AT the news Mike Tindall is entering the I’m A Celebrity jungle, some royal fans have baulked.
It raises the question whether the death of our beloved Queen has emboldened members of the Firm to seize showbiz opportunities they previously wouldn’t have dreamed of.
But the royals are no stranger to the small screen.
It started in the Sixties, when the late Queen was persuaded by Prince Philip to show the world what it was like to be a member of the elusive Firm.
In what was described as a ‘fly on the wall documentary’ cameras followed the Royal Family around for a year.
The Queen was anxious and insisted that every reel was carefully vetted before it was shown.
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Philip was delighted. He saw it as a way of showcasing the family to their best advantage.
Always at the forefront of new ideas, Philip became a veteran TV guest, airing his acerbic opinions on shows including Panorama.
In 1966 the BBC series Man Alive accompanied him on a tour aptly named the Duke Goes West.
It wasn’t exactly reality TV, but it was the forerunner of a kind of controlled royal reality.
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If it interested him and if he was in control, Philip was happy.
Funnily enough he was not keen on the idea of the Queen joining forces with Daniel Craig as James Bond for the opening scene of the London 2012 Olympics.
He thought the idea of the Queen jumping out of a helicopter – even if it was only a stunt actor pretending to be her – undignified and was concerned as to the public reaction.
He need not have worried. It was a massive success, as was the Queen’s most recent appearance having tea with Paddington Bear for the Platinum Jubilee.
According to reports, the Queen thoroughly enjoyed the filming and as a child had longed to be an actress herself.
Budding actor
Another actor in the family is King Charles, who has had numerous opportunities to showcase his professional delivery on television.
He has done interviews with TV luminaries including Alan Titchmarsh, Jonathan Dimbleby, Barbara Walters and David Frost.
He left Michael Parkinson’s show to his sister, Princess Anne, who appeared witty and amusing on his show in Australia.
The nearest Charles has ever got to reality TV was when he read out the weather forecast on Scottish TV – though he recently made a hugely popular appearance on The Repair Shop.
In 2006 he gave the first of many interviews to Ant and Dec, who were ambassadors of the Princes Trust, accompanied by Prince William and a very stilted Harry.
William and Kate starred in Mary Berry’s Christmas Show in 2019 – and, in the Eighties, the Princess Royal was on the panel for the quiz show on A Question of Sport, famously thwacking footballer Emlyn Hughes for being cheeky.
'Likeable'
As a world class rugby player and former England Captain, Anne’s son-in-law Mike Tindall is appearing on I’m A Celebrity with Ant and Dec.
He has a good chance of winning as he is such a likeable bloke.
Tindall is something of a veteran of reality TV having competed on The Jump on Channel 4 in 2015.
Being married to Zara, an Olympic equestrian, makes him a household name, but he was anyway in sporting circles.
Some years ago Zara was asked to take part in I’m A Celebrity, but declined – offended by the thought of appearing in such a comic charade.
But times have changed.
The Queen was fond of Mike. She would have trusted him and been thrilled he was earning such a lot of money.
I doubt if she ever watched I’m A Celebrity, so would probably have very little idea of what it was about.
Crucial mistake
The Tindalls and the Phillips get away with it by insisting they are not royal.
They do not have titles and they are certainly not a burden on the taxpayer, which is fair enough.
They just need to be careful they don’t do anything that might embarrass their mother The Princess Royal or their uncle the King.
Zara’s brother Peter Phillips sold his wedding photographs over two entire issues of Hello and appeared in a Chinese advert for milk.
Peter was definitely trading on his status on both occasions. Much to his embarrassment he was described in the TV advert as a ‘British royal family member’ – as the Chinese had no idea who he was.
'PR disaster'
Whatever the Royal Family have or have not done on TV, Prince Edward still takes the prize for most memorable – and not for the right reasons.
In 1987 he persuaded sister Anne and his brother and sister-in-law the Duke and Duchess of York to join celebrities such as Cliff Richard and John Travolta to take part in the TV game show It’s A Royal Knockout.
It was a disaster. The Queen Mother was horrified and luckily Charles had persuaded Princess Diana not to take part.
The Queen thought it was appalling to see members of her family behaving in such an unbecoming manner, dressed in ridiculous fake medieval costumes.
The show was cringe-worthy. It poured with rain, was freezing cold and muddy.
Worst of all the press were shut up in a marquee unable to see the action.
When Edward asked them what they thought of it, the response was muted and he stormed out in a petulant display of temper.
“The press had spent the best part of a day hanging around only to be sneered at by a rudely offensive young man,” wrote one disgruntled journalist.
“It was the Royal Family’s love of pantomime taken to new heights of carefully controlled silliness,” another commented.
To this day the show is used as an example of how not to appear on television.
We have to hope that when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Netflix documentary airs it won’t cause as much ridicule.
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But American-funded and screening in cyberspace, it’s exempt from the traditional rules – and respect – of the British networks.
Mike Tindall’s reality show stint could be a walk in the park compared to Netflix. We will find out very soon.
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