The late Princess Diana had “her favorite royal reporters,” who she would call up and gossip with often. She actually cycled through “favorites” at a steady clip and she pitted her favorite reporters against each other, which was very on-brand for Diana. Anyway, Richard Kay was one of her favorites for a time and he still milks that association to this day. He’s often billed as “Diana’s close friend,” the one she “confessed” to frequently in the years before her death. Well, Richard Kay appeared on the Mail’s Palace Confidential YouTube show this week and he massaged some old stories around to make it sound like Princess Diana was “preparing” her younger son for the throne. Good King Harry, his incandescent brother’s worst nightmare.
Princess Diana was allegedly preparing her youngest son, Prince Harry, to be the king over her “shy” eldest son, Prince William.
“I think William has been a bit of a surprise. He was a shy young man,” royal expert Richard Kay recalled on the “Palace Confidential” podcast Tuesday.
“Certainly, when his mother was still alive, she would tell me that she never really thought that William wanted the ‘top job,’ as she called it,” Kay added. Kay claimed his friend Diana, who died in a car crash in Paris in August 1997, “in her mind, was sort of preparing the way for the possibility that it would be Harry who succeeded his father. And she used to, she had a nickname for Harry: She used to call him ‘Good King Harry’ — a throwback to medieval days.”
“Things haven’t worked out like that, and I think we are all rather grateful that they haven’t. The consensus was ‘we got the right one.’ And, I think we got the right one in William as Prince of Wales.”
Kay noted how the dad of three, 43, has “grown into” his role as future king alongside his wife, Kate Middleton.
“What I quite like about him is that he is coming up with some quite different ways to approach royalty,” Kay revealed. “[William] recognizes that some of the aspects of monarchy is sort of antediluvian — doesn’t resonate well with the modern public. I think he is aware that he’s going to have to make some big changes to ensure its survival.”
[From Page Six & transcribed from video]
I’m including the video below, cued to the relevant section. My guess is that Kay was called in to bloviate about this story for two reasons. One, to keep William on the backfoot, paranoid as always that Harry might one day come back and assume the throne by popular demand. Two, to say all of that “Good King Harry” stuff and then back down and say, in essence, “but of course we’re stuck with William, so let’s make the most of it.” What Kay leaves unsaid is the fact that William only started feeling keen about his kingship when Harry married Meghan. Before that moment, William couldn’t have cared less about the crown. Now he’s salivating for the crown… but it’s only because he wants to use his “power” to punish his brother.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
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- FILE PHOTOS: As the 20th Anniversary of the death of Princess Diana approaches (31st August 2017), Cover Images take a look at these re-digitized images from the archives of celebrated British Photographer, Mauro Carraro. Approximate date of images is shown in caption below. August 1987 Princess Diana with Prince Harry on holiday with teh Spanish Royal family in Majorca,Image: 347670758, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: ***Not Available for Subscription Clients***Editorial Use Only. No stock, books, advertising or merchandising without photographer's permission***, Model Release: no
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- HRH PRINCESS OF WALES (Visiting the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London) COMPULSORY CREDIT: UPPA/Photoshot Photo UKWT 011125/26 06.03.1996,Image: 502658732, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: World Rights – Fee Payable Upon Reproduction – For queries call Photoshot Global HQ – London + 44 (0)20 7421 6000 , also New York Office Tel : + 1 646-429-8731 and Hamburg Office Tel +49 (0)40 530 240 5959, Model Release: no, Credit line: Photoshot / Avalon
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- HRH PRINCESS OF WALES Pictured in Birmingham, where she opened the National Institute of Conductive Education. COMPULSORY CREDIT: UPPA/Photoshot Photo URK 010559/A-23 31.10.1995,Image: 502659794, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: World Rights – Fee Payable Upon Reproduction – For queries call Photoshot Global HQ – London + 44 (0)20 7421 6000 , also New York Office Tel : + 1 646-429-8731 and Hamburg Office Tel +49 (0)40 530 240 5959, Model Release: no, Credit line: Photoshot / Avalon
