The job of a royal — if you can call it that — is to serve the public. Back across the Pond, the late Queen was revered for what was repeatedly branded her “quiet dedication” to “the British people.”
Which is why it’s so disheartening to hear that her son Prince Andrew “favors a US broadcaster” for an attempted comeback interview. The Mirror writes that he has been “approached by at least two major US broadcasters with offers of an interview taking place in the UK.” In going stateside, the Duke of York would be denying the smallfolk of the United Kingdom the chance to fully relive one of the best television moments of the century to date.
In case you’d somehow forgotten, Andrew, always perceived as a little self-dealing, became implicated in the affairs of his friend, fake Harvard graduate and real ephebophile Jeffrey Epstein. In 2011, Virginia Roberts Giuffre claimed that she had had sex with the prince when she was a seventeen-year-old and Epstein’s sex slave. A photograph of the pair together with Epstein’s consigliere and girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell was produced.
Andrew’s profile dropped for a few years, but the scandal resurfaced after bombshell reporting from the Miami Herald re-examined l’affair Epstein, leading to the billionaire financier’s re-arrest… and suicide. Facing questions at home and over here, Andrew took steps to save face and tell his side of the story. He set up an interview with the BBC’s Emily Maitlis, presumably thinking she’d give him an easier time than other British media hard-hitters such as Jeremy Paxman or Andrew Neil.
The Newsnight episode that followed should be protected in the Tower of London along with the Crown Jewels. It’s a masterclass from Maitlis and a horror show from the Duke of York. He described how when it came to Epstein, his judgment was colored by his “tendency to be too honorable.” He claims he couldn’t have been having sex with Virginia Roberts Giuffre in 2001, because on the day in question he was taking his daughter to Pizza Express in Woking for her birthday, “a very unusual thing for me to do.” He refutes Giuffre’s description of him “sweating” over her during intercourse as… he couldn’t sweat, due to a condition he developed during military service in the Falklands… which has since subsided. They teach this interview during trainings at top PR firms as an example of how badly taking image management into your own hands can backfire.
But now Andrew wants to deny us 2 Maitlis 2 Furious. He has a much tamer, straight-to-DVD sequel in mind. And he wants American “journalists” to produce it.
Could there be a more damning indictment of the American media that Britain’s dirtiest duke would rather drop off his reputation laundry here than face a hardier hack back home?
Let’s consider the obvious candidates. There’s CNN’s Anderson Vanderbilt Cooper, to whom Andrew’s nephew Harry gave his first US interview for Spare. He might fancy the facile infotainment approach of Good Morning America or Today, parking his royal posterior on a plush couch in a New York studio, facing softballs from a panel of grinning hosts. Then, of course, there’s Oprah, who let Harry and Meghan sound off unchallenged a year before. This is what Randy Andy has in mind, having settled Giuffre’s suit against him: he wants to push his sullied name through a car wash, so he can wear colors at royal events and live on palace property without controversy.
Isn’t it embarrassing that the land of free speech and the home of the First Amendment has become the go-to spot for such skulduggery? Andrew looks at how his nephew and niece are “grilled” here — and, let’s be honest, the kid gloves treatment of President Biden in TV interviews by the major networks — and thinks “I could use some of that.”
Frankly, Oprah’s old pal at CBS Gayle King could do a better job, given her tussle with R. Kelly. Or there are more creative suggestions, such as Joe Rogan or Bill Maher, say. The Red Scare girls or Adam Friedland would doubtless entertain. Many of Tucker Carlson’s viewers have thoughts on Jeffrey Epstein, that could be a good fit. Who are we kidding — as if he’d dare.
No, Andrew has one thing in mind: Clean-Up on Aisle Pedo (or should that be isle?). Us proles shouldn’t stand for it. The only Americans we want interviewing the duke are investigators from the Southern District of New York.
