Inside a Portakabin near St Albans, Prince Harry and Pippa Middleton are making an exclusive royal announcement. “We’re shagging,” grins Pippa. “Openly,” smiles Harry. “Not in public, though!” Pippa clarifies. “No, it’s more your classic bed job,” chimes in Harry. “Although there was that one incident with her knees: lacerated, they were…”
This is the kind of conversation you find yourself listening to behind the scenes of Channel 4’s new six-part series The Windsors. It’s a spoof sitcom that turns the lives of our monarchical overlords into a Dallas-esque soap, with the help of a heftily talented ensemble cast (Harry Enfield as Prince Charles, Morgana Robinson as Pippa Middleton, W1A’s dim work experience lad Hugh Skinner as Prince William). It’s written by the team behind mid-00s sleb-parodying comedy series Star Stories. And it’s not exactly the most reverential treatment that the royal family’s ever had.
The rehearsal I’m watching as I wander on to the Hertfordshire set features Prince Harry (played by Richard Goulding: JP’s brother Tomothy in Fresh Meat) attempting to marry the daughter of the Aussie prime minister, in a bid to get over his ill-advised attraction to Pippa. The Windsor family are standing in the Australian embassy, a comically shoddy wood-panelled affair, alongside an antipodean contingent dressed as if they’re attending a 1980s prom (leopardskin shirts, satin bow ties, jackets so loud they deserve an asbo). The bride-to-be’s choice of headwear is a white hat with dangling corks. The priest also has an alternative way of addressing Prince William’s younger brother: “Henry Charles Albert David Windsor,” he pronounces, “known as Shagger, Spliff Head, E Monster, Ginge Minge, Hair Pie Nosher, Adolf, Shit For Brains.”
“It’s about time someone had another pop at the royals,” says co-writer Bert Tyler-Moore. Presumably he means as a counterpoint to the fawning column inches lavished upon the monarchy? “Actually, it’s more that there are so many things like Peter Morgan’s The Queen, which feel like PR exercises. We wanted to bring a different flavour. Not with any agenda – we just thought: ‘This’ll be a funny idea.’”
Given that the royals have been recast as national darlings since William and Kate started breeding, this seems a bold move. It’s a reminder that this isn’t the 1980s, when the royals’ popularity was so low that Spitting Image could savage them with impunity. Surely they have to be fairly sensitive about how far they go, particularly, as on Star Stories, Tyler-Moore and writing partner George Jeffrie caused a kerfuffle after alluding to Princess Diana’s fatal crash. “Actually, we would’ve included Princess Di in this show. We just couldn’t think of anything funny enough,” smiles Jeffrie. Frankly, I find this hard to believe.
As rehearsals go on, the show starts to make a little more sense. Louise Ford, who plays Kate Middleton, explains how her character is recast as a “Gypsy” thanks to the Duchess of Cambridge’s supposed normality (at least compared to the rest of the royals). Meanwhile, Camilla is reimagined as a scheming villain determined to usher in the Parker-Bowles dynasty. It’s the kind of ridiculous fictionalisation of public figures that has a rich comedy tradition in Britain (The Comic Strip, Stella Street and, of course, Star Stories). And it’s had a mini-resurgence in recent years, with BBC3’s warped gameshow Murder In Successville and Channel 4’s structured-reality comedy Lookalikes, while original trailblazers The Comic Strip Presents… returned earlier this year with the phone-hacking scandal spoof Red Top. But, most notably, it means that a show that’s mocking the royals is not really mocking the royals at all – it’s mocking the media’s portrayal of them.
“Yeah, it takes [the royal family’s] public personas and takes an angle on those,” offers Ford. “That’s why we don’t need to worry about it feeling bullying or insulting.” Does it also mean that the cast didn’t need to worry about in-depth research for their roles? “Yeah, Harry only really has three characteristics in our show,” offers Goulding. “One: he’s a bit stupid. Two: he enjoys drink and parties. Three… actually, that’s probably it.” For Robinson, who has to play Pippa Middleton – a woman whose personality plays second fiddle to her buttocks in the public imagination – the lack of realism doesn’t strike a bum note. “If this was a drama rather than a comedy, I’d never have been cast,” grins the impressionist. “Not with the size of this arse.”
Real-life monarchy aside, it soon becomes obvious that there’s a king on set: Harry Enfield. His take on Prince Charles is a tour de force of deep-throated poshness. His co-stars flock around him, giggling fannishly at his quips. “When we’re filming, my inner monologue is just going: ‘Don’t look at Harry Enfield, don’t look at Harry Enfield,’” Goulding admits. “He’s so funny, I just crack up.”
Eyes appropriately averted from Enfield, the cast rehearse the wedding. Prince Harry proves unable to go through with the nuptials, and in a tender vignette tells his jilted bride he’ll “always have those [naked] pictures you texted”. “And I’ll always have your dick pics!” she replies before, naturally, holding up a photo of… wait a minute. Are they actually planning to show a snap of someone’s testicles masquerading as Harry’s danglies?
“We asked extras to take photos of their balls,” reveals The Windsors’ producer Izzy Mant. “We had a whole meeting to decide whose testicles were ginger enough to be Harry’s.”
High-brow humour this is not. But, despite a number of cast and crew comparing the show to Spitting Image, The Windsors doesn’t feel like satire: more a comic drama that makes the odd comment about monarchy.
“The thing about Spitting Image is that it was a sketch show. It could be entirely spiteful,” says Jeffrie. “But we’ve got a whole half-hour plot line – we’ve had to include a lot of warmth for the characters.” A serial format isn’t the only reason for trying to render the royals warmly, though? For all Jeffrie and Tyler-Moore’s earlier protestations that they could have included Diana if they’d wanted, there must have been some part of them that was conscious not to strike the wrong note? “Well, I suppose we did try to focus on the characters that were a bit… twatty,” admits Jeffrie. “Ultimately, if you take the piss to the extent that it makes the viewer go ‘Oh God!’, it can stop it being funny.”
As I prepare to leave, the cast are still talking excitedly. Robinson offers that “this is more Heat magazine than Private Eye” (no kidding). Goulding exclaims, “Hopefully no one will get sued!” (seems unlikely). And Skinner is telling people: “Basically I try to play a bad version of Matt Damon” (huh?). Which is all very well, but will the royals actually watch this?
“Actually,” chips in Ford. “I don’t think it’s high-class enough for them.”
She may have a point
The Windsors begins tonight, 10pm, Channel 4
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