[coughing]
[coughs violently]
[retches]
[spits]
Sydney!
-[footsteps approach] -Sydney!
[whirs]
[machine whirs]
[footsteps approach]
[gulps]
[in French] Unfortunately, the tests revealed structural alterations
in the larynx of His Royal Highness...
and that the disease is advanced.
There is no cure,
only palliative care,
and once we start the morphine,
His Royal Highness will be debilitated much of the time.
My advice would be to make the most of the precious time that remains.
[sighs heavily]
[in English] We must throw a party.
Our greatest ever party.
Hmm.
-[exhales] -And concentrate only on happy things.
To that end, let's cancel the Japanese emperor.
Hirohito? No, we can't do that.
No, too much planning has gone into it.
Besides, it may be my only remaining opportunity to restore my reputation.
Oh, reputation...
is an idle and most false imposition,
oft got without merit
and lost without deserving.
Hmm.
We... we don't want it to look like Kabuki.
[chuckles]
-[car approaches] -Ah.
[David] Only the second time he's ever left his country.
Last time he was only 20.
A boy. I was 26.
He didn't speak a word of English.
I gather he has a little now.
-[cameras click] -[reporters shout]
[in Japanese] They promised us no cameras.
I don't want my people to see me visit a man
who could not hold on to his throne.
[in English] Well...
we didn't agree to this visit for the conversation.
[in French] One, two, three.
-[camera clicks] -Perfect.
[continues speaking French]
One, two, three.
[camera clicks]
[in Japanese] Imagine living in exile from your homeland.
I would sooner die.
[in English] Never leaves Japan.
Imagine being stuck on an island your whole life.
An island which is home.
And where you reign as sovereign.
I can think of worse things.
[Elizabeth] "The Emperor and the former king.
Two great statesman reunited." The Times.
"A Royal Reunion." The New York Times.
"Fifty years of strife laid to rest in triumphant meeting." The Guardian.
I heard this morning that he's requested to do a television interview with the BBC.
What kind of interview?
An in-depth retrospective.
I can't bear it.
Now they're rehabilitating him.
It's possible, Mummy, that not everyone is as consumed
by loathing of him as you are.
Charles asked my blessing to visit him in France.
Whatever for?
He said, out of respect.
But I imagine it's curiosity, too.
One doesn't often get the opportunity to meet a former king.
Former kings are usually dead.
[car door opens]
[overlapping chatter]
[Parker Bowles] That was cutting it fine.
Why the cocktail dress? Tonight's black tie.
I'm not coming.
What? You can't not come. It's the amalgamation ball.
I had a clash.
-With what? -None of your business.
Look, this escalation of hostilities is neither necessary nor justifiable.
You had your chance for a ceasefire, and you broke it.
If you're talking about Ginny, it's over. The whole thing was hideous.
No, hideous was knowing you were out on maneuvers with her.
So, before we even discuss the terms of a truce,
you deserve to know how it feels.
[Parker Bowles] Who's that?
Never you mind.
[grumbles]
[jazz music plays]
-Evening. -Good evening, sir.
-You alone? -Ah.
Huh?
Where's, uh... where's Memsahib?
She had a better offer.
-Really? -Hmm.
Oh.
But, as it turns out... Evening.
...that means I'm free to seek a proposition of my own.
Thank you.
-Well, in that case... -Yes?
There's, uh... there's someone you should meet.
Come with me.
[clears throat]
Your Royal Highness?
May I present Captain Andrew Parker Bowles.
Hello, Andrew.
Your Royal Highness.
What are you staring at?
At you, ma'am.
-And how much you've-- -Choose the next word very carefully.
...flowered.
Oh, you mean the dress.
It's the Queen's. I look like a hydrangea.
No, no. I mean, uh...
...developed. [scoffs]
Grown up.
Evidently, I've gone from invisible to visible.
-No, you were, you were always visible. -But somehow you'd never seen me.
Now you're making up for it...
...by gawping.
-I'm so sorry. -Don't apologize.
