WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.000 [MUSIC FADES IN] 00:00:01.000 --> 00:00:02.000 This is "In Conversation," from Apple News. I'm Shumita Basu. Today, the future of the British monarchy in the face of family turmoil and scandal. 00:00:02.000 --> 00:00:03.000 [MUSIC FADES OUT] 00:00:03.000 --> 00:00:04.000 [CONTEMPLATIVE MUSIC] 00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:05.000 This year, Queen Elizabeth is celebrating her Platinum Jubilee, 70 years on the throne. She was crowned at 25 years old, and ever since then, she's had one mission: maintain the monarchy, make sure it survives no matter what. 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:06.000 There's been plenty of turbulence over the decades, but nothing like the challenges of the last few years. The Queen's son, Prince Andrew, was stripped of his royal titles for his association with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew recently settled a lawsuit in which a woman accused him of sexually assaulting her when she was a minor. 00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:07.000 Then there's Meghan and Harry who left the royal family after what they say was abusive and racist treatment from the monarchy and the British press. 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:08.000 Plus, with William and Kate's disastrously-received tour of the Caribbean commonwealth nations and the Queen's failing health, many are questioning the legitimacy of the monarchy and whether it has a future. 00:00:08.000 --> 00:00:09.000 Longtime palace journalist Tina Brown is out with a new book called "The Palace Papers$% Inside the House of Windsor - the Truth and the Turmoil." She's been covering the crown for decades, and she says she spoke to over 100 sources, inside and close to the royals, for this book. The cover says everything about who Brown thinks are the real power brokers in the family, aside from the Queen — the women who married into royalty. 00:00:09.000 --> 00:00:10.000 Well, clearly, these women are the real driving force behind the modern monarchy. 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:11.000 There's Camilla, married to the future king, Charles, which makes her the future queen consort. 00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:12.000 She has really done an extraordinary amount in the last 20 years, now she's married to Charles, to really kind of stabilize him after all of his years of misery, you know, during the Diana years and the post Diana years. 00:00:12.000 --> 00:00:13.000 There's Kate, married to William, who's next in line to the throne after his father, Charles. 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:14.000 A girl from the middle classes. You know, people said, "Oh, how could this middle-class young woman possibly marry the future king?" Well, as it turns out, now people ask, "How could the House of Windsor survive without Kate?" 00:00:14.000 --> 00:00:15.000 And finally, there's Meghan. 00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:16.000 Who has been such an extraordinary, kind of catalytic force in the monarchy. Coming in, married to Harry and famously not liking what she found. And breaking asunder not only, you know, herself from the situation, but in many ways, the family is now, you know, in turmoil because of what happened. 00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:17.000 I asked Tina to start our conversation by explaining for an American audience, and maybe even some skeptical Brits, what purpose does the monarchy serve? 00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:18.000 [MUSIC FADES OUT] 00:00:18.000 --> 00:00:19.000 Well, I think that the monarchy is… For a start, there's no real Republican movement in the U.K. to get rid of the monarchy. So the monarchy is popular in England. It is really the summation of its history. It is the uniter of the country's traditions, national story, and presides over the sort of roiling seas of, you know, contemporary and past life with a kind of calming, safe space, if you like. And that has proved to be very powerful again and again. When people say, "Oh, you know, people really don't care about the monarchy anymore," they're always proved wrong. I mean, at the time of the death of the Queen Mother, everybody said, you know, "Ancient dowager. Who cares?" The streets just were packed. It was like the funeral… more than, almost, the funeral of Winston Churchill. People wanted to come out and pay respects to the Queen Mother. So you see this again and again. And I think that the Queen's jubilee, her Platinum Jubilee, 70 years on the throne, is going to be an absolute sort of monster event because it's really the way that the nation can say what they feel… offer their thanks, essentially, for the Queen and her 70 years of service, which is an absolutely astronomical feat. 00:00:19.000 --> 00:00:20.000 Mm. Mm. You describe the Queen as the woman who matters more than anyone else. And in fact, you sort of say that everyone else is just, and this is in quotes, "high-born scaffolding," which is a very funny phrase to me. So how has your own understanding of Queen Elizabeth changed during the many years that you've been writing about this family? 