While Peter Morgan and The Crown are always a tad too generous with how they cast the “Prince Charles” role, they’ve gotten it bang-on with casting actresses for Camilla Parker Bowles. Emerald Fennell played Camilla in Seasons 3 and 4, and I thought she was great at showing why she would appeal to Charles, and she showed Camilla as a real schemer too, manipulating both Diana and Charles. In the two new seasons, Camilla is played by Olivia Williams and once again, inspired casting. They tossed an unkempt ashy-blonde wig on Olivia and told her not to moisturize and it’s PERFECT. In Season 5, you really get how Camilla was just, at that time, a suburban mom with connections, openly carrying on with a married man. According to Dominic West and Olivia, Camilla is a sympathetic figure because… she was just a woman in love, and sometimes life is messy, I guess.
As for how the divorce will be portrayed, Dominic believes The Crown will be ‘more even-handed and fairer than the newspaper coverage at the time’. Olivia Williams, who takes over from Emerald Fennell to play Camilla in season five, agrees saying, ‘I don’t think it’s something the Palace should be frightened of. Peter Morgan is very careful to always turn these events back to how they affect the crown [not the individuals]. The series if called The Crown, not Charles or Diana.’
West added: ‘Hindsight is a wonderful thing. At the time, when we were thinking about this divorce as it happened – there was an enormous sense of grievance in the public that this fairy-tale had been destroyed. I think now we realise Camilla was not a marriage breaker, she was not someone who was trying to deny us this fairy tale – she was just someone who was in love.’
Camilla, now the Queen Consort, has always been a divisive figure due to her role in the breakdown of Charles and Diana’s marriage. But Olivia believes the new season will dispel ‘the trope of the marriage breaker that the press fed at the time’.
‘Anybody who has a perspective on divorce knows that the whole blame game becomes irrelevant,’ says Olivia. ‘And maybe now we see that [Charles and Diana’s] marriage wasn’t a great idea in the first place. I say that without any disrespect to any of the families involved – as Dominic says, hindsight is a valuable thing.’
Reportedly, season five of The Crown will include a recreation of the infamous ‘tampon-gate’ phone call, when intimate conversations between Charles and Camilla were leaked – no doubt a moment that the royals would rather forget.
‘Back then, a lot of what we learn about Charles and Camilla seemed in some way sordid, or not very appealing,’ says Dominic. ‘Very often it was a gross invasion of their privacy which feels very squeamish now – when you could read the text of their phone conversations, or ring up a hotline and listen to their phone conversations.’
Despite this, both Dominic and Olivia were struck by the romance between Charles and Camilla. ‘What we learnt playing those times and those events – was how actually rather sweet they were together and how romantic it was,’ says Dominic.
I genuinely disagree with this, but I find it interesting that Olivia and Dominic both seem to be arguing that the “original sin” was Charles and Diana’s marriage in the first place, that they were unsuited for each other and they both had every right to look elsewhere. But what I’m reminded of is not that Charles simply wanted to have an affair with Camilla, it’s that he was in love with Camilla throughout his courtship with Diana and throughout their marriage. Camilla was the “original sin” of Charles and Diana’s marriage. Camilla kept him trapped, but make no mistake, Charles kept going back to Camilla by his own choice too. People always criticize Diana for not being “okay” with Charles cheating on her, but it was perfectly clear that Charles was incapable of keeping up with the appearance of a happy marriage. It wasn’t enough that he was unfaithful, it was also that he treated Diana like sh-t, publicly and privately. Camilla knew exactly what she was doing too. Anyway! Rottweiler Apologia, I think not.
Photos courtesy of Netflix/The Crown.
There is no justification. He had a wife and young children, and no one ever talks about the fact that those kids had a dad who couldn’t bother being faithful and the impact it had on them. If you truly love someone else, you do it the right way. Both he Chuck and Camilla simply wanted what they wanted and had no restraint, no sense of responsibility, no morals, no dignity.
They’re spoiled brats with no concern for others and have been their entire lives.
I agree with this. Charles wasn’t a fragile 18 year old that is easily persuaded. He was a fully formed 30 something year old that could have given his mother the proper pushback when it mattered. If he truly wanted to marry Camilla he should have fought for her, so i guess the real sin here was Charles himself.
Once he said his marital vows to Diana he should have done everything in his power to honour those especially after the william and harry were born. He clearly didn’t. I don’t think he thought for a second the effect his infidelity would have on his boys. He is a selfish man child.
Uncle “Dickie Nancy” Mountbatten had a big influence. He urged Charles to have fun in his 20’s and then to marry an unimpeachable virgin, first suggesting his granddaughter.
The original sin was, perhaps, insisting that Charles find a virgin when he was already in love with Camilla, who’s a pro at managing a narcissist like Charles.
That’s regal/masculine entitlement: Charles married an untested “vagina” and had no interest in the life beyond begetting two children.