I hate it when men apologize.
It isn't honorable or chivalrous. It's wet.
[sighs]
I didn't say I objected to it, did I?
-No. -Well, then.
I don't mind admitting I've done my fair share of gawping at you over the years.
Have you?
On the polo field.
When I should've been watching the Duke of Edinburgh or the Prince of Wales,
my young, impressionable female eye,
for some reason, was drawn to you.
[Parker Bowles chuckles]
[glass clinks]
[exhales]
-[Parker Bowles] That was fun. -Yes, it was.
That said, we should probably make it the last time.
-I don't want you to get hurt. -What makes you think I would?
Oh, it's what tends to happen to anyone who gets in the way.
Of what?
Me and her.
You sail, don't you?
Do I need to brace myself for a nautical metaphor?
At sea, there are, um...
hidden currents. Deadly. They can pull one under.
Camilla and I are a bit like that.
What are you doing?
Leaving.
-But I don't want you to. -You just said you did.
No I didn't. I said I don't want you to get hurt.
This conversation is going round and round in circles.
I preferred it when we were going round and round in circles.
I can see perfectly clearly who you are
and what this is, and I can assure you I'm not going to get hurt.
Now, what's it going to be?
A resumption or a cessation?
Of what?
A resumption.
Fine.
Where do you get it from at your age?
-What? -Oh, come on. That confidence.
I'm not confident, dear.
Just tough.
[kisses]
[commentator] Here come Windsor Park, in the green, on the attack.
Good run up the field, on a glorious day here at the Guards Polo Club.
Coming straight through, looking confident,
Prince Charles leading the charge there with number four.
Leans it forward, but there's Parker Bowles with a tail shot,
backs up the ball to his teammate, and Windsor Park, on the pivot,
to try and recover.
[Mountbatten] Go on, Charles, go on.
Blues and Royals in the white with the red stripes
on the counter-attack now with two minutes left in this chukka.
-[Camilla] Come on, sir! -...a tussle for possession now.
Go on, Your Royal Highness, sir! You can do it!
Yes, it's Windsor Park! Windsor Park pushing up once more.
[man] Parker!
Oh, Parker Bowles rides off the Prince of Wales.
He's ridden him off.
Parker Bowles hits the big one.
Windsor Park rushing back now, they're in trouble.
Parker Bowles striking ahead. But Prince Charles is still in the race.
Come on, sir! Come on!
He's closing!
Oh, come on.
He's closing!
And Parker Bowles scores!
Parker Bowles for the Blues and Royals!
That makes it two goals to nothing!
-Bad luck out there. -I might see you afterwards.
Hmm.
You played well today.
You and I both know I didn't.
Andrew Parker Bowles played well today.
You just need a bit more aggression in your game, that's all.
So you keep telling me.
[chuckles]
How was Paris?
And the Duke of Windsor?
It was all very odd.
He didn't look at all well.
Hmm?
And the house is like some... bizarre monarchy museum.
Reeked of joss sticks and dogs.
[chuckles]
Was she there? Flapping around like a demented bat?
-Yes. -Hmm.
I hear she consumes nothing but whiskey.
And has had so many facelifts she can barely speak.
-[Charles] Dickie... -Oh!
I don't know if I've told you, but...
we've been writing to one another.
I think he sees something of himself in me.
Don't tell your grandmother that.
He keeps telling me to find a wife.
Oh! It's far too early for that.
Now is the time to sow your oats.
Play the field.
Perhaps.
But as it happens, there is someone I quite like.
The one cheering you on today, yes?
-Yes. -Hmm.
Who used to be with Andrew Parker Bowles until they had a falling out.
Over Anne.
If you please.
-Your sister? -Don't ask. It's all a bit messy.
But the long and the short of it is,
Camilla is now free, and I'd like to snap her up.
Hmm.
And that's her name?
-Yes. -Hmm.
Camilla Shand.
I like her.
[chuckles]
So...
Have you voted yet?
[Camilla] Yes.
Who for?
None of your business, sir.
