A Very Royal Scandal

Hmmm. Time, I think, for the team behind this Scandal series to move on. It's clear now that they're never going to equal, much less top, the brilliance of A Very English Scandal, in which Hugh Grant and Ben Whishaw turned the Jeremy Thorpe story into a riotous and riveting frolic. The sequel - A Very British Scandal - was an undercooked and ultimately unsatisfying account of the sordid saga of the Duchess of Argyll. But there was every reason to expect a return to form with this account of the bottomless sleazefest that engulfed the Duke of York. Unfortunately, A Very Royal Scandal is even more timid and turgid than the Argyll affair. I can't help wondering if those involved just can't bring themselves to really go for it when the subject is royalty. It's interesting, by way of example, that both the Queen and Prince Charles are afforded a degree of dignity and immunity, in that they remain off screen throughout, their decisions and dictates delivered by envoys and fixers. Yet they are really as much a part of the story as the Duke of York, and they are engaged in an epic battle to save the monarchy from ruin. And if you can invent scenes and dialogue for Andy, Fergie, Bea and Eugenie, then why not Liz and Charles too? Letting them off the hook is the main reason this Royal Scandal looks continually lame. It is also poorly served by the casting. Michael Sheen gives what is in many ways a well judged and finely wrought performance as Andrew, but he still doesn't quite pull off the arrogance and the obliviousness. And Ruth Wilson is undone by an ill-judged and annoying vocal impression of Emily Maitliss, that somehow comes off as more like Fenella Fielding in Carry On Screaming. Claire Rushbrook is also a poor choice as Fergie, which even the director seems to acknowledge by shooting her mostly from behind, or in profile, or in soft focus at the edge of frame. There's enough schadenfreude.to keep it mildly interesting, but it never fully takes flight. Except maybe at the very end, when Randy Andy, shamed and banished, wonders what he's supposed to do now. Sir Edward Young, played by Alex Jennings, tells him: "live with the consequences of your actions". The preceding three hours could have done with a bit more of the same blunt honesty.

One star docked for Ruth Wilson's Elizabeth Holmes Theranos CEO type voice. What were they thinking? It was so obviously put on and fake. Took me right out of the drama. Is she angling to play Margaret Thatcher in future?

I loved the actress who played Sarah Ferguson and Michael Sheen is always good, but when I first heard he was playing Prince Andrew I was really surprised. I just didn't see how he could pull it off, but wow he did... And without a silly voice! He really captured the look and feel of a man in turmoil. That embarrassed type of anger when someone knows they have been caught out. That is skill.

I like Ruth Wilson as an actress, but I think Gillian Anderson's portrayal as Emily Matliss just pipped her, I think they should/could have put this into 2 episodes, I found myself drifting in the third although maybe then they would have cut the best line in the drama "I would have offered you tea but we've had to let the the staff go" this line delivered by "Fergie" played brilliantly by Claire Rushbrook, to the equally excellent Alex Jennings playing the Queens deliverer of bad news ,Sir Edward Young,this line probably sums up the weird world that they live in. Make it yourself you entitled so and so,shout all us commoners!

Was he guilty ? Maybe, Was he innocent ? Maybe Was/is he an idiot? No maybe's about this one .

I had missed, perhaps even avoided the original transmission of this three-part Amazon mini-series centring on the famous or infamous, depending on how you look at it, BBC Newsnight interview carried out with Prince Andrew by the station's Emily Maitlis. However, it naturally came back to mind after the sad news of the Prince's accuser Virginia Gioffre's very recent suicide. That said, the late Ms Gioffre barely makes appearance in this dramatisation, apart from actual footage of her being interviewed on TV stating her case and of course featuring prominently in the photograph taken by Jeffrey Epstein of the Prince with his arm around her as Epstein's convicted procurer Ghislaine Maxwell looks on.

Of course, as the printed text makes clear at the outset of each programme, much of what we see here is imagined from the known facts and obviously dramatised for effect. Thus the only thing to completely trust here is the verifiable recreation of the actual interview itself between the Prince and Maitlis and although understandably no one from the Palace is credited with assisting in the making of the programme, I would like to think that Matlis herself was open and honest with her input to what we see here.

