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Harry and Meghan want Lilibet christened at Windsor
Given all they have said about alleged racism and the hell of royal life, one might imagine Prince Harry and Meghan Markle would want daughter Lilibet’s christening to take place far away from what they see as a crucible of incurable dysfunction.
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Instead, the Daily Mail reports, the couple want Lilibet christened at Windsor Castle, as her brother Archie was. “Harry told several people that they want to have Lili christened at Windsor, just like her brother,” a royal source told the Mail. “They are happy to wait until circumstances allow.”
If the mooted christening, attended by the queen, went ahead, it would be Meghan’s first visit to U.K. since couple left Britain, and would also follow the storm of controversy over the naming of Lilibet, the queen’s nickname within the family. Harry and Meghan have indicated they sought permission to use the name, and said they told the queen about their intention to do so. But a royal source subsequently told the BBC that the the couple had not spoken to the queen about using the name.
The row, as The Daily Beast reported, culminated with Meghan and Harry threatening to sue British media for reporting that the queen felt there had been a lack of consultation with her about their use of her nickname, Lilibet, as the child’s first name, and the queen—via her official spokespeople—saying she would not be disputing the BBC story.
Camilla gets warm wishes from William and Kate
A public message of birthday congratulations from William and Kate to Camilla was posted on social media on Saturday.
It may seem a small thing, but in the carefully choreographed world of the royals, where nothing happens by accident, it’s worth attending to.
This is the fifth year in a row in which the Cambridges have sent Camilla birthday wishes, despite the fact that William is said to be, along with his brother, implacably opposed to his stepmother taking the title of queen when Charles ascends the throne. Charles, as The Daily Beast has previously reported, is said by some sources to intend to unilaterally declare Camilla queen when he is named king, despite having previously and publicly pledged to make her a mere Princess Consort out of deference to Diana’s memory.
Of course, Charles has shown readiness to completely and ruthlessly reverse course on the titular fate of another member of the royal family in recent days. His brother, Prince Edward, will reportedly no longer be getting the title of Duke of Edinburgh that was promised to him by Charles and the queen in a public statement made on the occasion of Edward’s wedding in 1999.
William and Kate’s ongoing warm words for Camilla on her birthday must give Charles hope, however, that his heir can be won round to his Queen Camilla dream.
Fergie on Diana
Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York, has given an interview to People magazine to promote her new romantic novel, entitled Her Heart for a Compass. In the course of the conversation she discussed Princess Diana, saying: “If she were sitting with me right now, I know she would say, ‘I am so proud of both of my boys and the wonderful wives they have chosen.’ Because each has got her own voice.”
One can’t help wondering if she wouldn’t also be immensely saddened, however, by the fact that William and Harry fell out so spectacularly that they now live 5,000 miles apart and their children hardly know each other.
Royal comfort
Prince William has reportedly been offering support to three Black English soccer players who became the targets of racist online abuse after they missed crucial penalties in England’s European Cup final against Italy.
The Daily Mail reports that William, who is president of the Football Association, has been “in touch” with Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka. The FA has been seeking to pressure social media companies to do more to stop their platforms being used for racist trolling in the wake of the controversy.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Home Secretary Priti Patel have both been accused of stoking the racism endured by the footballers by not condemning the booing from fans the team received by taking the knee in support of Black Lives Matter. Patel called it “gesture politics.”
Meghan’s Netflix talks predated “Megxit”
Meghan Markle was already in discussions with Netflix in 2018, Page Six has claimed. Page Six says Markle, along with Elton John’s husband David Furnish, was talking with the streaming giant while she was still a working member of the royal family about a number of one-off charitable advocacy projects. After they quit the royal family Meghan and Prince Harry signed a deal with Netflix, thought to be worth around $75 million.
Markle and Furnish are working on an animated show called Pearl. “Like many girls her age, our heroine Pearl is on a journey of self-discovery as she tries to overcome life’s daily challenges,” Meghan said in a recent statement. The series will celebrate “extraordinary women throughout history,” Meghan said.
Prince Harry told Oprah Winfrey in the couple’s bombshell March interview that the couple’s media deals came about because of their financial excommunication from the royals. “That was suggested by somebody else by the point of where my family literally cut me off financially, and I had to afford security for us.”
The Mail noted, “It is possible that the Netflix deal is something altogether separate from this newly-announced show, which Meghan could have been working on for years.”
Dropping the mask
In adjusting to a world where hands are no longer shaken, Prince Charles has turned to the elegant, steeple-fingered “Namaste” gesture as a greeting. However reports today suggest he could be preparing to ditch another totem of the pandemic, the face mask. The Mail on Sunday reports that henceforth Charles “will wear a mask only when Government advice dictates that he should do so,” and “is not expected to cover his face when he visits Exeter Cathedral” for a fundraising appearance Sunday. No word on if he will be shaking hands, but we doubt it somehow.
Windsor calling
The queen has embraced video calling during the pandemic like so many of her subjects, and now she no longer travels long-haul it looks set to continue to be an important way for her to meet people in far-flung realms. She was on a global call Monday with young people on behalf of the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust (QCT).
Prince Harry and Meghan were appointed President and Vice-President of the QCT, but gave up the role as part of their departure from the ranks of working royals. Town and Country reports that the participants on the call were Safaath Ahmed, who founded Maldives NGO Women and Democracy, Brad Gudger who built an app called Alike that helps young people with cancer combat loneliness, Jean d’Amour Mutoni who runs a youth program in Rwanda, and Jubilante Cutting of the Guyana Animation Network.
The queen must have been delighted that after the event was over she was able to sign off and go for a cup of tea or walk the dogs rather than hopping on a long-haul flight. Props to Harper’s Bazaar for observing that in an Instagram screen grab posted to the royal family’s account, the queen was wearing “one of her three Victoria Bow Brooches that date back to the 1800s.”
Bazaar adds some fascinating sartorial and historical detail, saying: “Queen Victoria, who is Queen Elizabeth’s great-grandmother, preferred to wear all three brooches at once cascading down the front of her skirt. In 1901, Queen Victoria designated the brooches as ‘heirlooms of the crown’ that pass directly from monarch to monarch.”
Cleaning up their act
Meghan and Harry donated “pallets and pallets” of diapers to a Los Angeles charity this week.
Harvest Home is a charity helping homeless pregnant women. Interesting to note that the Instagram post also thanked Pampers’ parent company Procter & Gamble, who have pulled off a remarkable piece of rebranding though their charitable partnership with the Sussex charitable vehicle, Archewell. P&G was famously slammed by Meghan when she was just 11 years old. Meghan took issue with the sexist voice over for an advert for the company’s brand Ivory Soap that declared, “Women are fighting greasy pots and pans with Ivory Soap.” Meghan wrote to the company and got them to change “women” to “people.”
This week in royal history
Prince George turns 8 on Thursday. William and Kate’s oldest child was most recently seen cheering on the England squad with his parents in the Euro final last Sunday. Now, royal commentator Angela Levin has suggested that William and Kate may not release an official 8th birthday portrait of George because of internet trolls. We shall see.
Unanswered questions
Will Prince Charles really stop Prince Edward from becoming Duke of Edinburgh? The queen’s former press secretary Dickie Arbiter tweeted this week that the title will indeed pass to Edward, but not until he is 65, in eight years time. If that really is the case, then why has Buckingham Palace not simply advised journalists that the 1999 declaration, that Edward would be made Duke of Edinburgh, still stands? It is, as the esteemed Prince Charles biographer Tom Bower told The Daily Beast this week, “baffling.”
