Over the years, dozens of “body language experts” have been called upon to analyze various royal figures’ public appearances. These experts are often tasked with throwing a haze of “analysis” on top of royalist talking points. It’s always shocking to see body-language experts inevitably claim that Prince Harry and Meghan have signs of physical tension when they’re just walking along, holding hands and smiling. Meanwhile, Prince William and Kate’s extreme physical awkwardness is always held up as the gold-standard of body-language for a couple. Anyway, after William and Kate’s appearance at the BAFTAs on Sunday, would you believe that a body-language expert said that they looked tense?
Prince William and Kate Middleton showed signs of tension at the 2026 BAFTA Awards following ex-Prince Andrew’s arrest, according to body language expert Judi James.
James told Hello! magazine that while the Prince and Princess of Wales “delivered their usual, impeccable red carpet A-list glamour” at the event in London on Sunday, she noted there were “a handful of tells that might reflect the undeniable tensions of the past week.”
The couple, according to James, did not act the way royals normally do on red carpets.
“[The royals] walk side by side with their arms hanging loose at their sides, with a closeness of the dangling inner hands suggesting a desire to clasp hands here or perhaps to perform the kind of signature truncated touches, pats and strokes they often give each other to support each other at events like this,” James explained. “Instead of touching, though, we can see the fingers of William’s right hand slightly curled so that his index finger touches his thumb, hinting at a self-soothe ritual,” James added of the future king.
James also said that William, 43, showed “some anxiety” at the BAFTAs in one moment “where his lips [were] pulled inward and his brows pulled into a small frown.”
Yeah, they looked tense, but magically that tension was just about Prince Andrew’s arrest, case closed! It’s not like William always has a face like thunder whenever he has to do an event with his wife. It’s not like William is constantly balling up his fists and clasping his hands in front of his crotch protectively. It’s not like Kate looked like she rolled out of bed, plopped an unkempt wig on her head and went to the BAFTAs at the last minute. It’s not like both William and Kate wince when the other tries to touch them. Nothing to see here, folks! Just a little bit of Andrew-inspired tension!
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
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- Britain’s William, Prince of Wales, and Catherine, Princess of Wales, arrive with Jane Millichip, CEO of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London Ken Olisa to the BAFTA Film Awards 2026, at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London, Britain, February 22, 2026,,Image: 1077419247, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Jaimi Joy/Avalon
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- Britain’s William, Prince of Wales, and Catherine, Princess of Wales, arrive with Jane Millichip, CEO of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London Ken Olisa to the BAFTA Film Awards 2026, at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London, Britain, February 22, 2026,,Image: 1077419262, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Jaimi Joy/Avalon
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- Britain’s William, Prince of Wales, and Catherine, Princess of Wales, to the BAFTA Film Awards 2026, at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London, Britain, February 22, 2026,,Image: 1077428209, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Jaimi Joy/Avalon
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- Britain’s Catherine, Princess of Wales, arrives to the BAFTA Film Awards 2026, at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London, Britain, February 22, 2026,,Image: 1077428218, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Jaimi Joy/Avalon
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- Britain’s Catherine, Princess of Wales, meets with Jane Millichip, CEO of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, Elaine Bedell, CEO of Southbank Centre, and Allison Kirkby, CEO of BT Group, at the BAFTA Film Awards 2026, at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London, Britain, February 22, 2026,,Image: 1077428292, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: *** NO UK USE FOR 48 HRS ***, Model Release: no, Credit line: Jaimi Joy/Avalon
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- 22/02/2026. London, UK. The Prince and Princess of Wales The Prince and Princess of Wales attend the EE BAFTA Film Awards held at the Royal Festival Hall. Their Royal Highnesses met performers and bursary recipients from The Prince William BAFTA Bursary.,Image: 1077447143, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: © Kensington Palace. This image may only be used for news or editorial reporting purposes. This image must NOT be used for any commercial or other use, save for news or editorial reporting and cannot be altered or amended in any manner or form whatsoever., Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons / Kensington Palace/Avalon
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- 22/02/2026. London, UK. The Prince and Princess of Wales The Prince and Princess of Wales attend the EE BAFTA Film Awards held at the Royal Festival Hall. Their Royal Highnesses met performers and bursary recipients from The Prince William BAFTA Bursary.,Image: 1077470360, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: © Kensington Palace. This image is free for use but may only be used for news or editorial reporting purposes. This image must NOT be used for any commercial or other use, save for news or editorial reporting and cannot be altered or amended in any manner, Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons / Kensington Palace/Avalon
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- Willian and Catherine, Princess of Wales at the 2026 EE BAFTA Film Awards held at The Royal Festival Hall,Image: 1077540488, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Credit line: Lounis Tiar/Avalon
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- Celebrities arrive at the 2026 BAFTA Film Awards at Royal Festival Hall, London Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales, William, Prince of Wales Where: London, United Kingdom When: 22 Feb 2026 Credit: Cover Images **NOT AVAILABLE FOR HELLO MAGAZINE**
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- Celebrities arrive at the 2026 BAFTA Film Awards at Royal Festival Hall, London Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales, William, Prince of Wales Where: London, United Kingdom When: 22 Feb 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Celebrities arrive at the 2026 BAFTA Film Awards at Royal Festival Hall, London Featuring: Catherine, Princess of Wales, William, Prince of Wales Where: London, United Kingdom When: 22 Feb 2026 Credit: PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
Funny way of saying making a fist is self soothing…
Indeed….
“the kind of signature truncated touches, pats and strokes….” omg /fanning myself. No more of this NSFW content! The chemistry, the heat!