00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:21.000 Well, I suppose I develop more and more respect for her tremendous self-discipline, right? I mean, the Queen has understood, for the whole of her life, the power of the royal silence. The need for her to be inscrutable. The need for her to be genuinely impartial. To not have any evidence about her of a political, a partisan, a personal point of view that could give any kind of suasion to anyone else's views. And she's managed to uphold that all of this time, which is really extraordinary. And as a result, has developed this amazing mystique about herself. Now, of course, in the years that she first took on this amazing role, you know, the media was very different in those days. I mean, there wasn't an invasive scrutiny. There wasn't a disrespectful press that probed and probed. I mean, there wasn't any pressure on her, really, to speak about things she didn't want to speak about. Her children and grandchildren, it's been very, very much harder, in a way, for them to preserve the inscrutability. We already know way too much about Prince Charles for him to have any mystique. And we know a lot about William, actually. The one who has the most mystique right now is Kate because she's actually decided to follow the example of her grandmother-in-law and be extremely, sort of buttoned up, really, about anything that… You know, we don't really know what Kate thinks about anything. 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:22.000 Yeah, so let's talk about these couples. Maybe we'll start with Harry and Meghan. You write that at the core of their difficulties was determining whether they were celebrity royals or royal celebrities, two very different states of being. So tell me what those two things are. 00:00:22.000 --> 00:00:23.000 Being a royal means that you are committed to a life of service that is about not making money for yourself and not furthering your own celebrity, but to support the crown, being the scaffolding that you mentioned earlier. 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:24.000 Right. 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:25.000 Being a royal celebrity means that, essentially, you know, you're in business for yourself. Your celebrity is about furthering your own goals, some of which can be humanitarian and philanthropic. But essentially, it's about you being famous for what you're choosing to do. Very, very different ways of being. I mean, Queen Mary, who was the current queen's grandmother, she once said, you know, "You're a member of the royal family. We're never tired, and we love hospitals." 00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:26.000 [LAUGHTER] 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:27.000 Which is sort of the ethos. 00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:28.000 "It's our job." 00:00:28.000 --> 00:00:29.000 "It's our job. It's our job to never be tired and to love hospitals." It is, essentially, a life of subservience, essentially, to, you know, the cause of the crown. It's a bit like a secular version of taking the veil, if you like. You know, it's not fun, actually. And a lot of your time is gonna be spent doing things you really don't much wanna do, and you have to keep doing them again and again. And there's sort of no light at the end of the tunnel because it's forever. 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:30.000 You know, Meghan said in her interview with Oprah that this idea of what it would truly mean to be in the royal family had sort of alluded her, that she really didn't quite understand what would be involved ahead of time. 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:31.000 [START CBS ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:32.000 He says, "Okay, well, my grandmother's there, so you're going to meet her." Oh, great! I love grand… I loved my grandmother, I used to take care of my grandmother. This is great. He goes, "Right. Do you know how to curtsy?" "What?" He said, "Do you know how to curtsy?" Now I thought, genuinely, that that was what happens outside. 00:00:32.000 --> 00:00:33.000 Yeah. 00:00:33.000 --> 00:00:34.000 I thought that was part of the fanfare or… 00:00:34.000 --> 00:00:35.000 Uh-huh. 00:00:35.000 --> 00:00:36.000 I didn't think that's what happens inside. And I said, "But it's your grandmother." He goes, "It's the Queen." 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:37.000 [END CBS ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:38.000 And I know that I've heard you be a bit critical of that. How could you possibly show up and not know what you're getting into, but I mean, can anyone truly be prepared? 00:00:38.000 --> 00:00:39.000 No, I think that even Diana, who was the daughter of courtiers and a major aristocratic dynasty, most of whom had worked for the royals at some point or other, even she found it extraordinarily difficult. There is no way that an outsider, including Prince Philip who found it extremely difficult to end up in that family, because you feel kind of, you know, in a sense, crushed by the whole structure. It's very, very onerous, frankly, to be in it. 00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:40.000 Almost ornamental at that point. 