Kay: The BBC is ‘nervous’ about how ‘The Princes & the Press’ will be received

Duke of Cambridge visit to Dulwich Hamlet FC

It’s completely hilarious to watch Prince William fumble around, engorged with rage, as he desperately tries to pull his father and grandmother into his self-made melodrama. Yes, we’re talking about the BBC’s The Princes and the Press, a documentary-style program about how William and Harry briefed against each other for years. There was some confusion about this, so let me say – Harry and Meghan did brief the media, but not anywhere to the extent that William, Kate, the Middletons, and the courtiers briefed against the Sussexes. Harry and Meghan were merely trying to survive the onslaught. The rest of them were the onslaught.

The Daily Mail has run multiple stories about how *everyone* is super-mad that anyone would suggest that Ol’ Moose Knuckle would have ever briefed against his brother and sister-in-law. As I said, William is briefing the press on how he’s never briefed the press. He’s reaching out to his favorite Rota journalists like Rebecca English and Richard Kay to brief them about how awful it is that anyone suggested that he briefs journalists. You cannot make this sh-t up. Here are some highlights from Richard Kay’s piece:

Kay thinks this is IRONIC! Even by the crass standards of the BBC, there is something supremely ironic for it to broadcast a major two-part documentary about briefing wars between members of the Royal Family while the embers of the Martin Bashir affair are still glowing.

Kay has been briefed that Charles & the Queen are dreadfully upset as well: It is highly unusual for all three royal households, representing the Queen, the Prince of Wales and Prince William, to unite in a threat of a potential boycott of our national broadcaster but it demonstrates what is at stake. And it underlines a shared sense of collective anger at the programme.

The BBC is nervous too: There was growing nervousness at the BBC despite its claim that the film will provide ‘context’ for William and Harry’s relationship with the media. ‘There has been anxiety within the hierarchy about the film for some time and it is the reason why, when it comes to what it contains, they have been playing things so very close to their chest,’ says a Corporation figure. ‘At the same time you do wonder if they have thought things through as to how it is likely to be received.’

William absolutely did this: Previous claims that suggested William and his staff had leaked a story about Harry’s mental welfare, for example, were cut from a prime time ITV documentary hours before it was due to be broadcast in July.

Oh my goodness: Questions they were asked included whether they become ‘too close’ to the royals, whether the relationship between the Press and the royals is ‘sycophantic’ and how stories about the Royal Family are presented or ‘spun’.

[From The Daily Mail]

What happened is Prince William and his current communications team contacted their favorite journalists and commentators and tried to blanket the media ahead of Part 1 of this two-part docu-series. They ran around like chickens with the heads cut off, whining to Becky English and Richard Kay about how dare anyone suggest that they were briefing against the Sussexes! It’s particularly rich coming from Kay, considering he was consistently used to break all kinds of nasty pro-Cambridge storylines, like how Meghan was to blame for the Rose Hanbury story, or how Prince Harry simply needed to come to his senses, divorce his wife and come back to play second fiddle to Baldemort. How did Kay even write this with a straight face?

NHS' birthday in London

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46 Responses to “Kay: The BBC is ‘nervous’ about how ‘The Princes & the Press’ will be received”

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  1. Noki says:

    King William is going to be terrible. This guy was born in the wrong century.

  2. FancyHat says:

    I’m loving that William is having to deal with this fallout but I love even more that you guys keep using that beaver looking picture of William.

    • Chloe says:

      You know what i love? That royal reporters have to sit there and deny their own sources after bleating about it proudly for years how they had very solid sources in the royal households.

      • JT says:

        @Chloe I love it too and I hope the rats get resentful enough to start spilling on them. It’s the rota who has the power anyway. A couple of truth bombs laid out and the royals will run into the rotas arms.

      • Randi says:

        Agreed! And wasn’t BBC that spouted with pride that they “refused” to air Oprah’s interview with Meghan and Harry? Now with their actions—isn’t that calling the kettle black?!

    • booboocita says:

      Which one? He looks like a beaver in all his pics.

