Ephraim Hardcastle
ONE of Harry’s most serious bones of contention with his dad the King is the monarch’s refusal to endorse his children Archie, three, and Lilibet, one, as HRHs. It’s a status they automatically gained – along with prince and princess – as grandchildren of the King when Charles acceded to the throne in September. Harry and Meghan are restricted from using their HRH titles, but it is only a gentlemen’s agreement. There is nothing to prevent them triggering the royal equivalent of the nuclear option by resuming use of the titles. But this could force the King into issuing Letters Patent formally removing the title from them all – something he would be reluctant to do. While the Sussexes seem keen to burn bridges, the King, advises a source, is still very keen on building them.
AS publication of Harry’s book Spare draws nigh, it appears that the Palace has been unable to get an advance copy. Although the plan is not to comment publicly – a policy the Palace has adopted with the Netflix Harry & Meghan saga – it would like to be ahead of the game rather than having to speed-read after sending an underling out to Hatchards in Piccadilly, booksellers to the King, on the morning it is published to pick up a few copies.
FORMER BBC correspondent Michael Cole, avidly watching Emer Heatley, pictured, playing John Stonehouse’s mistress on ITV, claims she greatly exaggerates Sheila
Buckley’s speech impediment. He should know. He got the only interview with her when Stonehouse was arrested in Melbourne after faking his death. ‘She lied very convincingly to every question I put,’ recalls Cole, adding: ‘The sexiest thing about her was a slight deformation of her upper lip which gave her a sort of Elvis Presley-style pout.’
THE custodians of Wales’ highest peak Snowdon have decided that in future it will be known by its Welsh name after pressure from a petition calling for reform. King Charles, a long-term Prince of Wales who spent time as a student studying the language, will need to decide whether to follow suit and rebrand the earldom created for Antony Armstrong-Jones when he married Charlie’s aunt, Princess Margaret. Will Earl of Snowdon David Linley find himself answering to the Earl of Yr Wyddfa?
SIX years since the last episode of his hit TV series Sherlock – starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman – the show’s creator and writer Steven Moffat announces on Radio 4: ‘I’ll start writing Sherlock tomorrow if Benedict and Martin show up, frankly. Sadly, they’ve gone on to bigger and better things and left us behind, crying “But Benedict, Martin – come back please!”’
THE Apprentice’s Claude Littner explains how the BBC prevents hanky-panky among the house-sharing contestants. ‘The boys and girls are separated in the house. There is somebody also living there all the time to make sure there is no monkey business.’