From what I can tell, the first day of Prince Harry’s testimony against the Mirror Group Newspapers went well. One of the biggest “tells” that it went well is that the British media is really struggling to find something to nitpick. Harry didn’t fall into legal traps, he did not speak to things he does not know and he didn’t make any wild accusations or perjure himself. Instead, he spoke calmly about how the British media has spied on him since childhood, how they hacked into his phone messages and how rotten the whole system is to the core.
The Telegraph is trying desperately to make a mountain out of molehill about Harry apparently calling Paul Burrell (Diana’s former butler) a “two-faced sh-t.” That was reported in the Mirror and MGN’s lawyers were like “why didn’t you include that in SPARE??” And Harry was like “because the incident you’re describing happened when I was 18.” He could have easily described in detail all of the sh-t he left out of Spare, you know. Harry also name-checked Piers Morgan in his statement to the court, speaking about Morgan’s ill treatment of Diana in what would have been Diana’s final months. You can read Harry’s full statement here at the NYT.
One of the craziest f–king parts of Harry’s first day of testimony didn’t even happen inside the court. Sky News decided that their viewers couldn’t handle reading Harry’s testimony or simply having his testimony read out by a news presenter, so they hired Random Ginger #5 to “perform” Harry’s testimony. Truly one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever seen – keep in mind, this was a dramatization organized on the very same day as Harry’s testimony.
In the phone hacking case, Prince Harry told the court that every single article played a destructive role in his life.
There are no cameras in court so as part of a special programme Sky News has recorded what was said by the Duke, played by an actor.
Watch ☟ pic.twitter.com/fxUx0ngOt5
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 6, 2023
Prince Harry has told the court that stories published on him were regarded as 'a hunt'.
There are no cameras in court so as part of a special programme tonight at 9pm Sky News has recorded what was said by the Duke, played by an actor.
Read more: https://t.co/SpCrjR4mDp pic.twitter.com/wVc17Zvuix
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 6, 2023
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry arrives at the High Court, Rolls Building. Several high-profile people, including Prince Harry, have taken legal action against Mirror Group Newspapers over alleged unlawful information gathering, including phone hacking. Pictured: Prince Harry BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince HARRY, Duke of Sussex, arrives at the Rolls Building of the High Court in London, to testify against Mirror Group Newspapers, in phone-hacking case. Pictured: 20230606_zip_k172_001.jpg BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince HARRY, Duke of Sussex, arrives at the Rolls Building of the High Court in London, to testify against Mirror Group Newspapers, in phone-hacking case. Pictured: 20230606_zip_k172_003.jpg BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince HARRY, Duke of Sussex, arrives at the Rolls Building of the High Court in London, to testify against Mirror Group Newspapers, in phone-hacking case. Pictured: 20230606_zip_k172_004.jpg BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry leaves the High Court, Rolls Building. Several high-profile people, including Prince Harry, have taken legal action against Mirror Group Newspapers over alleged unlawful information gathering, including phone hacking. Pictured: Prince Harry BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, leaves the Rolls Building at the High Court in London where he testified against Mirror Group Newspapers in the phone hacking case. Pictured: Prince Harry BACKGRID USA 6 JUNE 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Weird but it shows how hungry the British media is for Harry content.
Right?? Hahha. What’s next? Pap pictures of random ginger men with the caption “this could be Harry if he didn’t leave us”.
Yes! This! Comment of the day 😀
That’s just so…strange? I mean, really? It’s so very SNL. But then, the British media is a joke.
It’s quite ridiculous.
They are milking it for all its worth.
The actor is awful.
Much better to have just got someone who can really imitate Harry’s beautiful voice rather than a lookalike that doesn’t look like him.
Pathetic.
Agreed they are hungry for Harry material. However this has to be the most SNL thing ever…never heard of anyone hiring actors to recreate a scene in court from a news outlet. I will see their “news” segment of this.
We’re one half step away from British Media setting up an AI Harry.
Credible news outlets report the news; they don’t hire actors to perform it. What a joke.
At least they are no longer hiding the fact that they are just reading a script and performing….
The UK Media MAKES THE NEWS 🙄 not surprising, that’s right up their alley 😮
Excellent point.
Really stupid.
Bizarrely enough, the British press did this before, but sort of to show how necessary a free press is. The UK (and Ireland also) passed a law that stated certain members of terrorist or terrorist-adjacent organizations couldn’t be shown on TV. This was entirely aimed at the IRA; Northern Irish Unionist jerks were almost completely excluded from this. Anyway, whenever a Sinn Fein politician made a speech or what have you, the news would get around the law by hiring some schmuck to dub the whole thing and they’d air the speeches. I think it’s absolutely crazy that they’re now using the same tactic in a trial that is in part about the press’s too-cozy relationship to those in power.
Good lord.
Dear UK, this is why the world sees your media as a joke because WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK!?