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:41.000 Yeah. It feels… And you feel that you don't have a voice. You feel that you can't risk being yourself. You feel there are so many things that you can see you could do, but you're not allowed to do them. So there's a lot of issues that I think even somebody who was well-versed in it would've found very, very difficult. What I don't really understand, though, is how short a time she gave it, essentially. She gave it 20 months. I mean, Diana gave it 16 years before she came out of the royal family. And actually, it was only because her husband wasn't in love with her. So I think that 20 months was a short time to give it. Clearly what Meghan saw, she found she hated it so much, she just didn't think she'd ever, ever feel differently about it. The only thing that really puzzles me is that Meghan, you know, was a very accomplished TV actress. She was always known for being very well prepared. You know, I mean, many of her former colleagues said that, you know, she was always the actor who wanted notes, who, you know, who boned up on her role, who kind of really tried to understand her role. And this most difficult role of her life, she seems to have had a perfunctory understanding. All one can imagine is that she was madly in love with Harry and didn't want to see the downside. And it's quite likely nor did he wish to tell her about the downside. 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:42.000 Sure. 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:43.000 Because, you know, he'd lost two girlfriends that he adored because of their sort of distaste for the whole kind of scrutiny they were under and the difficulties of it all. And he didn't want to lose Meghan, with whom he was madly in love. And it's quite likely that he perhaps painted a rosier picture than it was. 00:00:43.000 --> 00:00:44.000 Mm. One thing that Harry and Meghan both claimed in that Oprah interview is that some members of the royal family are racist. And you've spoken to so many palace insiders over the course of your reporting. Do you get the sense that that's true? 00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:45.000 It's impossible to know, frankly, what actually happened. We don't know, and nor do I know. I can't pretend that I do know. Certainly, the diversity at the palace is very, very meager. You know, it's only 8%, I think, at the palace. She certainly didn't meet or know anyone who looked remotely like her, either in the family or in the palace structure. So I think that Meghan did feel very much alone in that situation. 00:00:45.000 --> 00:00:46.000 Mm. Mm. Harry has said that he thinks his mother, that he thinks Diana, would be proud of him for leaving the family, essentially for sticking up for his wife, right, against the press. I've heard you say that you're not so convinced that Diana would feel that way. 00:00:46.000 --> 00:00:47.000 Well, I think Diana would be very, very pleased that he stuck up for Meghan and that he went to battle for her because she never felt the palace did enough to do battle for her. That's for sure. And she would've seen that same thing happening with Meghan. But I do think that Diana would've wanted him to try to pursue his desire for change and humanitarian service from within the royal family because Diana was very much aware of the potency of being part of that royal machine, if you'd like. When Diana shook the hands of the AIDS patient, so memorably, in, I think, 1986, in that Middlesex hospital, the fact that she was a member of the royal family making this incredibly powerful gesture of humanity and inclusion to an AIDS patient mattered. You know, she wasn't doing it as an outsider. She was doing it as the epitome of the role, you know, of the establishment, the epitome of English society. And here she was without gloves, which today might sound dated, but at the time, the royal women, if they, you know, they shook anyone's hand, they would always wear gloves. No gloves. She wanted to make the gesture, you know, "I'm not afraid. I'm not… don't feel any anxiety about making this gesture." And it was incredibly powerful. And I do believe that it was more powerful for it coming from a member of the royal family. 00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:48.000 Mm. So many parallels drawn between Diana and Meghan. I wonder if you can maybe just describe what you see as having been different, in terms of the press coverage of Meghan. Do you think that there was a different element to it? 