Ephraim Hardcastle
TOMORROW’S publication of a book claiming Lord Mountbatten was a paedophile will make uneasy reading for Prince Charles. But less well known is Mountbatten’s enthusiasm for Jimmy Savile, bringing him into the heart of the royal Family. Savile even smuggled a young girl into a Buckingham Palace reception to meet Prince Philip. As Colonel Commandant of the royal Marines in 1966, Mountbatten facilitated Savile’s award of the coveted green beret. Charles, then in his early 20s, was dazzled. One royal was immune to Savile’s charms: The Queen.
APROPOS Savile, he was buried with his green beret, and uniformed Royal Marines bore his coffin. When he was exposed as a paedophile the military expunged his memory, removing memorabilia at their Lympstone HQ in Devon and re-naming the Savile Room.
CARRIE Symonds’ Balmoral debut has echoes of Camilla’s acceptance by the Queen after Charles engineered his mother’s approval of his 2005 marriage. Technically, after Diana’s death Charles was a widower in the eyes of the Church, whereas Boris Johnson is still married to Marina Wheeler. HM has to show support for the PM of the day, hence her Highland nod to Boris’s maitresse-en-titre.
MEGHAN Markle’s friend and apologist, Indian actress Priyanka Chopra, pictured, upset delegates at a Los Angeles beauty convention by supporting the Indian takeover of Kashmir. A fellow Asian grabbed the microphone and declared: ‘As your neighbour, a Pakistani, I know you are a bit of a hypocrite. You are a Unicef ambassador for peace and you are encouraging nuclear war against Pakistan.’ The microphone was swiftly removed.
SELF-RIGHTEOUS Emma Thompson is described in Paris’s Le Journal du Dimanche as la comedienne anglaise. An example of her humour? She curses Boris as a pathological liar crossed with a fat pig. ’Tis the way she tells ’em!
WHAT will British Film Institute patron Prince Charles think of accreditation forms for October’s London Film Festival? It lists 19 gender identities including androgynous, bigender, gender nonconforming, genderqueer/nonbinary, transfeminine, transmasculine and two-spirit, but at least it has male and female.
ENGLAND women’s team boss Phil Neville urges football to instigate a sixmonth boycott of social media after racist tweets against penalty misser Paul Pogba. But has he asked his motormouth TV pundit brother Gary – four million followers and 16,000 tweets – to cease his online babble?
A GUSHING Guardian profile of Radio 1 breakfast show DJ Greg James credits his wife, Bella Mackie, with improving his woke ‘empathy’. She’s the daughter of ex-Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger. James has been granted helpful coverage in the paper ever since their marriage last year.