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- HRH PRINCESS OF WALES (HRH Princess Diana). Seen at the VJ Day Celebrations. With Prince Harry, Prince William and Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales,Image: 526293424, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: WORLD RIGHTS – Fee Payable Upon Reproduction – For queries call London + 44 (0)20 7421 6000 , New York + 1 646-329-6242 or Hamburg + 49 (0)40 530 240 5959, Model Release: no, Credit line: RK / Avalon
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- The Duke of Cambridge and Duke of Sussex arrive for the unveiling of a statue they commissioned of their mother Diana, Princess of Wales in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, London, on what would have been her 60th birthday. Picture date: Thursday July 1, 2021. .,Image: 619024551, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: NO UK USE FOR 48 HOURS- Fee Payable Upon reproduction – For queries contact Avalon sales@Avalon.red London +44 20 7421 6000 Los Angeles +1 310 822 0419 Berlin +49 30 76 212 251 Madrid +34 91 533 42 89, Model Release: no, Credit line: Avalon.red / Avalon
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- (left to right) Guy Monson, a member of the statue committee, the Duke of Sussex, the Duke of Cambridge and garden designer Pip Morrison, during the unveiling of a statue they commissioned of the Dukes’ mother Diana, Princess of Wales, in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, London, on what would have been her 60th birthday. Picture date: Thursday July 1, 2021. .,Image: 619024558, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: NO UK USE FOR 48 HOURS- Fee Payable Upon reproduction – For queries contact Avalon sales@Avalon.red London +44 20 7421 6000 Los Angeles +1 310 822 0419 Berlin +49 30 76 212 251 Madrid +34 91 533 42 89, Model Release: no, Credit line: Avalon.red / Avalon
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- The Duke of Sussex during the unveiling of a statue commissioned of his mother Diana, Princess of Wales, in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, London, on what would have been her 60th birthday. Picture date: Thursday July 1, 2021.,Image: 619146822, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: NO UK USE FOR 48 HOURS- Fee Payable Upon reproduction – For queries contact Avalon sales@Avalon.red London +44 20 7421 6000 Los Angeles +1 310 822 0419 Berlin +49 30 76 212 251 Madrid +34 91 533 42 89, Model Release: no, Credit line: Avalon.red / Avalon
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- The Duke of Sussex during the unveiling of a statue commissioned of his mother Diana, Princess of Wales, in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, London, on what would have been her 60th birthday.,Image: 619146823, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: NO UK USE FOR 48 HOURS- Fee Payable Upon reproduction – For queries contact Avalon sales@Avalon.red London +44 20 7421 6000 Los Angeles +1 310 822 0419 Berlin +49 30 76 212 251 Madrid +34 91 533 42 89, Model Release: no, Credit line: Dominic Lipinski / Avalon
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- Princess Diana And Her Butler Paul Burrell Visiting Sarajevo Featuring: Princess Diana, Paul Burrell Where: Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina When: 15 Aug 1997 Credit: Cover Images
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- Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales, on holiday in Majorca, Spain, with their sons Prince William and Prince Harry. They are guests of King Juan Carlos of Spain and his wife Queen Sofia. They are staying at their holiday home, the Marivent Palace, which is situated just outside the capital city of Palma.
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- HRH PRINCESS OF WALES (HRH Princess Diana). With HRH PRINCE HARRY. Seen at the VJ Day Celebrations. COMPULSORY CREDIT: UPPA/Photoshot Photo URK 010143/G-29 19.08.1995
Keens are as lazy as ever and have not grown up. Diana wanted harry to be scooters wing man not king. She was directly quoted saying that. Kay quotes a deceased person who is not around to confirm or deny.
And it’s a super creepy thing to say. There’s only one way Harry would have become the heir, and there’s NO WAY Diana hoped for that.
Yeah, I agree with this take. No mother would want that. Maybe if William truly hadn’t wanted it and had voluntarily abdicated one day but that wouldn’t have happened.
In the thousand year history of the British monarchy, most monarchs sucked. Queen Elizabeth was a an exception, Charles is not and William won’t be either.