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:49.000 I definitely think that Meghan is correct in saying that the coverage was racist when she first kind of emerged as Harry's girlfriend. I mean, it was just gross. You know, they literally put their backs out in the tabloid, you know, stooping to new lows, kind of writing these obviously, you know, racist headlines. It was very unpleasant for her and shocking for her. And I think shocking period, actually. Then I think she entered into a kind of honeymoon period when they got engaged. And then there was a kind of embracing of Meghan after that. Left her wounded, obviously. But then the press, I think, turned around and tried to make a kind of division between her and Kate. Then it was about sort of dividing these two women from each other. I mean, the press are so misogynistic. There's nothing they like better than to kind of create a cat fight, supposedly, between two women, you know, two smart, beautiful women supposedly at each other's throats. So that became the next round of the coverage, you know. And then, you know, I think that they just wanted to keep up the division. It was a better story for them to kind of posit, you know, goody, goody Kate, essentially, you know, against Meghan. And that became a very bad and toxic atmosphere, I think, for Meghan. And she found it very difficult to handle. 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:50.000 This year, as we know, marks the Queen's Platinum Jubilee. And it was reported earlier this month that Prince Harry and Meghan and their kids will travel to the U.K. for the Jubilee in June. But their family, along with Prince Andrew, will not be on the Buckingham Palace balcony. What does that tell you about the state of relationships within the royal family right now? 00:00:50.000 --> 00:00:51.000 Well, there was a good rationale for not having them on the balcony. The Queen has said that she only wanted working senior royals to be on that balcony. And famously, of course, Meghan and Harry did not want to be working royals anymore. 00:00:51.000 --> 00:00:52.000 They are not. Yeah. 00:00:52.000 --> 00:00:53.000 So they're not. So they're no longer part of that. I think it's a pity, actually, because I kind of think that the Sussexes on that balcony would've been a great symbol of family unity. But of course, it would not be an accurate symbol of family unity because that feud, essentially that was kicked off by so-called Megxit, has not been healed. So the Queen has always been one for being authentic, and she's not prepared to fake it for, you know, a feel-good moment. 00:00:53.000 --> 00:00:54.000 You know, something you said there strikes me. It wouldn't be accurate, but it would've been nice to see it. That, to me, describes the entire tension behind the crown, behind the firm, really, right? That this tension between tradition and upholding how things have always been with what might actually be strategic and forward-looking and perhaps even progressive. Tell me a little bit about how you see the Queen thinking about these two tensions. 00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:55.000 Well, the Queen has always, throughout her whole reign, had to confront the thorny issue of the fact that the monarchy, the institution, is built on the shoulders of a very fallible human family, her family. So there are times when those two things are in collision. When she has to assess this tension, as you say, between what she would like to do perhaps as a mother and a grandmother and what the crown, the protection of the crown, the monarchy, the institution is best for that. She will always choose the crown, the Queen, and always has, actually, throughout her reign, starting from when her younger sister, Princess Margaret, wanted to marry a man who was divorced and who she was madly in love with, but who was, you know, quite a bit older than her. And it was not considered, at that time in the '50s, you know, appropriate or right. And so the Queen, essentially, had to deny her beloved young sister the man she really wanted to be with. And from that moment onwards really, you've seen this happening again and again, when the Queen has to… She doesn't do it gladly. It's not something she enjoys doing. But if it requires that, she will. I mean, she had to cancel her son, Andrew, frankly. Essentially cancel her favorite son, strip him of his military honors, banish him from public life. Which is extraordinarily painful for Andrew, but absolutely necessary for the health and future of the monarchy. 00:00:55.000 --> 00:00:56.000 [PENSIVE MUSIC] 00:00:56.000 --> 00:00:57.000 For years now, there has been growing criticism about Prince Andrew's relationship and friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. In 2015, an American woman named Virginia Giuffre alleged that she was forced to have sex with Prince Andrew when she was 17 years old, and that Jeffrey Epstein connected her to the prince. Then, in November of 2019, Prince Andrew agreed to sit down for an interview with the "BBC's" Emily Maitlis to discuss the allegations. This interview is widely remembered as a total train wreck. 00:00:57.000 --> 00:00:58.000 [START BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:00:58.000 --> 00:00:59.000 Just for the record, you've been on his private plane. 00:00:59.000 --> 00:01:00.000 Yes. 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:01.000 You've been to stay on his private island. 00:01:01.000 --> 00:01:02.000 Yes. 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:03.000 You've stayed at his home in Palm Beach. 