I thought I was watching an episode of Parks and Rec.
@Snuffles, yep and as a Brit (, sorry), I can confirm its because they are a fkg joke he even tried to mimic Harry’s way of talking and holding his hands, it was cringe worthy, and then they launched into “, Harry might not get back into the US because of the action brought by the heritage foundation.!! @Kaiser, don’t know if I’m allowed to mention this, but I was sent a link from a friend who has a twitter account, it was to Meredith Constant who did a brilliant breakdown of the way Camilla and Charlie used the media against Harry, WITH NAMES
@ Mary Pester, how BRILLIANT!!!
I hope it all comes out in court and we hear names, dates, £££ paid on top of WHO the puppet was!!
Please link!
It was one of the most bizarre things I’ve seen on twitter. Even people who aren’t Harry supporters were like “uhhhhh”….
I am questioning my Cambridge O and A levels now.
@ Snuffles, I thought we had entered the Twilight Zone!! This is all f#@king bananas and they are making FOOLS of themselves!!!
Can’t wait until the next “breaking” coverage will be with this “court jester”!! Bet we hear silence when the goods start dropping….get our popcorn ready at CB and Company!! I am already!!
Bring out the BIG guns Harry!!! You have them by the short hairs and we ALL support YOU!!
Good gracious that is bizarre! Just report the news, you don’t have to dance it up. I read the statement yesterday while waiting on a wheel alignment. I’ve always thought of course that the press intrusion was horrible, but just reading it laid out like that?! No compunction about following around a kid all the time, and reporting on stuff that no teenager would want everyone discussing. Just not seeing him as a human being at all. And the way they labeled these invoices, they didn’t care about hiding it at all. Labelling them Chelsy watch, Harry p.7, sometimes even using the exact name of the article. Entire system needs to be burned down.
I mean WTH ? An actor?
As if we needed more proof that the British media system is rotten.
He probably wasn’t even an actor. Maybe a red haired member of the crew.
The NYT link isn’t opening for me. This one worked.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23835120-bl-2019-001787-hrh-the-duke-of-sussex-v-mgn-witness-statement-of-prince-harry-the-duke-of-sussex
How embarrassing for Sky News to do this!
Unhinged doesn’t even cover what sky news did.
…..what in the chicken fried f*ck.
British media have officially lost the plot.
They’ve lost it ages ago.
Even The Guardian has a negative commentary about this and I’d eat my hat if all this deference to the BRF is due to the fact Royals and Tories have a strong hold on the country and the serious papers don’t want to be labelled controversial, anarchists or seemingly attacking the institutions.
Even in real life, the few times I’ve said aloud ‘abolish the monarchy’ or ‘Harry got out in time’, people look at me like I am a terrorist.
For some reason the actor reminded me of Chris Pratt
The Sky News thing is insane.
“One of the biggest “tells” that it went well is that the British media is really struggling to find something to nitpick.”
Another big tell? They’re spinning it as “brusing” and “grueling” anyhow and saying he must of longed for Oprah’s easy questions. You know they’re struggling for smears when they bring up Oprah.
Oh yes, and Sky News have hired a media lawyer who says that Harry has really done well as a witness. As a result it was so funny to see Sky News reporter Laura Bundock, who is usually negative about Harry when she is with Kay Burley, having to tone down her usual negative attitude towards anything to do with the Sussexes.
Am I misremembering or hasn’t Piers Morgan claimed he was friends with Diana? Sounds revisionist to me. Some friend.
Can we please talk about how when Harry was 20 or 21, Charles punished him for partying by making him clean the pig sties near Highgrove?!? Check out paragraph 125 in his statement. I suspect his wicked stepmother came up with that particular punishment.
A real life Harry Potter.
Totally Harry Potter.
It’s honestly not even the punishment that troubles me as much as it is the fact this wasn’t meant to teach a lesson…it was meant to demean. To otherize and put Harry in his place.
We all TOB would never be treated this way no matter how much he partied.
@ Rapunzel, of course not. Hell, KFC is probably fist-bumping Burger King for carrying on the tradition of having a proper mistress as it’s tradition and part of the lives and lies that the men in the BRF strive for! 🤢🤢🤢
That’s simply cruel by no other definition.
@bothsidesnow, yep it was all about Mark Bolland, Camilla, Charles and William. My friend Heather actually grew up on the Balmoral estate and knew Harry and William as they were in the same age group, played and hung out with them as they got older. I was so happy when she said that Harry remembered me from our time together in uniform
I knew she wasn’t just blowing smoke because he remembered my nickname!! It was Lee because I bested a lot of them on the ranges, so they gave me the nickname after an actor because he was a good shot in all his movies, I think he was called Lee Marvin..She is still in contact with Harry to this day
That’s so cool @MaryPester! 💗😎💗
@MaryPester: Lee Marvin was a bad ass former marine! That’s quite a nickname they chose for you!
