EPHRAIM HARDCASTLE: Palace funeral ‘rule’ is doomed
Buckingham Palace’s bid to restrict broadcasters to only an hour of footage from the Queen’s funeral seems doomed to failure judging by previous attempts to control royal coverage.
Even with the agreement of BBC, ITV and Sky to use only 60 minutes of clips the vast coverage would still be accessible.
This is evidenced by the BBC’s failure to restrict replays of the Diana/Bashir interview. Too many versions are out there to be suppressed.
Ditto the officially banned 1969 Royal Family documentary, which can be fully accessed on YouTube.
And if producers can’t access what they want they’ll simply follow the example of The Crown and ‘reimagine’ it.
Forensically perusing TV footage of the Queen Consort ‘tentatively’ signing the Accession Council document in the absence of King Charles III, Charles Moore notes that she was followed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who appeared ‘flummoxed and delayed signing as if searching for the right place’. He writes in The Spectator: ‘My guess is that the new Queen signed in the Justin Welby slot. Perhaps in a thousand years archaeologists finding the book… will falsely conclude that the Archbishop of Canterbury was a woman called Camilla.’ Isn’t Charles a card!
Kwasi Kwarteng is no stranger to financial turmoil, having completed his Cambridge PhD thesis on the recoinage crisis of 1695 when sterling was in disarray. A vast amount of silver coins had been criminally clipped, reducing their worth and devaluing the currency. Mathematician Sir Isaac Newton, warden of the Royal Mint, was asked to restore the currency’s value with new silver coins. Alas, he was unable to defy gravity and the recoinage failed. Jumbo-brained Kwasi will have all fingers crossed that history doesn’t repeat itself.
Carla Bruni, pictured, model wife of French president Nicolas Sarkozy, has been renewing her acquaintance with old pal Antoine de Caunes, co-presenter of Channel 4’s risque Eurotrash.
‘I had dinner with her in Venice,’ says Antoine.
‘And the first thing she said was: ‘Do you remember when you asked me to say, ‘Please put your finger in my a***’ in every European language?’ Her husband was very upset.’
Drinks columnist Christopher Pincher MP devotes his latest offering to listing the haters of Boris: ‘Drawn from swathes of the media, the arts and entertainment elite, the commanding heights of big business and the City, much of the Civil Service and academia, the Church and quite a few politicians.’ No mention of Gropegate Pincher’s bout of social intercourse at the Carlton Club, which ended his career as a Tory whip.
Paying tribute to Sir Michael Parkinson at a Lord’s Taverners lunch, Rob Brydon recalls Parky in his pomp interviewing real stars such as Lauren Bacall and James Cagney. ‘How would he fare now?’ he asks. ‘It would be, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, from DIY SOS, Nick Knowles. Now you have had a remarkable life haven’t you Nick, doing up these houses? You own your own screwdriver, don’t you?’
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