00:01:03.000 --> 00:01:04.000 Yes. 00:01:04.000 --> 00:01:05.000 You visited Ghislaine Maxwell's house in Belgravia, in London. 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:06.000 Yes. 00:01:06.000 --> 00:01:07.000 [END BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:08.000 She also asked him about Giuffre’s allegations against him. 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:09.000 [START BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:10.000 She was very specific about that night. She described dancing with you… 00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:11.000 No. 00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:12.000 …and you profusely sweating, and that she went on to have a bath, possibly. 00:01:12.000 --> 00:01:13.000 There's a slight problem with… with… with the sweating because I… I… I have a peculiar medical condition, which is that I don't sweat. 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:14.000 [END BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:01:14.000 --> 00:01:15.000 And there's an infamous photograph, which Giuffre says was taken around 2001, of Prince Andrew with his arm around her. Maitlis also asked the prince to explain that. 00:01:15.000 --> 00:01:16.000 [START BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:01:16.000 --> 00:01:17.000 You've seen the photo. 00:01:17.000 --> 00:01:18.000 I've seen the photograph. 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:19.000 How do you explain that? 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:20.000 I can't. Because I don't… I have no… Again, I have absolutely no memory of that photograph ever being taken. 00:01:20.000 --> 00:01:21.000 Do you recognize yourself in the photo? 00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:22.000 Oh, yeah. It's pretty difficult not to recognize yourself. 00:01:22.000 --> 00:01:23.000 [END BBC ARCHIVAL CLIP] 00:01:23.000 --> 00:01:24.000 Earlier this year, the palace announced Prince Andrew would be stripped of his military and royal titles and was suspending his public duties for the foreseeable future. He went on to settle with Giuffre, though he maintains his innocence. I asked Tina Brown for her impressions about how the firm has handled the accusations against Andrew. 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:25.000 [MUSIC FADES OUT] 00:01:25.000 --> 00:01:26.000 You know, the trouble with Prince Andrew was he was always an oaf. He was always a lout. You know, just terrible sort of elitist nonsense about him and bad behavior across the board. 00:01:26.000 --> 00:01:27.000 And yet he was always the Queen's favorite, right? 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:28.000 Yes. The Queen has always had a soft spot for Andrew. He's, you know, he had a period of being, you know, a very, sort of promising man. You know, I mean, he served in the Navy. He was very brave, actually, during the Falklands War. He came out of the Navy and, very much like Harry, he just seemed to go downhill from there. So Andrew kind of lost his mojo completely. He married, of course, Sarah Ferguson, who there was a great deal of excitement when they were married. But then, you know, he was separated from her going to his Naval base. She wasn't allowed to visit him. The marriage kind of, you know, kind of crumbled. It was all a bit hopeless. And unfortunately, Andrew, because of the high spending of his wife and himself, he really, you know, became obsessed with trying to get, you know, more money. Andrew had a real sort of pension, if you like, for mixing with really second- and third-rate people. And of course, the worst thing is getting involved, you know, with Epstein's network. 00:01:28.000 --> 00:01:29.000 Do you think that the Queen has created the right amount of distance with Prince Andrew as a result of these allegations? 00:01:29.000 --> 00:01:30.000 I really don't, actually. I think Andrew's a blind spot for the Queen. I really do. I mean, she did what she had to do, but she took a long time to do it, essentially, with Andrew. It really wasn't until Andrew sat down with Emily Maitlis, which was such a destructive interview, that the whole kind of impossibility of having Andrew anywhere near the royal orbit was understood. And, you know, one would like to have thought that he'd have been banished long before that, frankly. And then everyone was completely astonished to see Andrew escorting his mother in Prince Philip's memorial service quite recently. 00:01:30.000 --> 00:01:31.000 Right. Right. 00:01:31.000 --> 00:01:32.000 I mean, the optics of that were just dreadful, essentially. It's like, wait a minute, he's been banished, hasn't he? What's he now doing at the Queen's side? But you know, I mean, he's her son. And she, in her compartmentalizing way, probably thought this was his father's memorial service. It was her husband's memorial service. And she was probably quite comforted by Prince Andrew's presence. But in terms of the message it sent, it was most unfortunate. 