[laughs]
They say it's a formality for Wilson.
Ugh! Not if I've got anything to do with it. Ah!
I've rather given things away there, haven't I?
[Charles chuckles]
How am I going to be able to persuade you to have dinner with me?
-Issue a royal decree? -I can't do that.
I'm not king.
Yet.
Then just say please.
[laughs]
-Please. -[chuckles]
[man on TV] ...this early general election has failed to pay off,
then it could be we find ourselves waking up
to a different prime minister tomorrow.
[door opens]
The leader of the opposition,
Mr. Edward Heath, Your Majesty.
[door closes]
Mr. Heath.
The people have voted in your party's favor.
As their sovereign, I invite you to form a government in my name.
Congratulations.
Thank you, Your Majesty.
It really is an encouraging set of circumstances.
Labour took the British people for granted.
Mr. Wilson behaved like a petty emperor
and treated this election like a coronation.
[chuckles]
Nothing wrong with a coronation.
Under the right circumstances.
[exhales]
We then had a brief foray into small talk.
He's taking a grand piano with him to Downing Street, if you please.
[scoffs] Some bring a wife, others a grand piano.
I then asked him what his first priorities were,
he said he'd like me to go to France at the earliest opportunity.
What for?
To try to charm Pompidou,
so he doesn't block our entry into the European Economic Community,
like his predecessor.
He's passionately committed to Europe.
[door opens]
Your Majesty.
-Your Royal Highness. -Martin.
I never see the other one anymore.
-Sir? -Where's the other one?
The, um... the... the bald one.
The... Oh! Colonel Adeane. He's retired, sir.
Has he?
-Three months ago. You gave him a clock. -Did I?
What is it, Martin?
A reminder that the BBC interview with the Duke of Windsor is coming up soon.
Now, we understand the Duke is no longer in the best of health.
Might be worth visiting when you go to Paris.
Certainly not.
Go on, Martin.
There's just a slight concern that if the BBC interview were to go down well,
following the successful visit of Emperor Hirohito,
the question might be asked,
if the Japanese make the effort to visit, why would his own family not?
[Philip] He didn't cause them offense.
He didn't abdicate the Japanese throne or kill the Emperor's father.
For the last time, no.
That man, his shame...
like the stench of livestock.
-Sir? -[clears throat]
It seeps into the woodwork and never goes away.
[clears throat] Your Majesty.
Your Royal Highness.
[door closes]
[♪ "Beggin'" by Frankie Valli ♪]
Thank you.
♪ I'm beggin' ♪
- ♪ Beggin' you ♪ - ♪ Beggin' ♪
♪ Put your lovin' hand out, baby ♪
- ♪ Beggin' ♪ - ♪ Beggin' you ♪
♪ Put your lovin' hand out, baby ♪
♪ Ridin' high ♪
♪ When I was king ♪
♪ Played it hard and fast 'Cause I had everything ♪
♪ You walked away ♪
♪ Won me then ♪
♪ But easy come and easy go And it would end ♪
- ♪ Beggin' ♪ - ♪ Beggin' you ♪
♪ Put your lovin' hand out, baby ♪
♪ I'm fighting hard to hold my own ♪
♪ No I just can't make it all alone ♪
[Camilla] What's it like?
-[Charles] Like? -[Camilla] Living here.
Well, not very grand, as you can see.
This is the apartment where they keep Anne and me.
Two bedrooms. One small drawing room. All very normal.
Come on, none of this is normal.
Not just that you live in a palace, but the fact that you are who you are.
Prince of Wales?
It's not so much an existence as...
a predicament.
I am both free...
and imprisoned.
Utterly superfluous and quite indispensable.
One can never fully invest in one thing or another, because at any moment...
it could all change.
And you become king.
Not to mention what it does to you as a family.
How can one be a good son when...
even though it's the thing you most...
dread...
Her dying?
...it's the thing you most...
Not desire.
Well, yes, desire.
Because until she dies, I cannot be fully alive.
