While the run-up to Christmas usually comes with its fair share of stresses, no one is feeling the heat more this festive season than the royal family. The King, the Queen and the Prince and Princess of Wales have been dodging missiles related to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex yet again, as the recent release of Omid Scobie’s critically panned book Endgame named Charles and Kate as the so-called ‘royal racists’. But the new “Fab Four” – as they were dubbed after Kate’s Together at Christmas carol concert last year – have been putting on a steadfastly united front, after they were all photographed together at the annual Diplomatic Reception at Buckingham Palace last week.
That photograph marked an important moment – the last time the royals posed for a formal picture at a diplomatic reception at the Palace, it was 2016 and Elizabeth II was at its heart – and sets the tone for what we can expect from the royal family this Christmas, in the wake of yet another turbulent year with the divisive Sussexes at its centre. Rumours have been circulating for weeks that Harry and Meghan were hoping for an invitation to Sandringham for the holidays this year, after there were signs of a thaw in relations when Harry phoned Charles on his 75th birthday last month, with one friend quoted as saying, “I can’t imagine the Sussexes would decline an invitation to spend time with His Majesty.” But any thoughts of the drama-loving couple spending Christmas with the royals have been firmly quashed, following the fallout from Endgame.
