Prince Harry, Meghan Markle’s car chase story has doomed King Charles
Prince Harry may have already stuffed it with his dad King Charles but his latest move no doubt seals the deal.
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Maybe his parents should have named him Arthur or Hubert or Marmaduke because, this weekend, King Charles is looking dismally like he is about to succumb to the Curse of the Carolean King.
After all, Charles I ended up losing his head on the executioner’s block and the UK had a go at a republic for a bit, Charles II was a gadding buffoon, and number III aka the current throne-sitter looks like he is fighting a lost cause.
This week he presented a British Fashion Council design award, visited Covent Garden where he did his trademark staring-excitedly-at-food thing, and hosted a Prince’s Trust reception at Buckingham Palace. However, to look at any newspapers, websites or social media, His Majesty may as well have spent the week slumped on threadbare chintz sofa disconsolately eating homemade granola out of the jar.
The world would not have noticed because this week proved that the poor King looks destined to play second (or maybe seventh) fiddle to his family’s drama and their various shenanigans.
In no particular order, the new Little Mermaid movie appears to take a pretty blunt dig at his daughter-in-law Kate, the Princess of Wales; his brother Prince Andrew sounds like he is about to start nailing wooden planks over the windows and barricading him inside his vast historic home as he refuses to vacate it; someone in son Prince William’s orbit has been busy telling the Times he will have a much better coronation and his former sister-in-law Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York is doing a podcast.
Of course all of this is the smallest of small potatoes in comparison with what was happening in New York where, for conservatively, the 48th time the mushroom-cloud-obscuring-the-sky that is his other son and other daughter-in-law Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex was going off.
The Sussexes had been in the city for what was been widely read as the duchess’ big relaunch after months of the former actress staying an unusual arm’s length away from the spotlight. But she had a stunning gold dress and a gong to collect and so off she, Harry and her mother Doria Ragland went for an evening that soon descended into the unreal.
What followed, the couple later claimed, was a “near catastrophic car chase” with paparazzi, a highly dramatic reading that soon had cold water poured on it by not only the New York Police Department but also mayor Eric Adams and a cab driver who is currently enjoying his 15-minutes of fame.
No matter what happened in New York, an incident such that Meghan’s normally adhered-with-super-glue smile faltered at times and Harry looked even more thunderous than usual, there is one big salient point here for Charles: He’s looking a bit stuffed.
No one really cares about the King. Already. (And even before the Palace gift shop can start discounting their oversupply of coronation merch.)
Two weeks since the world tuned in to watch Charles star in the strangest royal TV moment since It’s A Royal Knockout and already His Majesty is struggling to even register. At the rate things are going he could soon be able to go and spend an afternoon at Harry Potter World having a go at the Sorting Hat and it would barely make page 15 of the papers. (He’s definitely a Hufflepuff.)
The noise and the drama being created by his nearest and perhaps not so dearest, even before he or wife Queen Camilla’s have gotten around to tidying up the vast coronation robes currently dumped in the corner of their vast bedroom.
So much for any sort of honeymoon period.
There are no prizes for guessing who is the biggest, loudest or most persistent source of hullabaloo because there are two names simply positively fathoms if not light years ahead of the rest. (‘20,000 leagues under the Sussexes’ anyone?)
To write about Harry and Meghan right now is to start to list things like his legal fights or all the broadsides they have been chucking at the Palace for years now.
Currently, the Duke of Legal Fees has five cases before the UK courts.
For the last two months especially, thanks to Harry’s three cases against UK publishers, we have had day after day of headlines that could make a King choke on his morning coddled egg. For example, William having reached a hitherto unknown settlement with News Group Newspapers (NGN) over alleged hacking to the stories about a supposed secret deal between Buckingham Palace and NGN. (NGN’s parent company is the owner of this masthead.)
Then there are the duke’s two court cases taking on the British Home Office over the 2020 decision by the Metropolitan Police to withdraw his official protection officers after the Sussexes peremptorily ditched working royal life.
Here we have the King’s son suing the King’s government, a situation that redefines the phrase ‘nightmare scenario.’
All of these five cases are a long way off concluding, meaning there is every chance things will get more red-faced for the Palace before they get better. That cocktail of high-priced lawyers, high stakes and a duke without much else to lose? The potential for more humiliating or unflattering details to come out about the inner workings of Crown Inc and how the royal sausage is made is off the charts.
(Camilla is in a secret ladies-only Wiltshire fight club? Kate has a very specific form of teaspoon kleptomania? William rubs ground mugwort onto his head to try and regrow his once luscious blonde locks? Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie are running a black market Tibetan pashmina ring?)
And all of that is even before Harry becomes the first senior member of the royal family in 130 years to take the stand next month.
The way things are going with Pacific Storm Sussex, Charles could scale Ben Nevis in nothing but his carefully ironed undies and no one would pay him much attention.
Not helping His Majesty’s blood pressure is also his other son William who along with Kate has been busy staging a digital coup, with their Kensington Palace office suddenly grinding out high-gloss social media content like a West London sweatshop.
Big picture, the King has, at best, about 20 years of reigning to do before he pops off to the great Pounbury the sky, leaving him with a pretty brief window to make his mark. If His Majesty were to shuffle off the mortal coil tomorrow he would be largely remembered for his marital shambles and the fact one of his son’s has made millions telling the world what a dud of a dad he was.
If His Majesty wants to replace that with a legacy of being, say, a visionary monarch who led the charge on the climate crisis and met the greatest threat of the modern age with all the backbone and strength of some Agincourt knight, then he needs people to pay attention to him.
But who wants to tune into a well-meaning septuagenarian whose car runs on cheese (seriously) when there is this other succulent, addictive soapie of a story involving feuds, car chases, Instagram videos and regular large helpings of royal dirt?
I feel like if the King came up with a way to reduce global carbon emissions in his backyard laboratory and it happened to be announced the same day that Harry and Meghan adopted two Himalayan children, Charles wouldn’t even make it above the newspaper fold.
It doesn’t matter how hard the King and Queen work and plug away at the meaningful, big issues they are tackling (the earth melting; domestic violence) if the world is looking elsewhere and is permanently fixated on the happenings out of Montecito.
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Poor Charles. For more than 50 years he has waited and planned for this moment but now that it’s here, now that he finally gets to put into action his vision of his being sovereign and his children look poised to shove him off centre stage.
I’m wondering: If Charles I was the treasonous King and Charles II was known as the Merry Monarch then will Charles III end up being the Sideshow Sovereign? Good thing he likes long quiet walks on his own.
Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles
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