Ryan Reynolds Went to “Monarchy Boot Camp” Before Meeting King Charles and Queen Camilla

(Image credit: Getty Images)

published 6 September 2023

Before Ryan Reynolds met King Charles, he put in plenty of preparation, he revealed in the teaser for season two of his FX series Welcome to Wrexham. “So, the King of England called,” Reynolds said in the teaser. “We went to monarchy boot camp. It was like the military, except your pinky is always up.”

The trailer shows Reynolds and Rob McElhenney—who co-own soccer team Wrexham AFC—detailing how they prepared to introduce themselves to the King, per Us Weekly. The show’s official social media pages state that “Rob and Ryan get a crash course in royal etiquette,” including hiring a coach to help them walk, shake hands, and sit properly when in the presence of the King.

“I feel like a serial killer,” Reynolds said at one point in the clip, as their coach tells him and McElhenney that “Everything starts with a first impression.”

Reynolds and McElhenney’s preparation apparently paid off, as the visit between the two of them and King Charles—accompanied by Queen Camilla—seemed to go well when the King and Queen visited Wrexham’s home stadium, the Racecourse Ground, last December, where they were personally escorted onto the pitch by Reynolds and McElhenney.

Welcome to Wrexham premiered in August 2022 and follows Reynolds and McElhenney as they learn to run the third oldest professional football club in the world, which they purchased in 2020. While season two at least in part features the duo learning how to interact with royalty, season one chronicled their crash course in football ownership, ending with the team being promoted to the English Football League for the first time in 15 years—no small feat. “Rob and I kind of blacked out during this moment, but somehow we’ll never forget it,” Reynolds captioned a clip via Instagram of him and McElhenney embracing after Wrexham won the national league championship in April.

Reynolds has brought his wife, Blake Lively, and their children to watch the Welsh soccer team play on various occasions, Us Weekly reports.

And King Charles isn’t the only member of the royal family McElhenney has met. He was photographed alongside Prince Harry and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia costar Glenn Howerton at Sunday’s matchup between Inter Miami CF and Los Angeles FC in L.A., where, per People, a star-studded crowd including Leonardo DiCaprio, Owen Wilson, Jason Sudeikis, and Selena Gomez watched Lionel Messi lead Miami to a 3-1 win over Los Angeles. The Miami club is co-owned by none other than David Beckham.

Welcome to Wrexham is available to stream on Hulu starting September 12.

Rachel Burchfield is a writer, editor, and podcaster whose primary interests are fashion and beauty, society and culture, and, most especially, the British Royal Family and other royal families around the world. She serves as Marie Claire’s Senior Celebrity and Royals Editor and has also contributed to publications like Allure, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle, People, Vanity Fair, Vogue, and W, among others. Before taking on her current role with Marie Claire, Rachel served as its Weekend Editor and later Royals Editor. She is the cohost of Podcast Royal, a show that was named a top five royal podcast by The New York Times. A voracious reader and lover of books, Rachel also hosts I’d Rather Be Reading, which spotlights the best current nonfiction books hitting the market and interviews the authors of them. Rachel frequently appears as a media commentator, and she or her work has appeared on outlets like NBC’s Today Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, and more.

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