@MaryPester — that’s such a great story! And it’s clear you have Lee Marvin’s wicked sense of humour too!!
I remember they did this during the last Michael Jackson trial, it was also bizarre then. Are cameras never allowed in UK courts, are there any exceptions?
Wow! The British press are really not doing okay, minds are twisting all over Salty Isle.
I’m in Scotland (our legal system is slightly different) and cameras are sometimes permitted, but only for sentencing and they are fixed on the judge only. I think this only happens in very high-profile cases, it’s certainly not the norm. I don’t think it happens in England/Wales at all, though I stand to be corrected.
The reaction of most of the British media reminded me of the proverb ‘Hit dogs will holler’.
The Fail’s front-page was atrocious in a funny way, and The Moron’s offended huff was glorious.
I don’t get how, after all this time, the BM think they can get away with spending hundreds of million £££ to settle phone hacking claims, and then try to convince the court and the public that Prince Harry magically is the one odd unicorn out that they didn’t hack when other Windsors have settled.
They are banking on readers to be both hateful and stupid.
Why not just use a photo of Harry with an excerpt of his testimony? This is bizarre. I guess on the plus side, more people who hear his actual words seems like a good thing?
This is the first time I’ve ever heard of news reporting relying on an actor in something so current. If that actor is not replicating Harry’s precise intonation, mannerisms and facial expressions, then that’s even more of a disservice: want to bet that many people will view what he says as having less gravitas and subconsciously linking it with programs like The Crown. This boggles my mind.
Love how Paul Burrell is asking for an apology from Harry, but not William, for calling him a name! Sorry Paul, let’s talk about how you were going to prison before the Queen stepped in, and that was only because she didn’t want secrets coming out, or about the way that for the last 25 years YOU have made a living by talking about Diana and how you were her rock, yeah of course you were NOT
I guess on the bright side, at least they’re giving work to struggling ginger actors. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
And, yeah, Burrell is a “two faced sh*t”. No news there.
Desperate much? This is a very sick way to get clicks. Proving once again that the British media is a total joke.
Is this guy going to put this on his CV now?
Giles Derbyshire IV:
Attended RADA 2012-2014
Understudy to Bottom in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” Glasgow Theatre, 2016
Happy Young Father in Pizza Express commercial, 2019
Prince Harry court transcript performer on Sky News, June 2023
I wouldn’t blame him if he did, for him it was probably a good paycheck.
Note: in the UK we also put volunteer/unpaid working experiences on our CVs, hopefully he got paid and a lot!!
The BM is proving it is a complete joke. I’ve seen better acting at a school play.
These people are mentally unhinged. Like seriously…what is in the water over there??
I cannot stop laughing — this is just hilariously dumb.
In the usa we have laws about this because producers would use actors and not state they are actors. Later there was lawsuits about actors confusing the public/jurors.
If sky news is going this route then it’s time for England to get some laws. There needs to be a clear line and the public needs to automatically know this isn’t the person. In this case maybe the harry actor could wear a turtleneck.
I will say this illustrates England employment problem. Is everyone an entertainer. They really have shipped off most of the jobs. It’s either entertainment, transportation, or finance. THEY NEED TO CRAWL BACK TO THE EU.
‘I am not a prince, I just play one on TV’.
“He could have easily described in detail all of the sh-t he left out of Spare, you know. ”
Remember he’s got another 400 or so pages that didn’t make it into Spare that he could drop, be careful what you wish for. And what next? A sock puppet Harry? That was unbelievably cringe, not even worthy of a Fox news stunt.
LOL “And what next? A sock puppet Harry?” OMG! This is hilarious.
Did the guy read all 55 pages of the statement? Wonder how much he got paid or if he’ll get future work for participating in this stunt. Guy isn’t nearly as good-looking as Harry, but who is? I can’t think of another redhead who is attractive enough to play Harry. In truth, I used to hate red hair on a man until Harry came along. Now I love it.
Prince Harry was trending in his adopted and my state of California yesterday- supporting him. @kaiser – I also saw that actor on my feed yesterday 😀. I was like is the British press literally going crazy mental. It was for sure childish. Lol.. and yes the world is seeing them as a joke. In another note, it was nice to see majority of Americans believe HMs version of the car chase in NY. And that the BP are full of sh$&t.
Seriously this was so low rent. It would have been better if they’d grabbed one of the “The Windsors” actors and played it for laughs
this casting is worse than the guy they had on the I Wanna Marry Harry dating reality tv series.
Jen, I love the I Wanna Marry Harry idea, though this is the first I’ve heard of it. Was it on before or after Harry married Meghan?
Omg the actor reminds me of the episode of Arrested Development where the dad hires a surrogate equipped with an earpiece and a GoPro so he can feed him lines to say verbatim since the real dad can’t be there because he’s on house arrest. Wtf 🤣