Over the three episodes, the two main characters, the Prince and Maitlis get almost equal coverage. We see each of them interact with their families and for want of a better word, their staff, although obviously the Royal can count on more resources in that respect. I personally feel this approach was wrong as for me the scandal surrounding Andrew is the story and not the interviewer, no matter how well the latter does her job.

The Prince is presented as a boor, expecting everyone in his orbit to ask how high when he commands them to jump, usually with added expletives. In particular he unloads on his long-suffering ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, presented as a parasite and sycophant who's a financial drain on her ex-husband and his meek subservient P. A. Amanda Thirsk. When his New York-based friend and at times landlord and banker, the convicted sex-offender Jeffrey Epstein apparently commits suicide in his prison cell and Miss Guiffre comes forward to allege that Andrew raped her three different times at three diffetent places always in Epstein's vicinity, the Prince comes under pressure to try to clear his name, which he chooses to do on national TV interviewed by the very capable Ms Maitlis. Although we never see them, it's made clear that the Queen and Prince and now King Charles take a keen interest in the affair with the general Palace consensus being that Andrew should try to ride out the storm rather than face it head on, encouraged in the latter course by his PA and older daughter.

We all know of course that the actual prime-time interview was a veritable car-crash for Andrew and that in its wake, a hefty no-liabilty settlement was offered to Miss Jioffre, likely from the Queen's purse, which the young woman couldn't turn down. No doubt it was hoped that this would make the story would go away but with further revelations about Andrew's shady business connections coming out in recent times to further sully his reputation, it's clear that his reputation has taken an irreversible hit, this only compounded with the news of Miss Gioffre's seeming death by suicide.

Although neither quite looks the part, the chameleon-like Michael Sheen and the equally skilled Ruth Wilson certainly convince as the two leads. For me, however, a good portion of the scenes presented just didn't quite ring true, often hindered by questionable dialogue and unsatisfactory scene-setting. I very much doubt that Andrew's two daughters ever joked about his old "Randy Andy" nickname or that he himself mentions fighting in the Falklands any chance he gets, although I am willing to believe his kids call him "Pups" and that he calls the queen "Mummy" but therein lies the problem. For every telling line and sly in-joke there were others which seemed hyperbolic and implausible. I'm no royalist myself but even I thought Andrew's petulant and bullying characterisation as depicted here seemed a touch heavy-handed, even as I personally doubt his vividly remembered Pizza Express visit and his frankly bizarre claim not to sweat which contrasts with his amnesia about ever encountering Miss Gioffre on three occasions. Of course, he was never going to confess on live TV to anything to his own detriment, but if he was innocent all along, then why not take it to court rather than make a multi-million pound payment just because you, or rather your mother can.

Still, like a real car crash, you couldn't turn your head away from all three hours of it. For the Prince, who has lost his royal term of address and been forced to retreat from active duty, he appears to have been tried and convicted at least in the eyes of the public, but as Maitlis points out at one juncture, let's not forget that here is a man born to luxury and privilege who still lives in a palace and is waited on hand and foot out of the public purse, and benefits from all the protective mechanisms that the Palace automatically confers on him. We should have his problems. Then compare that with the sad fate of Miss Gioffre, used, abused and trafficked as a young girl, who in the end, despite receiving a huge compensation settlement, decided she couldn't go on with her own life. I'm not saying that her suicide can be laid entirely at the door of Prince Andrew but it clearly weighed heavily on her, especially with all the attendant publicity.

How is it the old song goes?

"It's the same the whole world over, It's the poor what gets the blame, It's the rich what gets the pleasure, Isn't it a blooming shame?"

P. S. Do go back and watch, as I did, the full interview, which is available on YouTube. It's absolutely riveting.

After A Very English Scandal, which was sensational, I didn't expect to like this very much. However, I did find A Very Royal Scandal to be pretty darn good. Michael Sheen gives a great performance as Prince Andrew, and he even obviously put on weight for the role, subsuming his own good looks into the pudgy form and persona of the arrogant and clueless prince. Even so, he also makes the prince a sympathetic character, which came as a surprise. I was expecting to root for the journalists (as I usually do, having worked in journalism myself), but found myself instead feeling sorry for Prince Andrew and disgusted with the journalists, who come across as overly hard and driven and not especially concerned with the victim(s) of Jeffrey Epstein, so obsessed with their own success as they are. This all be part of the dramatization of the events surrounding this story and not how things actually spooled out, but it did make for interesting viewing.