EPHRAIM HARDCASTLE: Did King Charles approve of the interview which directly led to Prince Andrew’s banishment from royal duties?

On the eve of Amazon Prime’s screening of Emily Maitlis’s account of her demolition of Prince Andrew, she claims Charles approved of the interview which directly led to his brother’s banishment from royal duties.

Maitlis, executive producer of A Very Royal Scandal, tells the Radio Times: ‘One month after the interview aired, I was taken aside by someone close to [then] Prince Charles and told – somewhat cryptically – that ‘HRH was not unhappy with the interview’. 

‘Was I being told that the man who would ascend to the throne just three years later as our King was perhaps relieved that this exchange had taken place? 

‘That he could use the opportunity to reorder the monarchy in a way that befitted these times and the public perception of what it should be?’ Deep waters, Emily.

One of the eve of the programme airing, Maitlis Charles approved of the interview which directly led to his brother’s banishment from royal duties

The produce of A Very Royal Scandal, Maitlis implied that the King relished the opportunity to reorder the monarchy ‘in a way that befitted these times and the public perception of what it should be’

King’s reaction to Harry’s birth 

While the King wished his estranged son Prince Harry a happy 40th birthday, Princess Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell delights in offering an unflattering account of his birth in 1984. 

He claims Charles informed Diana he was ‘off to the theatre’ with then-mistress Camilla just hours after Harry’s arrival. 

Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell has claimed that Charles left for the theatre with his then mistress Camilla just hours after Harry was born

Publicity-ravenous Burrell claims: ‘He [Charles] said, ‘I’m delighted. I now have an heir and a spare… my work is done.’ Does gabby Burrell make it up as he goes along?

New play implies Dahl resented his star illustrator 

When Roald Dahl wrote The Witches, many credited its initial success to the Quentin Blake’s brilliant illustrations.

Before he died in 1990, Dahl described Quentin as ‘the finest illustrator of children’s books in the world’. 

Roald Dahl in Tales of The Unexpected. A new play implies the author resented his star illustrator Quentin Blake

Now a play at London’s Royal Court theatre, Giant, implies Dahl resented Blake. It features Dahl grumbling about the share of the book’s revenues that went to Quentin. 

The artist joins a long queue. His publisher, the late Tom Maschler, declared: ‘Roald fell out with everybody.’

Ruth Wilson shines light on playing Emily Maitlis

As Emily Maitlis in A Very Royal Scandal, did Ruth Wilson, pictured, go beyond the call of thespian duty to portray the pushy ex-Newsnight Madonna? 

‘She’s clumsy,’ Wilson tells Radio Times.

Ruth Wilson says Emily Maitlis was ‘clumsy’ and that the journalist gave her her military-style jacket used in the Andrew interview

‘She has ink everywhere, on her clothes, on her mouth, because she chews her pens. She also gave me one of her handbags and the lining was covered in pen ink. I wanted to put ‘Ruth was here’. I used that bag on set. She gave me the military-style jacket [used in the] interview; I could smell Emily on me.’

Churchill’s daughter in-law’s link to Princess Diana

Pamela Harriman’s biographer, Sonia Purnell, unearths a macabre link between Princess Diana and Winston Churchill’s grande horizontal daughterin-law. 

Pamela, Bill Clinton’s Paris envoy, died aged 76 after suffering a brain haemorrhage in the pool at the Ritz in 1997. 

Pamela Harriman (pictured) died of a brain haemorrhage in a pool at the Ritz – and was fished out by Henri Paul, who drove Diana from the hotel to her death

And who fished her out? Employee Henri Paul, who seven months later drove Diana from the Ritz to her death.

Sir Keir Starmer appeared to chuckle as racegoers booed him at the St Leger Festival in Doncaster

Prime Minister booed in Doncaster 

Sir Keir Starmer appeared to chuckle as racegoers booed him and chanted insults at Doncaster on Saturday. Surely the PM couldn’t have thought the punters were calling him a ‘banker’?