Over the weekend, the documentary Queen Camilla: The Wicked Stepmother aired in the UK. I have no idea if it was billed as any kind of thorough exploration of Camilla’s decades of manipulation and melodramas, but it apparently didn’t deliver much beyond some lukewarm tea and a history lesson. The part which most people focused on were the very credible claims that Charles’s then-PR-guru Mark Bolland, who was hand-picked by Camilla, regularly fed Prince Harry and William to the tabloids as a way to make Charles and Camilla look better by comparison. Did the documentary also explore Camilla’s longtime friendships within the media, including her dear friends Piers Morgan and Jeremy Clarkson? I don’t know. Well, all of this is now part of a weird new piece at A.N. Wilson at the Daily Mail. Wilson was tasked with defending Camilla’s horsey honor and Wilson argues that Camilla never, ever was part of a briefing campaign against the Duchess of Sussex. Huh. Some highlights:

Camilla doesn’t deserve this documentary: Now Channel 4 has a new documentary, Queen Camilla: The Wicked Stepmother? – a title that surely would not have existed without the Duke of Sussex’s paranoid accusations. Predictably, it airs his grievances about the Queen and, in a synopsis, poses the questions: ‘How did Camilla Parker Bowles ascend from most hated woman in Britain to Queen Camilla, national treasure? And was her transformation at Prince Harry’s expense?’ Poor Camilla, is what I say. She doesn’t deserve this kind of treatment.

The “Kate made Meghan cry” story: The programme presents itself as fair, and the ‘talking-head’ journalists in it were, on the whole, either on Camilla’s side or, at the very least, anxious to point out that there was not a scintilla of evidence to substantiate the view that she had been briefing the Press against his wife. Much was made of a pre-wedding squabble between the two sisters-in-law, Kate and Meghan, which supposedly ended with Meghan in tears. In the Sussex’s version of events, there was no possibility of this story becoming public, had not either Kate or the Wicked Stepmother’s aides leaked it to the Press. But as all the journalists in the programme pointed out, there were plenty of people who would have either witnessed the row between the two women, or who could have listened at the doors.

Camilla never would have leaked that particular story: The Royal Households are full of people, including large numbers of staff, and the institution of royal courts is leaky. No one has ever presented a shred of evidence that, after Kate and Meghan had a row, Camilla’s side immediately leaked the story. It would have been very surprising if she had done so….Yet taking up Harry’s cause, the programme commentary went on seamlessly to say that ‘the negative press against Meghan continued’. The unstated but unmistakable message suggested that Camilla had in fact briefed against Meghan.

Camilla the royal racist?? They showed the clip, yet again, of Prince Harry saying that his family failed to protect him and his wife from Press intrusion. A voice-over reminded us that there had been accusations against the Royal Family of racism, and this voice-over would not have been included in the programme if it did not want you to think that one of the ‘racists’ concerned had been Camilla. Again, there is simply no evidence for this.

Camilla is so hard-working!! The programme tried insidiously to suggest that there is still such bad blood between Harry and Camilla that the Royal Family’s reputation is irreparably marred. It gave almost no space to Camilla’s hard work, especially during the King’s illness and cancer treatment, during which she wore herself out doing public duties. The truth is Camilla is the best thing that has happened to the Royal Family since the Queen Mother.

Wilson’s thoughts on Diana: Diana was a wonderful person – but she was, as she said herself, a Queen of Hearts, a one-off superstar and not a natural royal consort. She had genuine empathy, and knew how to charm the public. It is perfectly understandable that we all cherish her memory. She did immense good and she was rightly loved. Of course, Harry remains traumatised by the horrible way in which she died. So is Prince William, and that tragedy will scar the Royal Family for the next generation. But Diana was not cut out to be the kind of wife that Charles desperately needed – one who loved him unreservedly; who had enough humour and maturity to laugh him out of his self-pity and touchiness; and one who was not trying to steal his thunder. Diana was herself a vulnerable, paranoid person who came from a broken home. She lacked some of Camilla’s solid qualities of common sense and humour.

Camilla rebuilt Charles’s self-confidence! When Prince Charles’s marriage to Diana was breaking up, Camilla was described as the most hated woman in Britain. Twenty-five years have passed since then and even the most fervent Diana fans can now see she has helped rebuild not only Charles’s self-confidence but also the plausibility of the monarchy. It is Harry, not her, who today is the despised outcast. Whatever Channel 4 may wish us to believe.

[From The Daily Mail]

People: Camilla was one part of a widespread attack on Meghan
AN Wilson: How dare you suggest that Camilla briefed the press about Kate making Meghan cry and reversing the victim and aggressor! Staffers did that!

So, yeah, this is a really weird defense of Camilla. Personally, I don’t believe that Camilla was part of the whole “Meghan made Kate cry” storyline – Camilla wasn’t there and it’s always been pretty clear that this was a special lie created by Kate and the Middletons, who were running their own little comms office out of Middleton Manor. But beyond that, Camilla absolutely was part of the widespread press attacks on both Harry and Meghan. It had been one of her special projects for years, to drive a wedge between Harry and William, and when Harry and Meghan got together, she absolutely stoked William and Kate’s jealousy and paranoia. Camilla got everything she wanted.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Instar.