New documentary takes aim at disgraced Prince Andrew: ‘Runt of the litter’ and ‘idiot’
From a childhood spent like a ‘little king’ to a scandalous association with underage sex trafficking as an adult, Prince Andrew: Banished takes a forensic look at how the Queen’s ‘favourite’ son fell from grace on a royal and international scale, Sheila Flynn reports
The latest headlines from our reporters across the US sent straight to your inbox each weekday
Your briefing on the latest headlines from across the US
“Pathetic figure.” “Runt of the litter.” “Narcissistic.” “Spoiled.” “Holier-than-thou.” “An idiot.”
These are just a few of the terms used by a plethora of experts to describe the UK’s disgraced Prince Andrew in a new, damning documentary examining the royal’s life and scandals – particularly his relationship with the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Prince Andrew: Banished premiered Wednesday on Peacock; its description on the platform calls the film “the story of how, through arrogance and lust, Prince Andrew’s scandals and his friendship with sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein nearly sank the British monarchy.”
Tracing Andrew’s life from his birth up until now, the documentary achieves a no-holds-barred, highly critical deep-dive into a man whose nicknames ranged from “The Playboy Prince” to “Air Miles Andy.”
Interviewees included everyone from palace guards and journalists to socialites and royal secretaries, with almost no one having a positive thing to say about Andrew. Those interviewed for the documentary expressed disbelief at how he had conducted himself, in a manner wholly removed from that of the rest of his family, even before news broke of his association with Epstein and accusations of abuse by Virginia Roberts Giuffre.
Ms Giuffre has been the most outspoken victim of sex trafficking by Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. After she sued Prince Andrew following the release of a now-infamous picture showing the royal with his arm around her bare midriff while she was underage, he settled with the now 39-year-old for an undisclosed sum.
Prince Andrew’s air of entitlement and subsequent antics began, essentially, from birth, according to the documentary. He was born in 1960, when the Queen had become more established on the throne and had more time for her children.
Unlike his older brother Charles, who was more studious and serious, Andrew was roguish and doted upon by his parents.
“Prince Andrew was one of the lads,” Ingrid Seward, editor-in-chief of Majesty Magazine, says in the film. “He was very mischievous. And of course, Prince Phillip loved this boy who was everything that perhaps Charles hadn’t been. So he had even more attention lavished on him.
Seward continued: “Being second in line to the throne was very important because Prince Charles was the heir, and Andrew was the backup – and, you know, he enjoyed his mini kingship for many years before the fact dawned on him that, actually, he was just number two.”
Yet, that didn’t seem to dampen his spirit. Andrew served in the Navy, fought in the Falklands and earned a reputation upon his return as a ladies’ man as headlines followed his romantic exploits. His marriage to Sarah Ferguson further added to his popularity, despite criticism of the monetisation of their royal status, until the relationship quickly soured and his behaviour became more controversial.
The palace staff had a firsthand view.
“My colleagues at Buckingham Palace, we used to have the joke that he should have a revolving door in his bedroom – the amount of women that are going in and out of there,” says Paul Page, who worked as a royal protection officer for six years. “It was literally every other day, someone would be coming in to see him, a different one every time.”
Mr Page recalled one occasion on which a female guest turned up to visit Prince Andrew but had not yet been placed on an approved list; she called the prince on his mobile while waiting and he asked to speak to the guards.
“He shouted at the top of his voice: ‘Listen to me, you fat lardy c**t - if you don’t let my guest in, I’m going to come down there,’” Mr Page says in the documentary.
He adds: “You would think that a member of the royal family would have some kind of decorum and respect for the staff that are there to protect them and look after them.”
Prince Andrew, he says, had “none at all.”
“He’s just a horrible person,” says Mr Page, who was sentenced to jail himself for fraud in a property scheme after his time at the palace. “He’s a bully.”
One of the women going through that “revolving door” was Ghislaine Maxwell, the former guard continues. She was apparently waved through whenever she arrived, completely flouting security protocols, according to the documentary.
“No one else had that access, apart from members of the royal family,” Mr Page says. “Myself and my colleagues were under the perception that Prince Andrew and Ghislaine Maxwell were in an intimate relationship.”