How much “in love” was he really in love with Camilla? If he were he would have told Camilla to wait for him before he left for a tour of duty. She may or may not have taken him up on the offer. Anna Wallace was considered someone for Charles to marry and reportedly he was besotted with her. She was a few years older than Diana and had experience, she told him to get lost when he ignored her at a party and danced with Camilla. Charles got to have the heirs and reject the wife and later marry the mistress. He got to have his cake and eat it too. Charles was the one who had the “original sin.” Charles and Charles alone made those decisions, not Mountbatten, Philip or the Queen. He did not have to listen to his great uncle.
Charles was never “in love” with Camilla. He had many women besides her while married to Diana. Camilla didn’t even want Charles. She was super into APB and was determined to marry APB and did. They just enjoy sex with each other like many aristos do.
This whole “star-crossed” lovers thing is just Charles PR.
The only person Charles loves is Charles.
The Crown has done an amazing job of demonstrating that the monarchy is a sausage grinder. You take a likable sympathetic person, run them through the system, and they are transformed into something horrifying, selfish and unhappy. For what? To maintain the facade and keep the money rolling in.
Camilla was around the entire marriage. She even helped Charles select Diana and she and her husband hosted c an d at their home. Charles later said he did not love Diana but still married her. So he brought in a teenager who was besotted with him into the marriage so he could have heirs. He was not exactly exclusive with Camilla. Janet Jenkins spoke publicly a about her involvement with Charles. Camilla imo undermined Diana and wrecked Diana marriage by gaslighting her. Maybe Dominic wants honors from c and c for trying to absolve Camilla
I hate the rewriting of Charles and Camilla as a great love story.
He saw other women and was serially unfaithful to Diana and Camilla. I am unsure he has ever considered that rules applied to him. I believe he demonised Diana to allow himself and others to look away at what was a very painful and damaging way for one person to behave to another.
He and his well aged friends should be ashamed of how they behaved, not back slapping at facilitating the grubby sexual escapades of two middle aged married people
Let’s not forget about Lady Dale Tryon (“Kanga”) with whom he had a lengthy affair until she began babbling to the tabloids about it. There were undoubtedly many more of shorter durations, but to say that C&C were madly in love is just whitewashing a seedy, sleazy affair with Camilla hanging in tenaciously until she bagged the big one.
And who wound up in a wheelchair and then dead a few months after Diana.
Camilla dated APB off and on for 7 years. Camilla was in love with APB and wanted to marry him, but he would not commit. C & C, in the early 70s was a fling, while APB was away in Cypress with the military. Charles was more into Camilla than she was into him. According to Charles authorized biography, they began another affair in the late 70s. It was then that Camilla became his confidant, she knew about the other women, even helping pick them out, and she knew his secrets. Camilla was Charles FAVORITE mistress, but not his only one.
According to Paul Burrell, Diana’s butler who she requested to be her butler in the divorce, he said he served two mistresses while he was a butler at Highgrove House. He said that during the week Camilla was the mistress of the house. On the weekends, when Diana came with the boys to try to connect with Charles, the staff hid all the evidence of Camilla.
Yes, Camilla was there though out the entire marriage.
It’s quite easy to understand why Dominic West would take the cheater side in this.
💀💀💀
Ha! Just noticed your user name! Love it!
Accurate
BINGO!!!
” I think now we realise Camilla was not a marriage breaker, she was not someone who was trying to deny us this fairy tale – she was just someone who was in love.’”
Yeah, I’ve heard that line before. They were both married. That is the very definition of marriage breakers, the both of them. The other woman in my marriage texted me to say that she was sorry but they are “in love”, yeah, well until I found out he was cheating I thought we were too.
“I’m sorry you’re hurting but we’re just two good people who fell in love.”
I just rolled my eyes so hard, I think I saw my brain.
Was thinking this right from the headline.
Which I might have written as ‘Known philanderer Dominic West…’
OMG! I was wondering if I was the only one thinking that. Of course, Dominic West would sympathize. He is of the same ilk. a fellow cheater!
(cough cough) Lily James.
Ha! I had to Google that. I didn’t know anything about Dominic West before all this. I suppose celebs, aristos, and politicians are all sort of in open marriages, the trick is whether the spouse knows they are.
PreXactly!! Dominic West should just shut up and play.
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I was going to say the same thing. Of course a cheating wanker like Dominic West would take that position. He’s gross. And the whole rewriting of history about Charles and Camilla is quite sickening.
He’s covering his cheating a$$, he sits on the board of the Prince’s Trust and offered to resign but Charles kept him on. West and his wife own Glin Castle in Ireland and have turned it into a hoity-toity hotel for the rich and titled so it’s clear he’s toadying up to KC3 to stay relevant to the aristos.
“A cheating wanker”
I love it! He got the money from Netflix for playing tampon Charles and now he is hoping that Charles the Cruel will give him an OBE or whatever by claiming that the rottweiler was not a home- wrecker. Puhleease!