    • BothSidesNow says:

      @ FancyHat, I know!! Baldingham is just an unpleasant fellow with zero redeeming qualities. He will prove to be an awful king as he has clearly displaced no interest in becoming FFK. I think Baldingham is extremely worried about this documentary as he has the most to lose. If his buddies and chums will keep their mouths closed he is in for a rude awakening! Baldingham and his Tooth promised access and information but Harry and Meghan grew too wise for him. Not that it was difficult to do!!

  3. Chloe says:

    Maybe its because i’ve created a nice bubble on twitter but from what i’ve seen people are calling out william.

    • L4frimaire says:

      Also a lot of the pro Royalists are really mad about it. It seems the host asked these Rota and others the right questions and just let them say whatever BS they tried to spin. I think Part 2. Will be way more critical of the Sussexes, because they dropped some bombs like the South Africa interview, the lawsuit, their Statement regarding Sussexit, and of course the Oprah interview. There will be lots of huffing and puffing. I hope they call out how the UK press enables Thomas Markle, the vicious attacks around Meghan’s pregnancy and newborn Archie, and some of the lies like “ Meg’s commandments “, and of course Piers Morgan’s unhinged attacks on Meghan. However, what no one has explained, is what now? They have these troll armys, drove the Sussexes out and away from the UK, so what now? If anything, it seems the attacks on the Sussexes have really ramped up lately, even before this documentary and the less they mention the royals and build their lives away from the UK.

      • Chelsea says:

        The more successful the Sussexes are the more bitter and angry the others get. They pulled that stunt with Knauf as a pathetic attempt to humiliate and smear Meghan knowing she was coming off leave but just succeeded in making it even harder for them to claim that they never briefed the press against Meghan. It was such an obvious error that shows definitively that the Future Future King is an idiot who will be a disaster if he gets to the throne and that the two ahead of him are weak and incompetent for not getting him in line.

    • BothSidesNow says:

      @ Chloe, good for you!! I wish I had more time on Twitter to watch his epic meltdown online!!

  4. Crowned Huntress says:

    Oh this is going to be glorious watching William’s vicious plans he made for his brother come back to ensnare and ruin what’s left of his reputation.

    The UK would be wise to end the monarchy well before the crown ever sits on his head, the man is a tyrant and a danger to others.

    • Lurker25 says:

      @crownedhuntress, I agree. Nature and nurture collided to create a hell of mess. He’s got Charlie’s lack of empathy. The future king business ensured that his entitlement was never challenged, he felt fine placing his needs above all others. And in addition to all this, something seems to have happened in his formative/toddler years that instilled a conviction that anger = power. “Billy the bully” Maybe it’s also due to his childhood head injury? I hear frontal lobe damage can cause personality/emotional volatility. Whatever it is, the man truly thinks that anger is a solution, a good thing, an answer, a solid way to fix things. He WANTS to be seen as incandescent and ragefull. It’s so messed up.

      Harry unknowingly bore the weight of it pre-meghan, being used as a human shield by TOB and used as the go-to Royal for events by courtiers who didn’t want to “bother” TOB. Then Meghan came along and changed the dynamic, empowered Harry, so she became the target. A bigger one since she DARED to cross him/stand up to him/take his shield away, probably first time anyone had done so.

      I think in 20 years, books and movies about William will eclipse Charles/Diana and not in good way. They were a tragedy, a love triangle. William is a primal horror story, Cain and Able writ large

      • BothSidesNow says:

        @ Lurker25, they called him Billy the Basher, per Diana. He was a terrible child with actions to bash anyone who was in his way or had more affection than what he considered appropriate, to him. Billy the Basher is now bashing all of those around him. More importantly, a brother that never caused him outwardly harm, unlike Billy.

      • BeanieBean says:

        And he was called Billy the Basher long before he got hit in the head by a golf club. He’s just got a rotten personality.

      • cisne says:

        how very clear!!