00:01:32.000 --> 00:01:33.000 I have to ask, how does something as disastrous as the Prince Andrew interview even happen? I would so imagine that all the members of the royal family, even the minor members, minor royals, have handlers and people who are there to just make sure the fire doesn't even start, forget about putting it out. 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:34.000 Well, I mean, the thing about them that is so interesting, I mean, very often they can't be persuaded. I mean, Andrew is essentially dumb, right? And he listens to all the wrong people. Primarily, actually, his ex-wife Sarah who thought it was a wonderful idea for him to talk to Emily Maitlis. Anyone could have told Andrew that to give an "ask me anything" interview to television's most kind of sharp news anchor, if you like, for an hour, I mean, it seemed to go on forever, was a catastrophic move. I mean, he strapped on a suicide vest when he walked onto that set. But let's not forget that Diana also gave an incredibly explosive interview to Martin Bashir, that Meghan and Harry gave an extraordinarily explosive interview to Oprah, and that Prince Charles, way back in the '80s, gave an extraordinarily explosive interview to Jonathan Dimbleby on ITN, in which he admitted, disastrously, that he had been unfaithful to Diana. So I would've thought at this point, after four of these catastrophes, that there would be a kind of edict that would go out saying, "On no account, sit down for a television interview with anybody." 00:01:34.000 --> 00:01:35.000 Right. Right. 00:01:35.000 --> 00:01:36.000 You know, just don't do it. 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:37.000 Don't do it. 00:01:37.000 --> 00:01:38.000 But I think at a certain point, it boils up in them a desperate desire to explain themselves. 00:01:38.000 --> 00:01:39.000 Wow. 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:40.000 And that's what I, you know, feel about the Queen's self-discipline. There must have been so many times when she just wanted someone to know exactly what had happened, how it was completely different to what they thought it was, in her own voice. She never fell for it. She never did. She's never given an interview her entire life. But her children can't seem to understand how smart that is. 00:01:40.000 --> 00:01:41.000 Let's talk, in our last few minutes we have, about Charles and Camilla. Yeah. I think for many Americans, especially for a lot of younger folks who have maybe been watching "The Crown" on Netflix, they know Charles and Camilla best during the Diana years, and it's sort of cast them in a villainous role. Tell me a little bit about what's changed about the public's perception of the two of them. 00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:42.000 Well, I happen to be a great fan of Camilla's. There's a large kind of amount of space in "The Palace Papers" to give a portrait of the woman who I think is the real Camilla. She's humorous, she's funny, she's earthy, she's stoic, she's intelligent and she can play the long game. She knows how to do that in a very subtle and interesting way. She's also, frankly, very gracious, very charming. And now she's married to Charles and is now the Duchess of Cornwall, future queen consort. The public are beginning to see just how much of a decent, charming and relaxed person she is. So she's won a lot of brownie points by simply doing her job with a smile, following the, you know, the age-old mission of like get out there, show you want to be there, never be tired and love hospitals. Right? She's doing it. 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:43.000 Yeah. She's doing it. 00:01:43.000 --> 00:01:44.000 She's doing it. And she's doing it very well. And that earns a lot of respect over the years from the British public. I doubt she will ever have the same kind of… certainly will never be a Princess Diana to the public. But I do think there'll be a certain amount of affection for her. And there seems to be at this point. Charles, everyone knows way too much about, but he is seen to be an authentic figure. I mean, Charles's passions have always been, you know, organic farming, his concerns about climate change, his preservation of the planet Earth. And he was mocked for it for decades. They would snicker and snicker and think Charles was eccentric. And gosh, what the hell's he on about? And people would mock him. Well, guess what? Turns out that he was absolutely prescient, absolutely right. 00:01:44.000 --> 00:01:45.000 Yeah. Ahead of his time. 00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:46.000 Ahead of his time. So that's a great thing. And if ever there was a moment for Charles to step, finally, out of the antrum of him destiny onto that, you know, main stage, it's now. It's now. And I think that he'll be… it'll be a short reign probably 'cause he's already in his mid-seventies, but I think it could be a significant one, you know, in terms of his ability to convene around that issue and his modernizing of the institution to be ready for the reign, which will be much longer, of Prince William. 