Nor can I be the thing for which I have been born, so...
one is condemned to this frightful business of waiting.
Like Saul Bellow.
Sorry, I don't know who he is. Did he wait a lot?
He's an American author.
He wrote a book called Dangling Man.
I sometimes feel like the main character, whom he describes as...
"existing in a timeless and slightly ridiculous abyss."
Was he a prince?
[scoffs] No.
An unemployed man from Chicago waiting to be drafted to go to war.
And he actually wants to be drafted, because it will give his life meaning.
Even though he might be killed?
Yes.
That's how much humans need meaning.
[door opens]
[footsteps approach]
Ma'am.
[Camilla] Oh, for me?
Hmm!
[door closes]
[yelps]
Ha! Gotcha!
-[chuckles] -That's brilliant!
[both laugh]
That dreadful waffle about dangling in the abyss!
Paul Sellow?
S-S-Saul Bellow.
And the Queen dying.
Yes! Mummy kicking the bucket at long last.
And then kerpow! Gotcha!
[laughs] That's brilliant!
Oh!
Yes. Your face when you saw it, "Oh, for me?"
[mimics explosion]
[gasps] I wasn't expecting that, sir!
-Oh, my God, you got me! -[door closes]
Sorry, yes.
[man] Sir, just a reminder,
the television interview with His Royal Highness,
the Duke of Windsor, is about to begin.
Thank you. Thank you.
[both laugh]
[door closes]
[presenter] You join me in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris
in this magnificent house, once home to General de Gaulle.
Its occupants today need no introduction.
His Royal Highness, the Duke of Windsor,
Edward VIII, King of England for a little more than ten months,
and the Duchess of Windsor, Mrs. Wallis Warfield Simpson
when they met.
Ma'am, when you first met the Duke, what was your first impression?
[Wallis] He struck me as being rather "with it."
Ahead of his time.
Full of pep. Unlike most Englishmen.
And that meeting occurred when you were Prince of Wales?
Yes. A role that I also very much hoped to redefine.
I had my own ideas, my own opinions,
my own... philosophy.
[presenter] And then finally the day came
when you acceded to the throne.
Yes, and much to everyone's frustration,
I stayed true to myself...
and the conviction that monarchy had to change,
to move with the times.
Hmm.
But I soon discovered that any attempt to make even the most trifling change
was met with hostility and suspicion.
[presenter] By whom?
By the establishment.
The gray men of the court.
And by my family, too.
They saw me as a rebel.
A threat.
-Too... -Colorful.
Dynamic.
Individualistic.
Christ, they're ghastly.
[David] In the end, I didn't get to introduce...
Both of them. Monstrous.
[presenter] Because of the pressure to stand down...
-I'm going to bed. -...to abdicate had become unbearable?
[David] Yeah.
People always assume it was because of the Duchess,
because of my obstinate desire to marry.
But the establishment's opposition to our marriage
was really a symptom of something deeper.
Their fear of the character and freedom of thought,
which I represented.
[phone ring in the distance]
[scoffs]
How was it?
The candle-lit dinner?
Come on. There are no secrets in this place.
Lovely.
Thank you.
Camilla Shand, eh?
Yes.
And you're seeing her ex, Andrew.
Not sure you can call what we're doing "seeing."
Not sure you can call him an ex, either.
Camilla told me. He's definitely an ex.
Hmm.
Just make sure things remain the right way round.
Us playing with Camilla and Andrew.
Not them playing with us.
What does that mean?
[chuckles]
Anne.
[sighs]
[coughs]
-[Wallis] Ah! Gotcha! -Well played, ma'am.
[groans]
Darling?
[David sighs]
[groans]
David.
Excuse me.
[groans]
-Sir? -No, no. I'm all right, I'm all right.
Sydney, call the doctor.
Yes, ma'am.
[David breathes heavily]
[Charteris] The plan is start in Rouen
to commemorate the Allied fallen in the Great War.
Then back to Paris for a presentation of the Diplomatic Corps.
Then the all-important reception
with President and Madame Pompidou in the Élysée.
