While Queen Camilla's impressive charity work and steadfast support for King Charles is viewed in a positive light today, her reputation in the '90s was...well, not great. With the public heavily siding with Princess Diana during Charles and Diana's very public divorce, Camilla was largely painted as a villain. That being said, growing up as one of Camilla's children wasn't always easy, as her son Tom Parker Bowles revealed in a recent interview with Hello!
While he describes having a "lovely happy English upbringing" with his mom, father Andrew Parker Bowles (his parents divorced in 1995) and sister Laura Lopes, the media intrusion surrounding Camilla's relationship with King Charles made life difficult and even "dangerous" at times.
As most royal watchers know, Camilla and Charles dated in the 1970s before going on to marry their respective partners Princess Diana and Andrew Parker Bowles. The King and Queen then had an affair in the mid-'80s, and after they both went through divorces, the couple reunited for good, later marrying in 2005.
The press interest in Camilla and the affair hit a fever pitch in "the mid-'90s," as Parker Bowles told Hello!, referring to the era as "the bad days."
He recalled "the aggression of the paparazzi, the screaming, the shouting," noting that his mother "didn't have a network to protect her" since she wasn't a member of the Royal Family. "I remember high-speed chases down the M4 that were incredibly dangerous," the food writer said.
When asked if he felt "angry" or "resentful" toward his mother for her high-profile relationship, Tom replied, "No. Never, never, never. She has always been – and this is not just PR – such a good mother."
In a previous interview with The Times, the acclaimed cookbook author also defended his mom's "reputation of drinking gin and smoking," adding, "Never drunk a glass of gin in her life. Doesn’t smoke."
Parker Bowles—who has been promoting his new book, Cooking With The Crown—also shared some memories about his mom's cooking, praising her killer roast chicken. "We all gather around the table. We all love food. We all love a drink," Tom said of his family. And when speaking of his stepfather, the author had plenty of praise.
"It wouldn't have happened without the palace and the King," he said of the book, which contains recipes spanning from Queen Victoria's reign through today. Tom described King Charles as "the kindest, most knowledgeable, lovely man. He is someone you can ask about food and it's like asking an academic."