    • L4frimaire says:

      Hate to say it but William will be just fine from this. He’ll won’t be mega popular, which he craves, but he’ll just get along, and still be the way he always is. He’s not a change maker, unless it is to move in a more authoritarian, right wing direction. There was a news report on this on Good Morning America and the tone was the usual keep calm and carry on spin, with William just going about with his duty at whatever event he was at. This documentary, like everything else in British media, puts way too much focus on the Sussexes, and not enough questioning of the institution itself. Why they were so threatened by this couple that they brought out the long knives? Everyone here looking for vindication for the Sussexes or the royals learning any lessons are going to be waiting for a long time. I get why so many think this whole thing is a set up.

  5. JT says:

    The BBC has no reason to be scared. What other options does the RF have? GB News? The BBC is the only, seemingly legitimate, outlet that the royals have at their disposal and they know it, otherwise the Beebs wouldn’t have aired the special in the first place. Who’s going to air the queen’s Christmas message, ITV? Who will broadcast the Jubilee bs? I don’t even know of any other major network that the Brits have, but surely none of them have the reach of BBC. If I were the chairman, I would call the royals bluff and boycott the monarchy. The firm has no other options and they need the media more than the media needs them. Or I would play the royals at their own game and start airing their dirty laundry; that would get the RF singing a different tune real quick.

    • Becks1 says:

      My thoughts exactly. the BBC isn’t scared. They know the royals need them more than they need the royals. And everything else aside, for the royals to boycott the BBC because they think a documentary painted them in a unfavorable light is a REALLY bad look. It makes William look like the opposite of an elegant statesman.

    • Amy Bee says:

      The BBC knows that they have the global reach that ITV and the others don’t have and that the Royal Family is eager for that global spotlight. The Royal Family is upset now but they will not boycott the BBC.

  6. TIFFANY says:

    Any creditable journalist wouldn’t even bother protecting a source like Baldimort.

    It just ain’t worth it and the source material will kill your career.

  7. aquarius64 says:

    William is the one nervous and I want to hear about part 2! I bet it comes out William told the press to weaponize Bad Dad.

  8. A says:

    Let’s be clear about what’s happening here the uk tabloid media is running scared, and for some reason (most likely because their surrounded by absolute idiots) the royal family is trying to give them cover. The irony is, that in the age of social media and mass International media ( plus streaming). The royal family doesn’t really need the tabloids ( something Harry and Meghan have proved). But, I guess you can’t fix stupid!

    • booboocita says:

      And that’s the real crux of the matter, isn’t it? No one, including the RF, needs the Beeb or any other TV or print news outlet in an age of social media. I haven’t seen the documentary in question, but clips of the dude who hacked Chelsy Davy’s cellphone have been all over Twitter, FB and Insta, so it’s not like I needed to. More people hear about the royals from the aforementioned social media channels plus TikTok than do from TV or the red-top tabs. Even the tabloids have social media accounts now.

      If the RF is trying to give the British media cover, it’s because they’ve proven to be abysmal at social media themselves, and they need the sycophancy of the print and broadcast press. If any one of them had the intelligence of a houseplant, they’d hire professional marketers to handle their social media and ignore the Beeb entirely, at least until they fell in line with RF’s wishes.

    • Nic919 says:

      I’m going to disagree a bit here and say the BRF does need the BBC and other establishment media. They need media that doesn’t question them and acts as propaganda without question. They only matter in the Uk and global media won’t provide the same deference that they automatically get from the BBC, ITV, Sky etc.
      As an example, just look at the American reporter asking Kate if she had seen Lili yet, something she’s couldn’t properly answer and something no UK reporter dared to ask. And this is a minor issue.

      Harry and Meghan never got any of that deference, at least Meghan didn’t, and so they had nothing to really lose by finding alternative ways to promote their activities.

  9. Harper says:

    It’s hilarious that the BBC’s first example of the invisible pact (which you can watch on youtube that is linked in the comments of other post this morning) was how the press made a joint decision to “get” Will & Kate for not fully cooperating with them in their early years of marriage. Apparently, Kate was hiding behind her hair and they couldn’t get great photos of her, so they went after Will’s lack of work and decided to call him work-shy. And it took off.

