- In 1995, Princess Diana gave a tell-all interview to the BBC in which she revealed intimate details about the breakdown of her marriage to Prince Charles.
- Prince William, who was 13 years old and away boarding school at the time, was reportedly "mortified" by his mom's candid interview.
- Royal biographer Katie Nicholl detailed the impact of the interview on Will's life at school in her book, Kate: The Future Queen.
Every kid struggles to watch their parents go through a divorce. That is especially true when the divorce turns ugly and it's especially especially true when said ugly divorce is going down between two high-profile parents and one of them decides to give a tell-all interview about the ~drama~.
Prince William dealt with that exact situation as a teen. Will was 13 when Princess Diana gave her infamous tell-all interview on the BBC's Panorama, in which she spoke candidly about the breakdown of her marriage to Prince Charles and his affair with his mistress/future-second wife, Camilla Parker Bowles.
"There were three of us in this marriage," Diana told the interviewer, Martin Bashir. "So it was a bit crowded."
OUCH.
Zingers like that didn't just sting Charles though. They also took a toll on Will, who was "mortified" by the interview, according to royal expert and biographer Katie Nicholl. In her book, Kate: The Future Queen, Nicholl breaks down how things were at school for Will during this time, writing:
"Within William's first term, he had to deal with reports that his mother was having an affair with England's rugby player Will Carling and then a London-based art dealer, Oliver Hoare. He was mortified when Princess Diana gave a now-infamous interview to the BBC's Panorama, during which she lifted the lid on her marriage and revealed her husband's affair with his long-term mistress, Camilla Parker Bowles, who was married to Andrew Parker Bowles at the time."
And:
"To William's horror, she also spoke candidly about her affair with former Life Guards officer James Hewitt, a family friend who had taught William and Harry to horse ride."
In addition to just being an embarrassing and distressing situation to live through on its own, the divorce and the press surrounding it also added to Will's stress with the paparazzi at school. Per Nicholl:
"Despite the college's best efforts to protect the prince, many of his peers watched the program, and for weeks, paparazzi lurked in the shadows of Windsor Castle, waiting to get a shot of William, who would head there at weekends to stay with his grandparents. It was a difficult start for the schoolboy prince."
Everything about this makes our hearts ache for Will.
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