Please look at the photo of them in the lift and say what you see. Once again Kate is smiling and looking at him for the cameras because she’s a game girl and she knows the money shot they want. Wilbur ‘ s upper body and head is tilted away from her. He’s not returning her look and smile. It is a professional smile for the cameras. She has plonked herself close to him in the lift AND he’s leaning away from her to create space and separation. Twas ever thus. She’s willing to take a take but he can’t hide his equal unwillingness not to and determination to protect himself from “encroachment” hence the protective crossed hands over the crotch. Keen can look but not touch or invade his space.
This sounds more like what I would expect from an actual body language expert!
I don’t think this even really requires analysis simple observation works. They do their best not to actually be within touching distance of each other, and they rarely look each other in the eyes. It’s amusing to me though that she at least tries. Whether that is because she wants to present the facade because of embarrassment, jealousy, or competitiveness who knows?
But it’s funny that she’s looking at him in a lot of these photos, trying to smile and look like she’s interested in what he’s saying or that he just included her in a conversation, and he’s looking ahead at the camera or at someone else. I wonder if they have to literally tell him behind the scenes okay I need you to actually look at Kate right now.
I keep saying it, but 40 more years of this. Because they aren’t setting the groundwork for them to be two people that do their own thing and it’s not odd, they’re the most in love couple of all time. I don’t see how they’re going to maintain this fiction.
They are trying way too hard to compete with Harry and Meghan and they will lose. This has been a convenient marriage not one with passion and they are idiots to pretend they can sell that fiction of a grande passion. Unless hatred is a passion, because that’s the only thing they are selling.
They wont last that long, I can make bets on it.
Except they looked more or less as they always do.
As I said in another thread, W&K looked stony-faced when they arrived at the BAFTAs. Perhaps this goes some way to explain it – from yesterday’s Daily Mirror newspaper describing the various members of the BRF and their responses to Andrew’s arrest: ‘When one reporter asked the couple if the monarchy was “in peril”, the future king and queen made a swift exit. At one stage Kate gently urged her husband to “look at the people” a lip reader decoded, with the future King replying, “Watch your step” as they went inside.’ “Watch your step” can mean one of two things – positive as in ‘be careful or you might fall’, or negative as in ‘behave yourself because the world is watching you’. I suspect the latter in William’s case judging how the pair interacted once they were inside the theatre. On the other hand I do wish these journalists would stop harassing the royals over Andrew. Shouting at them is very unseemly behaviour and that question was not merely asked, it was shouted as W&K arrived at the BAFTAs. I saw it for myself on the TV news.
Keep shouting questions!
These colonizers ARE NOT SPECIAL.
There’s a clip going around of when the reporter asked them this question and William’s face dropped. Then he recovered and turned to ask the lady accompanying them a question.
No, they need to be asked these questions. They knew, and I get the sense Andrew wasn’t Epsteins only royal friend.
They need to keep shouting these questions because the royals never, ever, make themselves available to answer questions on anything. And they should be questioned. What did they know and when did they know it?
Maybe they will leave H&M alone now that they have Andrew to blame for everything.
In the second pic of Kate, why is her chest so blotchy? Close up it appears she has patches of white skin…..
She also has some marks across her forearm. It’s most evident in the elevator picture
It looks like she’d had the bracelet pushed up before.
Upon closer inspection, I think you’re right Bqm.
It looks like Kate is so thin that the skin over the cartilage attaching the ribs to the sternum is stretched tight enough to reduce blood flow. I may not like the woman, but I feel sorry that she’s in this state.
The blotchiness will be the result of two things: excessive sunbathing that’s finally catching up with her & the chilliness of the evening. The marks on her left arm? In some photos I see her with her arm up adjusting her hair (and she does that a lot) with that bracelet sliding up (actually down) her arm. The line is from her bracelet.
Thanks BeanieBean. I saw more pictures of her at the event on another site, and you’re right, it looked like the bracelet lines.
Oh come on!! We don’t need a body language “expert “ to tell us what our eyes have been seeing for years. These two, especially Peg, don’t want to be together period.
lmao that wasn’t self soothing, that was trying to keep his wife from holding his hand.
These two are so awkward in public. The press just needs to stop pushing them as the Greatest British Love Story of All Time. It makes appearances like this seem that much worse.
Although it is totally deceptive, the ways some of these photographers take pictures at angles that almost make it look like they are touching is quite hilarious.
And they have been doing this for years.
William hates her. It’s so crystal-clear. That elevator image really does convey the truth — he has his hands clasped in front of the family jewels and his body is tilted away from Kate.
He’s trapped in a confined space with Kate in more ways than one.
Well, that’s who they have right now: Grommitt goes to the Baftas. At least he wasn’t leering over some young women saying gross things. Of course they are tense: they were drug out of wherever they had landed and made to go somewhere they didn’t want to go.
Grommet is the dog. Wallace is who William looks like.
She said what she said
They were probably pissed that the Palace made them go to the BAFTAs.
The way the BRF try so hard to absolutely never make contact with each other in public will never not be weird. None of the other royal families avoid each other like this. I don’t need to see them groping each other but it would look perfectly natural for a man to escort his wife down the red carpet with her hand on his arm.
This is still pretty mild. The rota is laying the groundwork to turn on ’em though. After a decade of fawning, the rota has to spend a few months backtracking before, em, more truthfully covering the Wails awkwardness together and solo. I can’t wait to read the truthful explanation of why Will-not holds his 🍆 during every public appearance. If Meghan EVER showed up in public with hair and make-up that looked that bad, the rota screaming would be audible from space.