The prince, however, has always denied any romantic involvement with Maxwell. She was the daughter of a billionaire and a socialite. It was through her that the prince met financier Jeffrey Epstein, who lived in the largest private residence in Manhattan and hobnobbed with the rich, famous and powerful.
“Ghislaine’s role for Epstein was to be the bridge to this big-time social world,” Tina Brown, author of The Palace Papers, says in the documentary. “As far as Ghislaine was concerned, one of her biggest white whales that she landed for Epstein was Andrew.”
It was a mutually symbiotic relationship, according to the documentary. Having a prince around would raise Epstein’s social status, while Epstein could finance a lifestyle that Andrew would never have been able to afford.
“That relationship was very valuable for Epstein,” Ms Brown says in the documentary. “But it wasn’t so much about money. The royal connection was really about status ... he got to go to the Queen’s private home, Sandringham, to go shooting. He went with Ghislaine and Prince Andrew to Balmoral. He went to Windsor Castle. I mean, these were prime invitations that definitely upped his ante and his social profile. So he got a lot out of it.”
Ms Brown says that when Andrew “was with Epstein, he felt he was the center of attention.”
“He felt that he was part of the big-time, and that’s what he never felt when he was in England. It’s sad when you see the pathetic figure that we see today,” she said, adding that the relationship was “a pretty good financial, social status trade.”
She also notes that “the other great glue between them was Andrew’s sex life” and that would contribute to the undoing of all of them – the prince, Epstein and Maxwell.
Andrew continued to spend time with Epstein after the latter was convicted for sex offenses, raising questions about the prince’s judgement, behaviour and associations. It wasn’t long before Ms Guiffre provided a picture of herself with the royal that had been taken when she was 17. She said she’d had sex with Andrew that night and levelled accusations against him in US federal court.
He denied it, as did the palace; Prince Andrew has always denied the truth of his picture with Ms Giuffre. The situation spiralled, with Ms Giuffre suing the prince, and it was worsened after Epstein was found dead in his jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
Three months later, Prince Andrew gave a car-crash interview to BBC Newsnight. In a series of bumbling denials and excuses, he claimed he’d never met Ms Guiffre and that the photo had been faked. He bizarrely insisted her acccount could not be true because she described him sweating and he had some odd condition that kept him from sweating.
“Prince Andrew’s an idiot for having agreed to have done the interview,” says former royal press secretary Dickie Arbiter in the documentary. “I would have put my foot firmly down ... You’re not allowed to do it.”
He continues: “Andrew thought, ‘Ah, I’ve got a vehicle. I can justify my friendship and clear my name. Well, he didn’t justify his friendship and he certainly didn’t clear his name.”
The press and public went wild, and the prince became something of a laughingstock.
Earlier this year, he settled Ms Giuffre’s lawsuit for an undisclosed amount, though the settlement was not meant to be construed as any admission of liability.
This year, he also lost his royal standing.
“After the Newsnight interview, the Queen saw that Prince Andrew had the potential to damage the institution,” Mr Arbiter says. “To her, the institution of monarchy is more important than safeguarding some of the stupid things that your children have done. So she took the decision to effectively fire him ... she decided to strip Andrew of all his appointments and fire him from frontline royal duties.”
The documentary, filmed before the Queen’s recent death, raises serious questions about the disgraced royal’s future. Buckingham Palace did not respond to requests for participation from the production team, and a representative for Prince Andrew responded without addressing any specific allegations, according to the film.
“Andrew refuses to accept today that he’s done,” Ms Brown says in the documentary. “I mean, he really believes that he can come back because, as a prince and as a son of the Queen ... everything always has really gone his way.”
She continues: “It’s a big dilemma for the monarchy: What to do to stash, frankly, a very healthy 62-year-old man who lives a stone’s throw from Windsor Castle and doesn’t want to go anywhere?”
A major question mark hanging over his future involves the one person who introduced him into the sordid circle of Epstein: Maxwell herself.
She was sentenced in June to 20 years in prison for sex trafficking but has until June 2023 to provide more information for reduced time behind bars, according to the film.
“I think that anyone who was involved with Jeffrey Epstein, which includes Prince Andrew, should be nervous about Ghislaine Maxwell talking,” Spencer T. Kuvin, a lawyer for victims, says in the documentary. “She is really the person that holds all the secrets. This really isn’t the end of the story.”
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies