Prince William’s appearance on AppleTV+’s The Reluctant Traveler is out today. Don’t believe the hype – the royalist media is desperately trying to convince everyone that this is William’s version of the Oprah interview or The Me You Can’t See. It is not. You can tell by the wall-to-wall reporting on his boring-ass quotes, which sound oddly detached and wooden. As it turns out, the real message of Eugene Levy’s “interview” with William wasn’t that William loves to sleep or that he misses his grandparents. The real message is… William has plans to change the monarchy when he’s king! Magically, William forecasting nebulous “changes” when his father dies is seen as less offensive than Prince Harry saying “I don’t know how long my dad has left.”
William’s tough 2024: “I’d say 2024 was the hardest year that I’ve ever had. Trying to sort of balance protecting the children, Catherine, my father needs a bit of protection, but he’s, you know, he’s old enough to do that himself as well. But it’s important that my family feels protected and has the space to process a lot of the stuff that’s gone on last year, and that was tricky trying to do that and keep doing the job. But you know, we all have challenges that come our way, and it’s important to keep going. So, you know, I enjoy my job, but sometimes there are aspects of it, such as the media, the speculation, you know, the scrutiny, that make it a little bit harder than other jobs. It’s just making sure that doesn’t overtake and intrude into areas at times when you just want a bit of space, and a bit of peace and quiet.”
What stresses him out: “Stuff to do with family overwhelms me, quite a bit. You know, worry or stress around the family side of things that does overwhelm me quite a bit… But in terms of doing the job and things like that, I don’t feel too overwhelmed by that…When it’s to do with family and things like that, then that’s where I start getting a bit overwhelmed — as I think most people would, because it’s more personal, it’s more about feeling, it’s more about upsetting the rhythm.”
His parents’ divorce: “You have to have that warmth, that feeling of safety, security, love/ That all has to be there, and that was certainly part of my childhood. My parents got divorced at 8, so that lasted a short period of time. But, you take that and you learn from it and you try and make sure you don’t do the same mistakes as your parents. I think we all try and do that and I just want to do what’s best for my children, but I know that the drama and the stress when you’re small really affects you when you’re older.”
How he approaches the media: “If you’re not careful, you can intrude so much into someone’s life that actually you start unpicking everything. And growing up, I saw that with my parents, the media were so insatiable back then — it’s hard to think of it now, but they were much more insatiable. They wanted every bit of detail they could absorb, and they were in everything, literally everywhere. They would know things, they’d be everywhere. And if you let that creep in, the damage it can do to your family life is something that I vowed would never happen to my family. And so, I take a very strong line about where I think that line is, and those who overstep it, I’ll fight against. But equally, I understand, in my role, there is interest; you have to work with the media. So, you have to have a grown-up sort of situation with it as well. It’s about knowing where the line is and what you’re willing to put up with.”
His kids are phone-free: “Yep, absolutely, yep definitely. So, we sit and chat; it’s really important. None of our children have any phones, which we’re very strict about. Louie loves the trampoline, so he’s obsessed with trampolining and actually Charlotte does a lot as well. As far as I can tell, they just end up jumping up and down on the trampoline, beating each other up, most of the time. Apparently, there is an art to it.”
His future as king: While he admits one day becoming King of England is “not something I wake up in the morning and think about,” he does know the kind of monarch he intends to be. “I think it’s safe to say that change is on my agenda. Change for good. And I embrace that and I enjoy that change — I don’t fear it. That’s the bit that excites me, the idea of being able to bring some change. Not overly radical change, but changes that I think need to happen.”
He said his brother’s name in relation to George’s future: “I want to create a world in which my son is proud of what we do, a world and a job that actually does impact people’s lives for the better. That is caveated with, I hope we don’t go back to some of the practices in the past, that Harry and I had to grow up in — and I’ll do everything I can to make sure we don’t regress in that situation.”
Suffocated by history: “If you’re not careful, history can be a real weight and an anchor around you, and you can feel suffocated by it and restricted by it too much. And I think it’s important to live, for the here and now. I want to question things more. I think it’s very important that tradition stays, and tradition has a huge part in all of this, but there’s also points where you look at tradition and go, ‘Is that still fit for purpose today? Is that still the right thing to do? Are we still doing and having the most impact we could be having?’ So, I like to question things is what I’m really getting at.”
His electric scooter: “I’m always late, so I thought this was the way to keep my meetings on time….We live down outside the castle. My father spends a lot of time here, but we don’t actually live in the castle itself. But we come and use the castle for work and for meetings, and see people. And I’m always late, so I thought this was the way to keep my meetings on time. I’m still regularly late anyway.”
[From People Magazine & The Royalist Substack]
This reminded me of the British media’s talking point that all Prince Harry does is “whine” about his life or his childhood, because watch what they say about all of this. Harry wears his trauma on his sleeve, and he’s shown for years that he’s working on it and going to therapy and prioritizing his mental health. And here’s William talking about how his parents’ divorce still affects him and how he’s still traumatized by how the press behaved when he was a kid. As for the buzz about William’s discussion about what he’ll do as king… lol. He’s talking around the fact that he doesn’t have any actual plans, he just knows that he’s going to refuse to do almost all of the work around his kingship. “The history is suffocating me,” he’ll tweet from his makeshift 150-acre country estate, before he shows up late to his video-conference audience with the prime minister.
Screencaps courtesy of AppleTV+, and photos courtesy of AppleTV+.
