Charles In His Own Words first aired on National Geographic, and is now available to stream on both Hulu and Disney+. The new documentary uses newsreel footage and archived interviews to depict the new King Charles not as simply a misunderstood and complex man, but a man whose entire existence has been defined by the media. The result is a successful, sympathetic version of Charles’s story, one that acknowledges that he’s always been a character in a narrative he has no control over.
Opening Shot: This special opens with an aerial view of Balmoral Castle. It’s September 8, 2022 and a news anchor states that Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, has died.
The Gist: With the coronation of King Charles III upon us, we’ve been graced with the arrival of several new documentaries about the life of the cranky, stoic, controversial new King of England. I use those words to define Charles because those are the descriptors that the press has led us to believe are true. In the new special Charles In His Own Words, rarely-seen interviews with Charles, archival news footage, and new interviews with close confidantes offer a different side to the man who waited over 70 years to assume the role of king.
Charles’ contemptuous relationship with the media began at an early age, and as the film shows us headlines and footage that scrutinize his every last move, it’s easy to elicit sympathy for this boy who couldn’t escape the spotlight. Unlike, say, the children of American presidents who can request at least a small amount of privacy, everything the future king did during his life was fair game for scrutiny and public opinion, and Charles wasn’t afraid to express his frustration with that. The film also provides oft-repeated anecdotes about his father Prince Philip’s desire to toughen his sensitive son up, sending him to rigorous boarding schools and survival camp in an effort to “put some steel in him.” Everyone wanted Charles to be something he was not. Another recent documentary about Charles, King Charles: The Boy Who Walked Alone, has similar intentions to reveal the real Charles, but it does so by blaming people like Princess Diana and Prince Harry for publicly revealing details about their relationships with Charles, and it creates a narrative that Charles was a victim of their shrewd hunger for attention. Charles In His Own Words places all the blame on the media who created the thirst for that kind of information in the first place, and it paints a much more sympathetic picture of him.
Unlike so many other shows about Charles and the Windsors, Diana doesn’t factor heavily into the film, and instead, Charles’ relationship with Camilla is depicted as a fairy tale: unrequited lovers since young adulthood, kept apart due to the constraints of “the system,” who finally end up in one another’s arms after their failed marriages. When put in that context it becomes a very different story, another example of how Charles has been made a victim of this backward system he’s a part of.
Whether due to time constraints or respect for Charles, the film doesn’t dwell on his most controversial moments for long – his divorce from Diana, his rift with son Harry, these things are addressed but not labored over. It helps his case, because it at least gives a sense that those are the things Charles probably wishes would not define his legacy.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? The format of this film is very similar to HBO’s The Princess, which told the story of Princess Diana’s life entirely through archival newsreels. Charles In His Own Words similarly lets his past interviews and the interviews of many people close to him, to speak for themselves with little else added.
Our Take: The biggest point that this film tries to make, and does so successfully, is that Charles never wanted… *gestures around to the castles, the cameras, the global audience*…ALL OF THIS. From the moment he was aware of who he was, he realized he wasn’t built for it, and though he has had to play along with the media for most of his life, he has often been vocal about his disdain for… *gestures around to the castles, the cameras, the global audience*… you get the picture.
After an attempted attack on Charles in 1994 in Australia, an interviewer named Robin Harrison told Charles that his response to the attack had improved his image, to which Charles responded, quite rightly, “Why do you listen to all this rubbish that these people say? It’s not done for my image for goodness sake! What I don’t understand is that you’ve all got to have some angle on it all the time instead of treating it as part of life.” Charles then criticizes the fact that the media has created a 24-hour news cycle that grasps at straws to make every little thing more exciting. The fascinating thing about his critique is that he said this before we even had a 24-hour news cycle, CNN was the only news station in the game, and yet Charles already knew how one incident could be wrung out to create content for days. That’s the game he’s been playing his whole life, and as a result, it’s impossible for most of us to know who he really is. While this documentary and others like it purport to give us a sense of the “real” Charles, by including this particular clip of Charles lambasting the press and its spin, that only underlines the point that whoever we think he is is just a fabrication.
I also found it truly interesting that Charles and Diana as a couple are nothing but a footnote in the story of his relationship with Camilla Parker Bowles here. Perhaps now that Charles and Camilla’s well-documented “soul mate” status has endured for nearly 50 years its okay to acknowledge that they can be the stars of that narrative now, with little reference to Diana. With the luxury of hindsight, we can definitively say Charles and Camilla are the real deal, not just speculative, sensational tabloid fodder.
Sex and Skin: None.
Parting Shot: Recent footage plays of Charles shaking hands with his subjects. Across the screen it reads, “Time will tell how Charles will fare as king. As always, one thing above all others will define him… his relationship with the media.”
Most Pilot-y Line: Early in the film, we hear the voice of a man named Michael Mann (not the filmmaker but the domestic chaplain to Queen Elizabeth II) who states, “They’re not the same as any other family because they’re one of that very small group of families that whatever they do is news and is subject to public scrutiny.” That’s the essence of Charles’s life, one lived and defined by his media coverage, and that’s what this documentary hopes to correct.
Our Call: STREAM IT! I’ve written this here and in other reviews of the royal family before, but given that the media creates so many narratives around these people, they’re almost impossible to really know. But I always appreciate when a film or show actually acknowledges the media’s role in this family’s life, and this version of his story does try to peel off from past versions to depict him as a savvy, fully-fleshed out person who loathes the drama he’s unable to escape.
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.