Mike Tindall has joked about hanging out with Prince Harry “when he was fun”
Mike Tindall joked about Prince Harry
The former rugby star was talking about his 2011 wedding to Harry’s cousin Zara Phillips – who is the daughter of Princess Anne and her ex-husband Captain Mark Phillips – when he made the quip about the Duke of Sussex, who stepped back from royal duties with wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, in 2020 to start a new life in California.
Speaking at the Hay Festival with his The Good, The Bad and The Rugby podcast co-hosts James Haskell and Alex Payne, the Daily Telegraph reports Mike jokingly expressed his surprise that the former hadn’t made a fool of himself at the wedding and quipped: “A lot of other people managed that way better than you – [like] Harry, when he was fun.”
Mike – who has three children with Zara – also made a joke at the expense of his wife’s uncle, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who was stripped of his titled by King Charles last year.
Alex noted Mike is well connected thanks to both his rugby credentials and the fact he has “got his own bedroom at Buckingham Palace”.
Mike replied: “Opposite end to Andrew, though.”
But the sportsman admitted the quip might have got him into trouble.
He said: “Backstage, they were like, ‘It’s being recorded, maybe stay away from [the subject of] Andrew tonight?’”
And Mike’s co-hosts also mocked his royal connections as they discussed the corrective surgery he had had on his broken nose back in 2018.
James joked: “Taxpayers’ money fixed it. It’s got the royal warrant if you look inside it.”
During their appearance at the festival, the trio revealed they have filmed a pilot episode for a TV series in which they attempt to run Richmond Rugby Club in West London, comparing it to Clarkson’s Farm and Welcome to Wrexham.
Alex said: “We’ve got some amazing ideas – Amazon Prime are interested – if we can get it going. The Rolling Stones used to practise when they were 16 years old in the Richmond club house, and one of my ambitions is to get Mick Jagger back, because he lives in Richmond, to do a big gig at Richmond Athletic Ground, raise money and get the club back on the map.
“Tin[dall]’s obviously got good connections … we could have Catherine meeting the team, the Princess of Wales. These are all massive pipe dreams.”