    The thing is, Rajan could have picked another example to illustrate the invisible pact, but he used William’s poor work ethic–something which still merits criticism to this day. In the current anti-Meghan climate, William and Kate have been prioritized and protected. It’s refreshing to see that the Rajan/BBC took the kid gloves off where William is concerned.

  10. Catherine says:

    What indication is there that Harry ever briefed the media against William. The Sussexes tried to provide corrections to lies. It not fair to compare their attempts to fight character assassination with the smear campaign that was carried out the the BRF particularly William. It is not briefing the media with narratives designed to demean, discredit and dehumanize. Over the years it was always Harry’s business that was put out often to protect William. The carnival has previously admitted to that.

    • Amy Bee says:

      @Catherine: I agree, I have no recollection of Harry and Meghan briefing against any other member in the press. In fact they weren’t even allowed to respond to stories in the press.

    • L4frimaire says:

      Yes, how exactly were the Sussexes briefing the media, apart from trying to correct inaccuracies and defend themselves? I don’t think they could play the same games as the other households because they didn’t trust anyone in the press, had no power or protection within the institution and they knew it would come back to bite them if they briefed against others. They were playing defense while the other households were playing offense. I recall during the South Africa interview, Meghan mentioned that the tabloids would print lies, and they would tell them the story was incorrect or not true, and the tabloid would still print their inaccuracies. So many red flags.

    • bisynaptic says:

      agree. they’ve never even had their own, independent, press ops.

  11. Amy Bee says:

    The BBC didn’t put this documentary on its main channel and they put it up against a popular reality show. Although they commissioned the documentary, they’ve done everything they could to bury it. If the Palace had keep quiet about it, nobody would have paid attention to it.

    • Scorpion says:

      @AmyBee…

      It seems the Palaces do not understand the Streisand effect. The inmates are running the asylums….

      • Amy Bee says:

        @Scorpion: You’d have thought they would have learned from their campaign against the Crown. Apparently not.

    • Becks1 says:

      I’m not sure I would have ever heard of it – we didn’t really even talk about it here until this week, basically when the royals started kicking up a fuss. Way to draw attention to it, idiots, lol.

      • Sofia says:

        I live in the UK and didn’t hear about it until the palace kicked up a fuss. And as @Amy Bee said, the BBC didn’t even put it on their main channel so it’s not like they’re massively advertising it.

  12. Chelsea says:

    Every high profile person whether celebrity, politician or royal has people around them from their staff and friend group that talk to the press on background from time to time. That’s just how it works. What makes the situation with the British royals different is that their courtiers go to the rota an unusually high amount because of the power the rota holds over them and they in turn weaponize the rota against members of their own family to play out some sick medieval power game. It’s incredibly bizarre and Bulliam can cry all he wants but his fingerprints are all over multiple cruel smears aimed to destroy his own brother and sister in law, including while she was pregnant, and he will always be vile trash for doing so.

    While I’m sure at times Harry did authorize certain people to talk to the press he was very smart in not allowing them access to Meghan. We all see how Richard likes to pretend he was bffs with Diana because she worked with him and how the fact that she worked with the press is used against her to attack her as being cunning and manipulative for the playing the game to counter Charles attacks on her. We’ve also seen how psychopaths like Piers and Angela Levin have used short conversations with Meghan and Harry respectively to pretend they knew them and have the right to speak on them. This all would have been even worse for H&M if those other clowns were wined and dined by H&M like they were the rest of his family. And now that H&M are in a place where they can speak for themselves and have teams they can trust the leaks have pretty much completely dried up which makes the constant leaks still coming from that island seem even more unhinged.

  13. Lala11_7 says:

    Someone needs to tell the “The Firm” that they are a non-mofo factor when it comes to trying to tame the publicity beast they helped make…

    Though I for one am enjoying it…I envision Meghan in her lovely garden…in the mornings…watching her babies frolic…while having a hot cuppa…and chuckling😍

  14. Jay says:

    Oh, this is hilarious – they are pretending the BBC is quaking in their boots because they didn’t give the royals the chance to shape their coverage.