@Jaded, do you mean to tell me that even though we’ve heard about little else from Charles except whining and moaning for months and months about how unfair The Crown is to him, the BM’s position that Netflix = Satan, blah blah blah— he allowed the actor playing him to remain on the board of The Prince’s Trust?! What the actual? I will never understand these people.
He echoes penny whose books absolved Camilla. Tina Brown did this too.
The original sin was Charles using Diana as the perfect virgin wife and not considering her as a human being worthy of kindness.
Agree, totally. But one step back, the original, original sin was the queen demanding her aging son marry and produce heirs with a young virgin of good birth, knowing fully he didn’t want to and that he was in love with another woman.
To be fair to betty and phillip, I dont hink they demanded that he marry Diana. Its my understanding that they told him to either marry her or set her free.
But its a testament to charles despicably weak, traitorous character that he couldnt bother to exert himself to find a more suitable wife. And there was the snake camilla egging him on.
The queen avoided confrontations and ostriches. I doubt she tried to force Charles to marry Diana. Philip told Charles to drop Diana if he did not want to marry her. Typical charles not taking responsibility for his own decisions.
Not to defend the queen and Philip, but there’s no evidence that they demanded Charles marry Diana. Supposedly, Philip advised him not to string her along. Somehow Charles interpreted this to mean, marry her and then string her along.
If theirs is this wonderful, inspiring love story why didn’t Camilla wait for him to begin with? Why marry APB? Why drag Diana into the story at all? Or why not marry a woman willing to be the broodmare and let Charles do what he wanted on the side? Be upfront about the whole thing instead of making a young woman think he was in love with her? And why take Di and try to gaslight her and break her afterward? Do an upfront divorce and move on. The fact that they were supposedly in love, doesn’t excuse or explain away the sheer nastiness in private and in the press.
Charles spin talked of forbidden love which is inaccurate because Charles told his biographer he did not want to marry Camilla when he first met. He also had many other women in his life.
It wasn’t the love story that they’re trying to convince people it was/is.
Camilla always wanted APB, not Charles. She knew she had power over Charles and she used that power, but it was always APB that she “loved”.
But did she really love APB?
That episode in S5 when the tape hit the fan……..rmbr that phone call charles made to camilla’s marital home when APB answered the phone, it was charles, and APB knew that charles was cuckolding him? He even facilitated his cuckolding by getting his wife on the phone to talk with her lover!!!
I cringed throughout this scene. Such nasty abusers, charles and camilla.
YES! In my opinion she really did love Andrew Parker-Bowles and Andrew Parker-Bowles was always her first choice.
APB was also a notorious philanderer so they were all bed hopping about (cough Princess Anne cough). Seems only Diana went into it expecting a love match.
I don’t really think even Diana went into it expecting a love match, not the way regular people see it anyway. Everyone ignores this, but Diana took no issue with Charles other mistresses, even during times when he was spending much more time with them than Camilla and they were much more available than Camilla, who had absolutely no intentions of leaving her marriage for the bulk of their affair. Diana was even very friendly with some of them. She also never had any qualms at all about being the other woman in other peoples marriages (in fact she often seemed to relish it) so the idea she was some innocent to the ways of the incestuous aristocracy is just silly.
The real issue with Camilla was that she had none of the attributes Diana valued in herself, which triggered Diana’s insecurities. She didn’t mind the beautiful mistresses, but Camilla’s appeal was something different, something Diana didn’t possess, and that distressed her.
Kate, nicely done–Chuck would be very pleased with you. You forget the age that Diana was when she became engaged. I believe she said they had seen each other 13 times. Or, perhaps that’s when they married! She was barely 20 when she married Chuck–and yes, she was in love with him. She believed that. Chuck did not love her. Camilla inserted herself into the Wales’ marriage and she was aided by Chuck. This happened before and during the Wales’ marriage. Diana never had a chance. If you want to have people believe what you’re suggesting, you need to stay away from anyone old enough to know what was happening in real time. There’s a lot of us.
Kate, Diana was only friendly with Dale Tryon after her marriage was more or less over and Camilla “won.” Both did not like Camilla and Dale was sympathetic to Diana. Diana did love Charles and yes she did care. If she did not care she would not have fretted about Camilla being around. She fell for CHarles. Diana never struck up friendship with Charles other lady friends including Janet Jenkins. The “other marriages” Diana were involved in has been exaggerated. IMO. Diana did not “relish” anything of the sort, IMO, she wanted a marriage. Carling denied any affair took place and Julia Carling had no leg to stand on and could not name Diana as the other woman in court. Diana flat out denied any “sexual affair” with Mannakee to Settelen. Hoare and Diana are both dead and never spoke of what happened or made any public statements. Hoare did pursue Diana according to Jephson and Wharfe. Diana was happy with her relationship with Dr. Khan, who was single and she called him Mr. Wonderful and she saw a possible future with him. Whether or not they would have reconciled had she lived, is subject to speculation. I think Diana wanted a real marriage to a man and have children and not have the complicated “arrangement’ Charles had with Camilla. Camilla was involved with Charles the whole time.