Hmm.
Landing in ten minutes, ma'am.
[Elizabeth] It is said
that those who do not learn from history
will be forever condemned to repeat it.
Though we have lived through times of conflict,
our two countries share an ancient relationship.
Let us not forget our deeper bonds,
our sense of common purpose
on which can be built a new partnership,
a new entente.
[cameras click]
Joined together in this august European enterprise,
a great adventure lies ahead.
Monsieur le President. L'Union fait la force.
[applause]
Merci. Thank you.
Thank you.
-Excuse me, Your Majesty? -Excuse me.
[cameras click]
We've had a message concerning His Royal Highness, the Duke of Windsor.
Uh, I think we're close to the end.
Thank you.
[door opens]
Your Royal Highness. Ma'am.
Her Majesty the Queen, she's coming.
-What, here? -[Sydney] Yes, ma'am.
She's on her way.
-Get me up! -[Wallis] You can't be serious.
I-I've never been more serious.
[breathes heavily]
[grunts]
[breathes heavily]
Thank you.
[door opens]
Her Majesty the Queen, sir.
[Elizabeth] Thank you.
-[grunts] -Oh, no. Please don't.
[grunts]
Your Majesty.
[coughs]
There was no need for that.
If the roles were reversed...
you would do exactly the same.
[coughs]
Yes.
I am sorry you're not well.
We've had our disagreements.
But you've always remained my favorite uncle.
[coughs]
It's kind of you to say
and kind of you to...
visit.
Dear Lilibet.
-"Shirley Temple." -Ah...
Yes.
I underestimated you.
[coughs]
We all did.
But the Crown always finds its way to the right head.
My father, my brother...
you.
And... and one day, God willing, your son.
You don't think he's up to it?
I never said anything of the sort.
But you think it.
I can read you
every bit as well as you can read me...
and I know why you think it.
He can often appear weak.
Indecisive.
But with the right woman by his side,
I say he'll make a good king.
And his...
[gurgles]
...thoughts have already turned to the matter.
He writes to me, and I to him. He's...
He likes this girl, Camilla.
They barely know one another.
Sometimes...
one knows immediately.
You did.
What does he say?
Take the letters. Read them.
I can't do that. It's a private correspondence.
They concern the future of the Crown...
and shed light on the soul not only of a future king...
[coughs] ...but also your son.
Better they should be in your hands than anybody else's.
In the bureau. In the... the drawer.
[coughs]
And...
before you go,
one last time...
for all of it...
what I did to you...
forgive me.
Thank you.
What you did, your abdication of the throne, did change my life.
Forever.
But I want you to know
it's not always a curse.
And I haven't always been cross with you.
That there are days...
in fact, more and more the older I get...
when I consider it to be a blessing.
I've even on occasion found myself...
wanting to thank you.
[Charles] "Dear Uncle David,
I want to thank you again, and Wallis,
for having me at your home in the Bois de Boulogne.
It's a rare thing that fate should allow
a former king and a king-in-waiting to meet.
To tell the truth, it opened my eyes to a few things.
To the nature of kingship...
the nature of love...
and all the difficulties that go with both...
[indistinct conversation]
...I'm sure you know the family would have preferred me not to visit you.
Afraid, perhaps, I might recognize myself in you,
sympathize with you.
Well, let me confess that I do recognize myself in you.
Your progressiveness and flair.
Your individuality and imagination.
What a king you would have made in a kinder world.
What a king we were denied.
It makes me so sad to see you living in exile,
when all you did was take a stand for principle,
and love one woman completely.
You were cruelly denied your right
to reign alongside the woman that you wanted by your side.
[sighs]
But I give you my word
I will not be denied what you have been denied.
The Crown is not a static thing resting forever on one head.
It is moving.
Alive.
Divine.
The changing face of changing times.
And if, God willing, it has been ordained that I should wear it...
then I shall do so on my own terms...
and hopefully, make you proud."
[whimpers]
[gasps]
[sniffles]
[mutters]