    They even mention, “when it comes to what it contains, they have been playing things so very close to their chest” i.e. they didn’t give us a prescreening so we could make threats! If he feels there is misrepresentation or inaccuracy with the program they broadcast, fine, but I doubt he can. Also, notice that he’s not mentioning the rota members who talked to the BBC – he still wants them onside.

    If William wants to work with a producer on the Earthshot documentary, that’s one thing, I think it’s his job to have input in that case, but this. is. news! On the national ( taxpayer funded, if I recall) broadcast station! It’s entitled and also just silly to expect to be able to have them give you a free preview of their coverage (of you) to make sure you like what they say. That’s not how it works!

    I do love the irony that it’s a program about him, and reporting on his attempts to control the media.

    All that said, this was only part 1 – my guess will be that part 2 will be some attempt to “both sides” the issue, maybe dropping some dirt on how Harry may have used the media to his advantage or something like that. The royal family might end up wishing they hadn’t made such a big stink!

  15. Well-Wisher says:

    There have been a well established pattern as far as William is concerned, it is only apparent when the discussion does not include blame apportioning and finger pointing.
    One would think that it is more important to understand why the ‘source’ is compelled to leak beyond the lack of respect of personal boundaries rather than the usual obfuscation.

    One can go back as far as the announcement of the Sussexes’ relationship at the courting stage, but especially after the Oceania tour. Leaking was apparent since the editor Shipman’s article in the Sunday Times to Don Wotton’s in present day Fail.
    Every revelation was clear as to its source, the above mentioned response to the series can be interpreted that leaking will continue to be ongoing, but would it be seen as such from the consumers of this type of media?
    I am more intrigued by the business plan and the source(s) for the profit motive in present day media where the real news is found in the sector dedicated to the financial news.
    This is about the curation of public taste, with news as distraction and/or entertainment.etc
    I suspect this is beyond the weakest link in the RF’s chain, a lot more is going on, irregardless the BBC has decided to serve its citizens and maintain its mandate, there is power and then there is POWER, I hope William is old enough to understand this concept.
    Charles should be assertive to ensure his eventual reign to be his responsibility, even if his wife is relegated to be Princess Consort. The monarchy is at stake and it is his duty to ensure at the end of his reign that he has left it in better shape, irregardless of the future. He owes it to his mother, beyond that, in my humble opinion, Who Cares?

  16. Jaded says:

    This BBC documentary is the thin edge of the wedge. Bit by bit other media organizations are going to feel safe enough to start revealing some of the dark secrets and closet skeletons that make up the royal family. None of the Camilla Tominies or Richard Kays or Dan Woottons or Angela Levans or Penny Junors will be able to float this sinking boat. There’s wayyyyy too much damaging information on the royals that will be unleashed in this media war. And this hasn’t taken into account what Harry’s autobiography may reveal in the coming months.

  17. jferber says:

    In part 1 of the doc I learned of an anecdote I hadn’t heard before: the line “whatever Meghan wants, Meghan gets.” I don’t believe anyone at any time ever said this. What I do believe is that this was a steal from a song called “Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets” from the American musical Damn Yankees in 1958. A lot of the “journos” seemed very defensive and said implausibly stupid things (the Tominey woman ?) claiming the “chatter” about the Sussexes became “too much to ignore.” The f-ck? The Brits have ignored climate change, the continuing effects of their colonization, poverty, racism and a whole boat load of world problems and they “couldn’t ignore” the rumors/lies/backstabbing about Harry and Meghan? Hell, they gleefully and ruthlessly chose to make bank off it and hound the most popular royals out of England.

    • L4frimaire says:

      I only saw clips, but that was part of the questioning of the tiara story, but it also surfaced in some press reports surrounding the wedding. Neither tiara story was accurate as it’s been recently revealed it was all BS. Another clip I saw, they were talking about Kate Middleton, and one of the journalists said that Kate acts more royal than the royals. It wasn’t complementary. That quote reminded me a bit of some things said in that Tatler article they scrubbed.

  18. CROWHOODRETURNS says:

    What’s going to happen when these people (Kay etc) die. Not in a wishing it to happen way just that the old guard is literally old and it’s a lot harder to force the up and comers to prune your rose bushes for you.