Will is not the right one for anything. He is completely lazy and lackluster and his only distinguishing feature is anger. He and keen have done no preparations. They have lowered the bar to the floor in terms of royal “work” and spend their time on vacation, changing houses, and pretending to do school runs.
Very good summary, Josephine.
Was Diana thinking about Edward VIII and his younger brother, George VI?
Buyers remorse? What you wanted? An excellent visionary king, energetic , honest and proactive capable of revitalising the Monarchy. What you would settle for? Monarch who is diligent, dutiful, Christian, intelligent, surrounds himself with the best advisors. What you get and are stuck with for the next FIFTY years? Vindictive, lazy, racist, misanthrope, stupid coward who makes bad decisions and surrounds himself with the worst people ever.
I think they throw this out just to keep W up at night, incandescent with worry.
Mummy really did like him best!
“Things haven’t worked out like that, and I think we are all rather grateful that they haven’t. The consensus was ‘we got the right one.’ And, I think we got the right one in William as Prince of Wales.”
I would love to know how, and why they feel that way? Or why they’re at least pretending that this isn’t a bold-faced lie. They frequently write articles about how all the reporters think William is a jerk. How they need to do more bread and butter events, or events period. How he’s in the constant power struggle behind the scenes with his father.
And now their criticism about how doing royalty with a small “r” wasn’t going to be sustainable, but now is a forward-thinking good thing. It’s not because you have the right one, it’s because that’s what you’re left with and you have no choice but to accept it.
Have any of the RR seen the Twilight Zone episode, it’s A Good Life? because they are going to be stuck with the crappy and nasty King Billy for FIFTY years writing propaganda on how it is GOOD that we have a rage filled tyrant in charge, punishing people left, right and centre when they say, do or simply sing ? it is GOOD that King rations his time so wisely (not where is the lazy jerk on another luxury holiday?) It is GOOD that our Christian king goes round smiting anybody he’s displeased with! It is GOOD and HEALTHY to be a relative beating alcoholic! It is GOOD not be a READER so as not to clutter up your mind with empathy for others!
LOL. I have seen that episode MANY times so I read each and every one of your ” GOOD “‘ with the same emphasis that the voice over does when they are describing that awful little boy.
And you are correct. The same way I ask how Will and Kate expect to maintain the facade of a happy marriage for the next 40 years, I don’t understand how these stenographers expect to more and more have people buy that they’re getting good value for money from that family.
Oh dear they are poking the bear with this one lol. Must keep the incandescent one in full rage against his brother!’
Princess Diana from what I have read was a good mother to both her sons. She possibly did say she thought Princess Harry would make a better King, she would know, she was mother to them both. However, she knew how the hierarchy worked and how William was swallowed up by the firm so she put as much as she could into her youngest son and referenced him as good King Harry as an esteem building exercise. Kaye is just a gossiper who goes around swirling accusations and pronouncement as though he is truth teller when he is a known liar identified by the Sussexsquad.
For what it’s worth I seem to remember reading that Diana thought that William did not have the best temperament to be a good, honest and benevolent king. It seems his was a bossy, more mercurial personality even then. I also recall that she described Harry as having a more thoughtful and focused temperament, played well with others and was more light-hearted. It sure seems that nothing has changed much except that Willnot seems more angry, more bossy and more violent than ever, if Spare is to be believed!
He’s right! William does have a different approach to royalty. Basically, he ignores the duty aspect of it and leans into the grift. Very innovative!
Yeah this is the DM toying with William. They know he’s highly jealous of Harry. I don’t believe Diana was preparing Harry to become King. It’s been reported that she left more money to Harry in her will because she knew that Harry wouldn’t have any of his own and that the Royal Family was going to take care of William.
Kay is delusional. This isn’t the Lion King.
“ Before that moment, William couldn’t have cared less about the crown. Now he’s salivating for the crown… but it’s only because he wants to use his “power” to punish his brother.”
Nailed it. He was actively avoiding the role as much as humanly possible. Now he can’t wait for it & I think it is indeed for retribution.