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:47.000 That's right. Yeah. Next down the chain. He, I should say William and Kate, recently wrapped up a royal tour of a number of Caribbean Commonwealth nations, and they were met with a lot of protests, calls for reparations for slavery. How did they handle the tour and the criticisms that they got on the tour? And how do you see William and Kate being prepared to handle future criticism? 00:01:47.000 --> 00:01:48.000 Well, they actually handled it as well as they could, given that they were put into a situation which was so, for them, must have been deeply uncomfortable, I would think. They handled it graciously, but they weren't happy with it and nor was anybody else. And it really, I think, was a wakeup call to both of them that the modernization of the institution cannot wait. That they simply can't go out there and behave as if it's the Queen's monarchy, his grandmother's. It's different. I mean, you know, they were photographed in the same Land Rover that the Queen and Prince Philip had been photographed in, kind of standing up, wearing kind of very formal clothes, Kate in a sort of tea tray hat, you know, whole thing. 00:01:48.000 --> 00:01:49.000 Right, right. 00:01:49.000 --> 00:01:50.000 You know, sort of being admired by islanders behind a fence. I mean, it was terrible optics, terrible for them. And I think that you could argue that they perhaps should have understood that ahead of time, but certainly they understand it now. And I gather that, you know, Prince William has ordered a kind of top-down review about: how are we gonna do all this stuff in the future? I would say, you know, it's late in the day to be asking that question, but they are asking it. 00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:51.000 When you talk about the necessary modernization that needs to happen under Charles and then eventually under William, what do you see as the most urgently in-need-of-reform areas? 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:52.000 I think that a major need for reform is to review situations through the prism of the modern world while, at the same time, trying to keep the mystique of the monarchy of some kind. But less archaic, less kind of with the aroma of old institutional structures. I think that the Windsors are, to put it mildly, over-housed. I mean, you know, they have all these palaces, all of them kind of staffed with, you know, footmen and valets and gardeners. And it's too many, you know, for… 00:01:52.000 --> 00:01:53.000 "Over-housed" is a phrase I really haven't heard. But yeah, I guess that's sort of exactly the right description. 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:54.000 They are over-housed. They're over-palaced. And you know, Prince Charles is considering turning Balmoral into a museum of the Queen. He's also… 00:01:54.000 --> 00:01:55.000 That's interesting. 00:01:55.000 --> 00:01:56.000 Yeah. He's also considering opening up really most of Buckingham Palace to the public. Some of it's open now, but, I mean, there's 100 bedrooms in Buckingham Palace. Charles is, you know, going to live in an apartment on the top, but he's gonna open up a great deal of Buckingham Palace now, if not all of it, to the public. These are kind of things that, you know, that are gonna take time, but are obviously the right evolution. Nobody wanted to do that while the Queen was alive because it's kind of disrespectful to her, essentially, to sort of start dismantling things. But there is gonna have to be quite a bit of dismantling and rethinking and making this a kind of, an institution that can work for the 21st century. 00:01:56.000 --> 00:01:57.000 What do you think Queen Elizabeth wants her legacy to be? And do you think it lines up with what her legacy actually will be? 00:01:57.000 --> 00:01:58.000 I think Elizabeth's legacy will be that the monarchy survives and remains an institution that embodies service and duty and stoicism and British commitment to fairness and justice. I think that that's really what she wants to see happen, that the monarchy itself continues with the purpose that she's brought to it and that her family can continue to do that. I think she feels strongly that she's done some really kind of amazing things. I mean, in her lifetime, in her reign, probably her most… greatest political success, even though she's not supposed to be political, but you know, her soft power was incredibly helpful in Ireland, for instance, when she was the first monarch since her grandfather George V to go to Ireland and to ease and bless and create the atmosphere for the reconciliation and the, you know, the end of the Troubles, essentially. She did that, and it was enormously effective and the monarchy, at its very best. I'm sure that she will feel that's part of her legacy is to be a soft power influence that only brought the best of Britain to every country that she went to and to her own. 00:01:58.000 --> 00:01:59.000 [MUSIC FADES IN] 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:00.000 You can find Tina Brown's new book, called "The Palace Papers: Inside the House of Windsor - the Truth and the Turmoil," on Apple Books. We have a link for you on our show notes page. 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:01.000 [MUSIC FADES OUT]