law enforcement source told Page Six: “They should have just gotten a hotel for the safety of everyone. Instead, they were cheap and wanted a free place to stay”. Meanwhile, another source has said the Sussexes’ “people” had contacted the five-star Carlyle hotel “and asked for a discounted room, and the hotel said no”).

Even after this three-day flurry of events, things are not entirely over, because a few days after the close of the Invictus Games, right when Harry and Meghan will likely be back in the US, who else is going to turn up Stateside than William? His Earthshot Innovation Summit will be taking place in New York on September 19.

Even if both Harry and William and their teams studiously ignore one another’s big outings and focus on their own starring moments, staying scrupulously on message, they simply will not be able to avoid the maelstrom of comparisons that the press, public and every sentient human will be making. (And some very wise parrots too, maybe).

There’s no love lost between the Waleses and the Sussexes. Picture: Max Mumby/Indigo/Getty Images

So too, the wildly and nearly incomprehensibly divergent paths, lives, and values of William and Harry are going to be on full display, warts and all.

Both men might want the focus to be on their milestone professional moments – being tipped to represent the crown on the late Queen’s anniversary; the success of Invictus – but the proximity of their events means they are going to be relentlessly held up against one another.

I also can’t help feeling sorry for Kate and Meghan, because with apologies to feminism, their outfits will be more relentlessly contrasted and analysed than frontline Ukrainian troop movements in a Pentagon briefing. Who spent more? Who wore what jewellery? And how many moving tributes to Her late Majesty will junior digital writers be able to divine from the two women's’ outfits?

My only advice is this: Stay hydrated. Maybe get in some muesli bowers and protein shakes to fortify yourself. When this three-day cascade of dramahhh starts, it’s going to be a wild ride.

May She-Ra watch over us all.

Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.