The proof of that is the number of articles dedicated to talk of William taking titles or this or that from his brother and various other relatives, versus “learning the ropes of statecraft” or “taking on the diplomatic mantle his father shouldered for decades for Her Late Maj”.
He wants to be *seen* as a ‘global statesman’; but doesn’t put in the work. That absence of true effort is visible from space, and it’s not a sign of stability for the future of the monarchy.
Kay bought a pig in a poke.
The only thing one point Willy the bald demon and waity are keen on is less work and more drinking.
That photo of Harry as a little kid looking up to William breaks my heart a little. Harry deserved a good big brother.
Instead, William ignored him when they were away at boarding school and threw tantrums whenever something good happened to Harry. And William is still throwing tantrums.
What sad bullshit these stupid reporters come up with when they have got nothing to talk about so they re-create dumb bullshit. There’s no way that Harry was ever going to become king and he doesn’t want to be king. He’s made it quite clear that he never ever wanted that role.
He actually feels sorry for his brother, who is trapped in his role. Harry was the one that got to get away and do you think he’s gonna go back? When hell freezes over. Anyway, I’m so sick of this dumb narrative. I’m so sick of hearing about these people. They’re useless, pointless and a waste of space.
Diana’s duty to her country was to raise a future king. Had William’s brain injury and surgery at age 8 gone tragic, Harry would have no longer been the “spare”. It’s not a far stretch to think she understood that raising a future king also included raising the backup to be prepared as well in case of a random quirky event of fate.
Kay is trying to change history here about William. Diana called Harry GKH not because she thought that William was too shy but rather because William did not have the temperament to be King. Diana thought Harry would be a better King than William. That is always how it was reported back in the day. And, she was right.
All this rewriting of history…
A long time they told us Diana wanted to skip Charles and William to be king and he was the shoulder to lean on. Now it’s suddenly Harry and William to be skipped?
Diana loved both children, and as much as she wanted them to be prepared for their role, she would have stand with them had they decided for a private life. It seems to me she was the only one loving William.
Diana would be horrified at how Scooter turned out.
Please remember the Middletons’ baleful influence on William: before taking up with KM, he was set fair to be at least a half decent Prince and working royal.
Hopefully he wouldn’t have turned out so horrifying with his mother around him. Hopefully.
They keep talking like the role is pre-scripted and all you have to do is show up, but no job works like that, in real life, including theirs. The Queen had to improvise to a degree how to transition from an empire to a commonwealth and a war footing to peacetime and great affluence to austerity and then the deferential society to the permissive society to the antisocial society to the papparazzi society. I mean. She had to stomach *a lot* but she managed it with a gritty kind of dignity and humour. The role is what you make it. Diana and Charles both invented the jobs they did, really, bespoke by the use of personal curiosity and conviction. Harry’s done the same. He’s carved out his own role. William has never bothered because he thought there was some pre-made, pre-consecrated role for him to step into. There really isn’t. I think that’s what’s beginning to dawn on him, and he’s panicking. In order to be plausible, under a global spotlight, he would have had to start taking this seriously a couple of decades ago. He was content with superficial popularity instead. Now he’s no longer the equivalent of a boy solo artist released from the boy band, he’s pissed. He’s exactly like one of those awful brats who thinks when he quits the band, he’ll be the breakout star.
While you can say Charles is better than Andrew, the reverse is true with William and Harry.
Harry is the better and more courageous leader.
But they are going to get the one with anger issues who only cares about Aston Villa and hates his wife.
Please remember the Middletons’ baleful influence on William: before taking up with KM, he was set fair to be at least a half decent Prince and working royal.
I really wish we had some insight into who hired Bulletproof Sunshine and what her true goals are. I just keep getting the feeling that the people at the top who pull the real strings know that William will be a complete disaster if they crown him, and everything coming out is a set-up for no King William V. After decades of trashing Harry, now this? That’s because they realize that Harry is the only one of them who can save this now. He wasn’t involved in any of it. He left when it was all coming out, and he said it was because the family was protecting one member at his expense. Harry is really the only one with the moral gravity to save the ship from the storm Unfortunately for The Firm, William is the storm. What a time to be alive!