The last time Charles came here for a state visit, nobody seemed to notice. I saw him up close during his trip in the autumn of 1985, from his stop at J.C. Penney in a suburban mall to promote British clothing to a starry state dinner. I was impressed.
The Prince of Wales had a reputation back then as a bit of a wimp, always chafing in the shadow of his towering mother, resentful about being relegated to cutting ribbons.
In a flashy decade full of bling kings like New York developer Donald Trump, Charles seemed like a man from another time. He yearned to be taken seriously and to have an impact on global issues. As charming British actor Peter Ustinov, who attended the state dinner, told me: “He has a clear sense of what he would do if allowed to. One regrets that he didn’t live in 1400.”
Touring the sights in Washington, Prince Charles impressed sales clerks and senators alike with his genuine interest in culture and politics and his playful and self-deprecating small talk.
As I wrote in The New York Times back then, “He went out of his way to move past protocol, and was equally at home discussing the architecture of Baltimore, the actresses on the television show Dynasty, the opera roles that Beverly Sills made famous and the tenuous state of international relations.”
It didn’t matter. Nobody was paying attention. He was simply the man who accompanied Princess Diana to Washington. Even without talking much, just tucking her chin in shyly and looking up out of those luminous blue eyes, Diana outshone her prince. It was pretty much a total eclipse of the son. I don’t remember seeing a single picture of Charles from the state dinner. His remarks are lost to history.
All eyes were on the Sloane Square Cinderella. The state dinner was Diana’s fairy tale turn, conjured by her fairy godmother, Nancy Reagan. The first lady invited Clint Eastwood, Mikhail Baryshnikov and John Travolta to dance with the princess who loved dancing. Mrs Reagan directed the Marine Band to put aside the society two-step sheet music and get up to speed on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack.
“She’s a great little mover,” Travolta said of Diana, who wore a gorgeous midnight blue velvet gown and a diamond tiara.
The total effect of the visit was “Charles who?” Being overshadowed by his young wife, after decades of being overshadowed by his mother, did not boost his ego. The ensuing decades would not be kind to Charles. He was mired in scandal and pain.
He blew up his marriage in spectacular fashion, returning to his old girlfriend, Camilla. After spilling her guts on the BBC, Diana died in a nightmarish car crash in Paris with her new boyfriend and ascended to a saintly status in Britain. Netflix’s “The Crown” had an unflattering depiction of Charles manoeuvring to get his mother to give up the throne to spur generational change. The queen decided not to move aside, and Charles entered his 70s still hanging about.
Harry and Meghan executed “Megxit” and moved over 5000 miles away. Then Harry aimed a trans-Atlantic missile at the family with his royal tell-all, “Spare,” painting his father and brother as emotionally distant and insensitive. Harry cast his stepmother, Camilla, as a manipulative villainess. After Charles gave Harry and Meghan an elaborate wedding with a Black minister and gospel choir, Meghan Markle told Oprah that she had encountered racism within the royal family.
Charles underwent treatment for cancer, as did his daughter-in-law Kate Middleton. Then Charles had to strip his brother Andrew of his title when public outrage grew over his seamy friendship with Jeffrey Epstein.
But in Washington this past week, Charles came into his own. Forty years after Diana’s Cinderella turn, Charles got to be Cinderfella.
In a country rife with No Kings protests, this king was a tonic. He presented himself with elegance, intelligence and wit — everything that has been wanting in Washington during the Trump era. He arrived at a propitious moment to remind the autocrat in the White House why Britain’s rebellious colony ran away: to escape the tyranny of an oppressive king.
“Out of the fires of a bitter and bloody Revolutionary War, the triumph of the father of this country, George Washington, and his fellow founders was to forge a democracy founded upon the rights to liberty and the rule of law,” Charles said at the state dinner.
In his pointed speech to Congress, he reminded the lawmakers that our Constitution, based on Magna Carta, provides checks on a tyrant’s power.
The King deftly schooled Donald, and Donald took it because he has always been awed by the British royal family. The president was thrilled when a British newspaper did a genealogy that found he may be a distant cousin of Charles. (Then again, so are the Bushes.) Trump even dropped the tariffs on Scotch whisky to please the king.
Charles gently reminded the president, who has been blasting NATO for not helping bail him out of the Iran quicksand, that America’s allies stepped up after 9/11. Britain battled in Afghanistan beside us, and tried to rebuild it with us, for 20 years. “Our people have fought and fallen together in defence of the values we cherish,” Charles said.
The message to Trump was obvious: Don’t berate us for not backing your misadventure in Iran, after we went all in on America’s misbegotten occupation of Afghanistan and war in Iraq.
Gently mocking the territorial Trump at the state dinner, Charles noted that he is already the King of Canada — no need for another. He also teased: “Now I know you have big plans for the moon, Mr President, but I’ve checked the papers and I rather suspect it is already part of the Commonwealth, I’m afraid!”
He quoted Shakespeare’s Henry V to prompt the bellicose president to seek peace: “my speech entreats, that I may know … why gentle Peace should not … bless us with her former qualities.”
It was lovely to hear the King’s English, devoid of the vengeance, blasphemy and vulgarity common in our leader’s language. The King put a salve on a blistered partnership. Trump has trashed Prime Minister Keir Starmer as “cowardly” and a “loser” for not helping with Iran. Britain’s ambassador, Christian Turner, didn’t help with his leaked comment that the “special relationship” America has now is with Israel.
On his last state visit, Charles was in the shade of Diana’s radiance. On this one, he radiated an élan of his own – a class act, shining next to the boorish Trump. At long last, Charles was in no one’s shadow. At 77, he has done what he always yearned to do: make his mark on the world.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