@Saucy, that actually might be too generous— I’m not positive, but h thought they’d only met *11* times before the wedding. Regardless, Charles is a selfish POS.
I know that the bed-hopping is perfectly normal and even expected with these people, but it just grosses me out so much. I cannot imagine casually sleeping with the husband of a friend of mine, and my husband sleeping with his wife (or whoever). And then continuing to socialize.
I guess it works for them, but I find it to be so repulsive. It seems like they’re basically only taking marriage vows so that their estates can legally pass on to “legitimate” children.
If there’s an “original sin,” it’s the fiction that marriages within the RF are about love and romance, especially when it comes to those in the line of succession. Marriages like that have always been about procreation, economics and politics. Love and romance is what you do on the side.
True, Eurydice, and I think that is why Kate hates Meghan so much. Meghan and Harry clearly married for love … which William doesn’t understand, Kate would love to have, and Charles quietly scorns.
Chaz and Camilla aren’t a great love story. They’re two crappy human beings who ended up together after cheating on their first spouses.
Also, I LOL’d at this line from Kaiser: “and told her not to moisturize.”
This, this, THIS @Eurydice! I may have said it before and I’ll likely say it again but it’s funny how all the dirt on the marriages of Elizabeth & Phillip, C & C, and even W & K simply underscore for me why H & M simply couldn’t thrive in the BRF. Theirs was a love match based on respect, admiration, teamwork, a desire for the other’s good and betterment, a desire to help each other navigate life and enhance the world. These other people JUST DONT GET IT! You don’t marry someone you love and stay faithful to them. You don’t love someone so much that you’re willing to sacrifice for them. You don’t value your vows, spouse, and family above your true family and calling -The BRF and it’s reputation. It’s standard, accepted, and dare I say expected that you marry to produce heirs and have your dalliances and kicks on the side in the BRF. Spouses don’t complain and basically you try to keep it hush hush.
Charles changed the game a bit with Camilla being so in-your-face, the villainizing and divorce of Diana, marrying his mistress, and the mistress becoming queen consort. These people do not get H & M. Harry should have done his duty to marry the standard and take up with Meghan on the side. Meghan wasn’t supposed to express any kind of displeasure over not being treated fairly or equally or staff actually being effective to do their jobs for she and H-she was just there for the optics. Still more, H&M were part of “the spare” role and it was outrageous for them to outshine W & K. They only see that Harry lost his mind because of that American, divorcee, actress, non-aristocrat, half-black upstart who didn’t know her place and infected Harry. They do NOT see that Harry is his mother’s child was never about that pretentious, hollow life and always wanted something different for himself. It is ingrained in this family, it is part of their DNA. Protect the queen/king/heir, embiggen the crown at all costs. There is no equal footing or playing field in that family. There is no individualism or the honor, work ethic, accountability and responsibility that comes with personal obligations and relations it is all about the establishment. If W & K wanted to do the least, there was no room for H & M to actually want to do ANYTHING that might make W & K look less than. If tabloids belittling or attacking M served to diminish her popularity and shine Kate’s star there was nothing they’d do to stop that. Unpopular opinion: I feel for Kate. She was raised in that and to accept this behavior. She is married to a man who just wanted her to have his heirs and doesn’t care for or connect with her and it must have been a double edged sword to see M come in with all of this, be DESIRED by the most desirable brother, be valued and PROTECTED to the point he was willing to lay down everything he knew and had to honor her. What a blow! It’s not an excuse, but I sometimes think it’s got to sting and only contributed to the rift between the brothers’ families.
Yes, that’s a very generous take by both actors. I’ve watched four episodes of the new season so far and it’s quite sympathetic to Charles. He’s been throwing hissy fits for nothing, really. Camilla hasn’t shown up yet, so I’ll have to see how they portray them together before I get a sense for how the show chose to treat this relationship.
It is true, to be fair, that the marriage was a mistake. Diana herself got cold feet before the wedding. But it doesn’t excuse what a s**t Charles was. That said, I don’t think West’s real life cheating is coloring his view on this that much? Olivia seems to be saying the same things he is. Maybe it’s the show’s take and the actors are just kind of repeating the party line.
@Annel
I think indeed that West’s real life cheating is coloring his view on this matter VERY much!
And the fact that Olivia seems to be saying the same things he is, could be because her possible shenanigans might not be public knowledge, like West’s.
I suspect that it is West’s real life views that are colouring his view on the matter, and that those same views gave rise to his own infidelity.
From what I’ve seen so far, The Crown is doing a rather good job of showing that Charles just could not stand Diana, for no very good reason – she is charming, lovely company. She is an asset to The Crown. He can barely even manage polite conversations with her.
I think Charles just didn’t want to get married period. I think he liked the idea of having a wife and of course he needed heirs but otherwise I think he wanted his single life too. Diana seemed to want a close loving relationship but Charles wants what he has now: him and Camilla living in separate houses, doing work appearances, maybe the occasional vacation together and that’s about it. He’s the ultimate “have my cake and eat it too” guy.
This has always been what I believe for both .Charles and William. They do not like too much intimacy or attachment, family yes, kids yes, but then leave them alone. Charles loves his lifestyle with Camilla because Camilla also wants her space, they are a good match. William was is no rush to marry, he now looks so happy like he just got out of prison.
A documentary on the Windsors showed that the bachelor Charles chose to have affairs with married women so there would be no expectations of marriage. He truly did not want to give women the wrong idea…until he did. Poor Diana should have been given a clear picture of the contract and left to decide whether that was what she wanted. Camilla and Kate were both fully prepped and consented.
I think Diana was emotionally needy, and Charles was hardly capable of emotional nurturing after a childhood left by his parents for months and raised in a cold, bullying boarding school. What a disaster.
Nikki, if Diana had gotten any care and consideration from Chuck, I think the marriage would have had a chance. When Chuck wore the cufflinks that Camilla gave him on his HONEYMOON, I think we know exactly how he treated her.
Even with the wig and without moisturizer, she’s much too pretty to play Camilla. But I haven’t seen the performance yet so I will withhold judgment.
As for the rest of this nonsense, yeah, no. It’s not like Charles ever loved Diana and then met Camilla and was just bowled over by her. So that’s when he left Diana. Didn’t happen that way. He knowingly led on a naive teenager when he was already involved with Camilla. He used the teenager to satisfy the demands that he marry a virgin and provide “an heir and a spare”. Then, once that was accomplished, he publicly humiliated his wife with the woman he wanted to be with all the time. It’s all gross. And this history should never be revised. Diana did nothing wrong here, unless being a naive teenager is wrong. Charles was totally wrong.
I haven’t watched this episode yet but that wig needs its own show.
I don’t know why, 40 years after Chuck married the wrong woman, people still try to parse whose fault it was that this blew up in everyone’s face. I think if there’s one thing The Crown really hammers home, it’s that this isn’t a normal family and these aren’t normal relationships. They’re work relationships too. Basically, your spouse is your co-worker only you don’t meet at work, you marry and bring them into the office. And everyone has an opinion on who you should marry. I think the real enemy is this obsession with tradition and keeping things the same. I think marriage to these people was something entirely different than it was to the peasants, that’s why Camz had no problem marrying APB. I don’t even believe they thought they would be having an “affair”. They would just stay friends, hook up sometimes, and keep it completely separate from their marriages. As you do.
And then Diana came in, didn’t understand a damn thing that was happening (understandable) and it all went t*ts up. You can blame Chuck and Cam and wouldn’t be entirely wrong imo. But I do believe they just didn’t understand what Diana’s problem was.
The actors are just trying to ensure that they don’t get uninvited from any royal parties in the future.
West runs that castle with his wife. He might have to be careful in case it benefits from any royal grants.
Agree, if Netflix was a British company we would never have the Crown. The Royals have done an excellent job in brainwashing the masses.
This.
I don’t disagree about Dominic West wanting to keep in with the royals, but Glin Castle is in the south of Ireland, not anywhere where they might be asking for the royals’ help with grants.
I also think that Morgan deliberately cast actors who are better looking (by far!) than both Charles and Camilla to make C&C more sympathetic to the audience. He probably got blowback to season 4 for being too rough on them.
Exactly. You don’t marry into the RF; you’re hired by the institution. It’s rare for a 19-year old to be cynical enough to understand this.
Totally agree with your comments from the wig on down.
I’m no big believer in romance, and I think the royals are all just various degrees of revolting, but even I have to admit that Charles and Camilla have a weirdly compelling love story. Dare I say a romance for the ages.
I know, I know, you all hate C & C here, but they really have survived tremendous adversity over the decades. I know the people think Diana is prettier so somehow deserves the romantic storyline, but hey ho, sometimes true love happens to people we dislike and think are not attractive enough to deserve it. Such is life.
Okay, but this weirdly compelling love story isn’t the whole truth as commenters have said. Charles had other mistresses besides her. She was really into APB. Just feels like this version of them as star-crossed lovers kept apart bc Charles was being forced to marry Diana but they’ve endured over time is all part of a play the long game Royal PR revision, aided by members of the Royal Rota that love Camilla bc she’ll call them on the regular and drip tidbits of gossip. I guess what I’m saying is this weirdly compelling story just feels like a narrative that isn’t the truth but is awfully convenient for Charles and Camilla. However, before I started following royal gossip on CB, I would have fallen for this idea and been like wow they must’ve really loved each other. I just don’t think that anymore. Do they enduringly have each other’s backs? At this point, yeah, they do. Does Charles care about her to the exclusion of his own sons? Yeah, he does. It’s Charles first. Camilla second. I believe they love and support each other in the only way their tiny egotistical hearts can. But the idea that they were each other’s one true loves if only it weren’t for circumstances just isn’t true.
I don’t like the way they treated Diana. What adversity did they survive. Charles was holding all the cards and protected Camilla and had spin doctors. The two gaslit Diana. If they really loved each other Charles would not have married Diana nor had.other women in his life. Charles and Camilla were never separated they were involved for years.
You know what tremendous adversity is? Being hounded literally to death by paparazzi. (Don’t mean to sound tetchy, Decca, but I don’t have an ounce of empathy for Charles.)
Charles hasn’t really known adversity. He’s been pampered his entire life. Sure, he loved his creepy uncle — and his parents in a standoffish way — but he didn’t have to mourn their deaths while holding down a real job, like the rest of us.
He chose a teenager to be his broodmare and then tortured her by cheating on her. He’s a garbage human being.
(Not sure why my name has “bn” in front of it … must have done something wrong.)
Here we go. An actor completes a project, got loads of money. The project isn’t liked by some establishment people, in this care our lovely RF. So, once it’s wrapped and out facing criticism, the actor starts putting out puff pieces to make out he has real insight into the events and everyone involved behaved wonderfully. It’s so obvious Dominic West doesn’t want to ripple the water for future work or networking.
Isn’t he on the board of Charles’ trust or something? So of course he’s going to spin away!
“…says the philanderer”🙄
btw, I’ve only just started watching The Crown and have dived into series 4 to get the full backstory to Diana in series 5, which is the one I really want to watch. All the negative press has only made me watch something I’d never have watched before. The actress playing Camilla in 4 is way too gorgeous IMO. I wouldn’t have matched the two. The others seem pretty well aligned. She must’ve been so flattered. And god does it get to how vile Camilla and Charles were. You sometimes forget, given how much Camilla’s been absorbed into the fabric of the RF nowadays.
Needless comments from both of them, especially Dominic West of cheating-scandal infamy
The whitewash is strong here. BP must have done a poll showing Camilla is still not accepted as Queen Consort despite what the talking heads say.
What’s entertaining is Charles, the RF and all the courtiers raged through their media connections of all the problems with the historical 1990s being replayed on TV. They opened the discussions around Prince Philip and Penny’s affairs and how the story slapped a dead Queen, they talked about the mistruth of any conversations between Major and Prince Charles, etc. They dug out the skeletons and melodrama the series didn’t mention. That’s irony.
I mean yeah, Charles and Diana were a disaster from the start and should’ve never married. That’s pretty obvious. But since they did marry, Charles and Camilla both should’ve respected Diana and not continued their affair for literally the entire marriage.
It is unfortunate if Charles was pushed into a marriage he never wanted (that’s how the show portrayed it; I’m not a huge royal watcher so IDK if that’s how it really happened). That seems to be a recurring theme with the BRF that they can’t seem to shake off and it’s toxic. But Charles and Camilla are not blameless for their behavior.
It was a disaster.because Camilla did not leave the scene. C and c were in touch at foxhunts and social events.i think they were involved the whole time.also Charles had little respect imo for Diana and wanted her to just fall into line. Charles huge mistake was starting another affair with Camilla after she got married
He also hot involved with married dale tryon.
Charles did not marry Diana in good faith. That’s the bottom line. Diana became suspicious about this before the marriage but was too young and scared to know what to do about it. She even consulted her older sister since she had no other close female relatives to confide in. Her sister was the opposite of helpful, telling her it was too late: the tea towels were already ordered. Diana was failed by everyone in her life. Repeatedly. It’s a miracle she turned out as well as she did.
Yeah, it is pretty disastrous when a woman marries an abuser who lovebombed her and gaslights her. Pretending there was any level of “both sides” to it is playing into the abuser’s hands.
I don’t like cheaters.
I suspect these types of stories are filled with coded language that reminds Weak Willy who his true overlords are.
The original sin was using AND ABUSING a naive 19 year old girl who fit the ideal of the perfect royal wife and child bearer.
Diana harnessed her power (good description by Kaiser) and burned them – she continues to burn them after her death and to that I say CHEERS. Bottoms up – the BaRF deserves it for all the blood that is on their hands for eons, not just Diana. Diana was and is karma.
Charles and Camilla, as the youths say (can confirm, as I am a youth), “effed around and found out.” That bit in The Crown with Charles yelling while Diana burned everything to the ground with the Martin Bashir interview was just *chefs kiss*. Get wrekt, Charless.
i cannot accept the Rottweiler Apologia they are pushing. He deserves absolutely no sympathy from anyone. There is no information that can come out which will justify his behavior.
Charles AND Camilla broke that marriage. All the other women he cheated with played a role but they are the key players here. Don’t want the crappy reputation? Don’t do crappy things.
SARAHCS: EXACTLY!
Camilla didn’t chase Charles away when she should have. Plus she was gaslighting Diana even before the marriage. So she nor Charles get no sympathy from me.
Agree wholeheartedly with you. Neither of them had the right to exploit Diana, and they did, and now they want us to forget.
Dominic West, known cheater and adulterer making excuses for…two cheaters and adulterers. Shocker.
Recently, on this website, someone asked what Camilla did that made people hate her so much.
I am thankful that The Crown is covering this subject. Camilla and Charles cheated. They were both married to other people. They used and abused their spouses. Charles, and the BRF, hung Diana out to dry when she decided to ask for help. Camilla gaslit Diana. None of this behavior is ok.
It’s too bad Salt Island and it’s royal inhabitants are getting wound up about what they have done, but really?? They f’d around and people found out.
The idea was that had Charles had more room and less stipulations to chose his bride, both parties would have been spared the pain of divorce.
This was not an uncommon view around the time of the divorce, mostly shared by citizens who refused to take sides in an unfortunate state of affairs.
The thing that strikes me is that he married a woman that is so devoted to him that she put everything else aside including her family. I know the show is a dramatization but he needed a woman who would put all his needs first and I think that’s the main draw for him to Camilla!
There’s a scene in the second episode of this season’s Crown where Charles has organized all the visits they’ll do on their yachting trip to Italy. It’s all ruins and history and so forth, very dry, and everyone sitting around the lunch table looks quietly disconcerted. Diana speaks up and says something along the lines of “what about water sports for the boys…what about shopping? Who wants to go shopping?” Charles hadn’t included anything that his children would have enjoyed or even Diana. That shows clearly his utter selfishness and pompous one-track mindedness. He then rolls his eyes and looks exasperated at Diana. The constant “putting down” and diminishing of her was terrible, and like William with Kate, they both make it obvious that they can’t stand their wives. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
Yes, I watched that episode. Charles basically plans the whole itinerary for what is meant to be a “second honeymoon” (with the kids), even inviting relatives without Diana’s say-so, and is annoyed when she has other ideas and wants. The way he rolled his eyes when she said she’d like to go shopping at some point, ugh. He looked down on her because she didn’t want to spend the whole damned trip visiting ruins with him acting as tour guide. Shopping?! How gauche.
Can you imagine going on a family trip with your spouse, one that is supposed to be a chance to re-connect, and having him ice you out of the planning phase? Hell no!! And why couldn’t they just do separate things sometimes? There’s no harm in that. Which is what they basically end up doing (that’s not really a spoiler) and it works fine. Until Charles just has to upset the whole apple cart.
As I understand it, Charles and Camilla are often apart and living in their own homes. While they should obviously arrange their lives in a way that works for them, I have a hard time buying this ‘love of their life’ story that they enjoy peddling to the masses.
Especially as Camilla’s she-shed is a mansion.
How disgusting of that boot licker. Because he acted his way through a script he didn’t write, he is telling us he knows the history better than we?
Quite aside from whether Camilla and Charles are a great love story, whatever love is, he was cruel to his wife and the mother of his children, and clearly an unloving and unsupportive father. Decency would dictate that he at least treat his wife with some degree of respect. From all accounts, Harry loved both his father and his mother- but only one parent seems to have returned his love. It’s hard to imagine Charles loving anyone- his so-called love for Camilla just strikes me as another form of self-love. Dominic West totally fails to capture the dweeb in Charles- he makes him far more appealing than what emanates from him as a person considering his actions.
Charles was not in love with Camilla. Charles has never loved anyone. He had multiple affairs and did not want to marry Camilla when he married Diana.
I agree with Dominic about that one line though. Camilla wasn’t a marriage-breaker. She wanted to stay married to her husband, and she wanted Diana to just put up with whatever. Charles was the marriage-breaker.
Camilla didn’t want Charles either. She was married to Andrew Parker-Bowles. Neither of them wanted a divorce, even with both of them being unfaithful in their marriage, and they wouldn’t have gotten divorced if Charles hadn’t given that interview with Dimbleby, admitting on TV that he was having an affair, and naming Camilla specifically.
If Camilla wanted Charles that bad, she wouldn’t have married APB, and she wouldn’t have stayed married to APB. Even after Charles got divorced and Diana passed away, it took years for Charles to actually bother to propose to Camilla. He was confronted by Camilla’s father, who was frustrated with Charles having combusted Camilla’s life and put her on the firing line unduly, for nothing.
Their relationship is a lot of things. I think they are, above all, suited for each other. Camilla is the sort of woman Charles is into. But a star-crossed love story, this ain’t.
People always focus on the wrong things with the dissolution of this marriage. It’s not about being denied the fairy tale. It’s not even about infidelity, tbh.
Diana was disrespected. She was dehumanized, not by the press, but by her husband, the family she married into, and the institution she was a part of.
That is the fundamental original sin. Charles didn’t need to treat Diana like sh-t. His family didn’t need to treat her like sh-t. The cheating and the unhappiness and the not being in love with Diana didn’t need to get in the way of him being a decent person to her. He could have not made snippy comments about her weight. He could have not been jealous of her that she was more popular than him. He could have stood up for her against his family and the press. Even if he cheated, even if he didn’t love her, he could have still been in Diana’s corner, as her friend, as someone who respected her, as someone who shared two children with her, as someone who is in the same unique, alienating position that she was also in.
Instead, he demeaned her. He dismissed her when she made her problems known to him. He ran to the press and said she was crazy. His family expected her to work like a dog to make them look good with her star power, but gave her no support, encouragement, or kindness in return. She was expected to give them her all, and expect nothing but pain and humiliation in return. And when she said, “No, I’m not doing that, sorry,” they started treating her like she was the one who was being disrespectful to them.
All Diana ever wanted was someone who was on her side. I think she could have overlooked quite a lot in Charles if only Charles had actually cared about her on any level, and shown that he cared about her. But Charles didn’t care. Camilla didn’t care. The Queen didn’t care. Nobody cared. That was the original sin. It was the alienation of a human being whose biggest mistake was marrying into a family, thinking they’d at least treat her like a friend, only to be constantly treated like an enemy.
Dominic West and whoever played Camilla Parker-Bowles in this season can FOH. Dominic West hobknobs with the posh set. Of course he’d fall over himself apologizing for them, to say nothing of how he conducts his own personal life. Charles better be thanking his lucky stars that he got cast in this role. Isn’t it interesting, how all the endless whinging abt how The Crown is going to be a hatchet job has just mysteriously and suddenly gone completely silent??? Funny how that works, eh.
Well said, A
Well, I have the not moisturizing thing down so I guess all I need now is a big wig
LOL !
I think I’m in the middle of episode 6. I’m not sure because I keep falling asleep. This season is not only so boring, I am having trouble with the casting. Charles is too handsome. Diana, I don’t know, I’m not 100 feeling it. As for Dolores Umbridge…well, I’ll leave it at that.
They are writing Charles with such a sympathetic hand, and totally rewriting history, while leaving out a ton of stuff.
The Queen is basically a doddering shell.
I just can’t.
I like Umbridge and Debicki. I absolutely despise the casting for Philip, though. He was not 80 years old at the time, and frankly, was still pretty bangable in the early 90s. He also met Penny Knatchbull years earlier. His whole story line feels off because of the bad casting. Even though DW is WAY hotter, he manages to capture the nerd factor of Charles pretty well.
The writers are not doing right by Diana imo she is passive, mopey and not proactive and spirited like the real Diana. The writers praise Charles for his work but so far as I am still on episode 6 not Diana. Diana got more assertive after the separation in her life and work and did not just mope around.
Since this is this week’s Crown story, Kaiser did you catch when the Queen invites Penny to Sandrigham for Church?! I thought this was totally a reference to rose bushes….
good catch, Candy! I just saw that scene and it didn’t occur to me, but you’re right. that’s either ever so clever or literally how they always do it. either way, well played & good eye.
Diana’s grandmother told her to think twice before marrying in because they were different and she might not like it.
Charles lured Diana in under false pretext; she was in love with him, that is why she married him. She fell in love with him because she was innocent and inexperienced, suffered through his ill treatment and that of his family, and then he threw her away, whining all along. I wish I could remember where I saw the footage of a young prince charles archly saying “oh, am I in the way?” It’s always about himself, it’s never about his country. And they are soft-soaping or soft-peddling Camilla, I think. Had she left him alone, and let’s be real, she had that choice, she wasn’t locked into being his mistress, he would have gone back to his wife and made a go of it, delicate bitch that he is. I still remember the way Camilla looked at the wedding: oh, she wanted it. She supposedly initiated it with Charles by saying so how about it.
So I am at about Episode 8 on the Crown, and I am trying to decide if they subtly or not so much are leaning toward Charles and the RF over Diana. They said that the Panorama interview blew up in her face and people left her in droves, and that is what made her boyfriend (heart doctor) leave her as well, and it show Prince William withdrawing from her as well. I would be interested to know what you all think, if you think the Crown is too favorable to the RF. I’m beginning to think so. Much too sympathetic to Camilla. She did want the crown, or all the trappings. I think the Crown is much too sympathetic.
I
Absolutely agree. Thus was a bad season to me. Too boring; dragged on too long. And it’s really has a pro Royal family/ Charles agenda
Diana was written as saying she had no friends. Of course she had. They just were not written into the script including monckton and Bartholomew. The queen was miscast and her script was not good. I must say that William meeting with the queen for tea creeped me out. One if the things that was bad for his character.
This is where they slip in the Queen telling William after she asks him if he is worried about his mom, that it is not right for children to worry about their parents. They also have Charles telling Diana that she smothered William, then William is seen telling his mother that he was uncomfortable with his mother telling him about her love life. Are we sure the Crown didn’t actually cooperate with the Crown writer. William and his mom used to be thick. He was her champion when he was little, and he did worry about her. I always worried about my mother.
So William was not uncomfortable with dad’s confessions about his love life then.
Well put.
Well put.