I once asked Daniel Day Lewis if he was watching “Downton Abbey.” He replied, astonished: “No! Are you kidding! I always wanted to get away from the class system!”
And so now Prince Harry replied to Anderson Cooper’s question tonight on “60 Minutes” about his warring family by saying: “I don’t watch Game of Thrones!”
He was very insistent but you could also it was an unplanned revelation. He’s living Game of Thrones, he doesn’t have to watch it. (You sort of think he might be Jamie Lannister.)
Harry has a sad tale to tell about his mother’s death and his life afterwards with a cold father and brother and an evil stepmother. The first segment tonight was very moving and sympathetic.
But the second part didn’t quite make sense. He grew up learning all the ups and downs of his position. He saw what the Palace did to his mother. So why was he so naive about the relationship between the Palace and the press? Why did he marry someone who clearly had no interest in giving up her life for royal duty unless he knew what the repercussions would be?
Plus, to get the $100 million deal at Netflix and another $50 million from Random House, he seems more than eager to throw his whole family under the bus. He says he wants to repair the relationships. But how would that work exactly? Camilla will never speak to him again. Charles will never hear the end of all this from her. William and Kate won’t be having the Sussexes over for dinner any time soon.
So he doesn’t watch “Game of Thrones.” Harry would have been wise to watch “The Crown” in the earlier seasons. He would have learned a lot about his great grandfather, great grand uncle, aunt Margaret, and so on. I feel like we, the readers and viewers, have more tools to deal with the Palace than Harry. And that’s pretty strange.
