PLATELL’S PEOPLE: Is Prince Harry any better than Netflix, the way he milks the royals?

What a painful few days for the Royal Family. On Thursday, the Mail published exclusive photographs showing that Netflix had been filming outside the Alma tunnel in Paris, where Diana died in a car crash, recreating her tragic final moments in every ghoulish detail.

The horribly shocking death of one of the world’s most iconic women is being treated as entertainment fodder for the masses, no matter how upsetting it must be for the royals.

Then, later that same day, came the unveiling of the title and cover of Prince Harry’s memoir, due for release in January. Cruelly, he called it Spare, with the clear message that he’s been done down by his family — the King’s ‘spare’ son, cast aside, as opposed to the heir who takes the crown.

Publisher Penguin Random House confirming the £28 book ‘full of insight, self-examination, and hard-won wisdom’ will be released on January 10. The title page shows Harry staring at the camera in a brown T-shirt and a black string necklace

Spare, which is available to pre-order, will cost £28 hardcover, £13.99 as an eBook, £20 as an audio download and £25 as a CD. It will be released simultaneously in the US, UK and Canada, with 15 foreign language editions, including one in Spanish entitled Spare: En La Sombra (Spare: In The Shadow)

It is understood that Harry, seen with his wife Meghan in New York last year, was paid a $20million (£18.4m) advance for the autobiography as part of a three-title deal worth £36.8m

The publishers, which paid him £35 million for a four-book deal, say the tome will ‘take his readers immediately back to one of the most searing images of the 20th century: two young boys, two Princes, walking behind their mother’s coffin as the world watched in sorrow — and horror.

‘As Diana, Princess of Wales, was laid to rest, billions wondered what the Princes must be thinking and feeling. For Harry, this is his story at last.’

Forget the rubbish about the book’s ‘raw truth, unflinching honesty, insight, revelation, self-examination and hard-won wisdom about the eternal power of love over grief’. This is about hard cash.

‘As Diana, Princess of Wales, was laid to rest, billions wondered what the Princes must be thinking and feeling. For Harry, this is his story at last.’

And what about his brother William’s agony — his ‘raw truth’? He, too, walked behind their mother’s coffin and, with Harry, left a bouquet of white flowers on it, along with an envelope which bore the heartbreaking message, ‘Mummy’

And what about his brother William’s agony — his ‘raw truth’? He, too, walked behind their mother’s coffin and, with Harry, left a bouquet of white flowers on it, along with an envelope which bore the heartbreaking message, ‘Mummy’.

Diana was Mummy to them both. The difference is that Harry is brazenly monetising his grief while William carries his silently and with dignity, like his dad, King Charles, and other members of his family.

Self-pitying, self-aggrandising, ready to sell his story to the highest bidder, Harry has torn apart any relationship he might have still had with his brother and father.

Instead of embracing his new family and life in California, he is still raking over the past, the eternal victim.

In the cold light of day, is there really much difference between Netflix’s ruthless exploitation of Diana’s death for profit and Prince Harry’s?

For the cover of Spare, Harry chose a picture of himself looking into the camera with a cold, messianic stare. And dare I say vengeful eyes, his balding head cropped, giving a ginger halo effect. If he’s finally found peace, why does he look so damn miserable?

About to appear on I’m A Celeb, Princess Anne’s son-in-law Mike Tindall has become the first royal to star in adverts for pizza, and is seen jumping out of a cardboard box in another for Amazon.

All this when Tindall is already worth £15.7 million and lives on Anne’s Gatcombe Park estate.

Shamelessly coining in on his links to the monarchy is about as appetising as a soggy Domino’s ham and pineapple pizza, with extra cheese.

• Well done to Prince William for letting it be known that, though he’s the FA President, he will not be in Qatar to watch the Three Lions, even if they make the finals (as if!), citing the old royal chestnut of ‘conflicting diaries’. A wise decision. Seeing our future King there would have diminished us all.
• No such qualms for model Naomi Campbell, fierce campaigner for LGBT rights, as she hosted a ‘spectacular’ fashion show in Qatar helping to promote the Gulf state, now as famous for its persecution of LGBT people as for its oil. I wonder how much they paid Campbell to swallow her principles. 

• England’s captain, our Harry Kane, is encouraging fans to travel to Qatar, saying it will be a great, fun experience. Banned from drinking, smoking (even vaping), betting as well as kissing? That’s what many England fans would call purgatory.

Taking control of Twitter, tech giant Elon Musk gleefully announced ‘the bird is freed’. He’s sacked its top executives, removing all the woke Lefties who had overseen its blatant political bias, and plans to lift lifetime bans imposed on users such as Donald Trump. Chief financial officer Ned Segal left with a paltry £22 million payoff — chicken feed to billionaire Musk.

Elon Musk gleefully announced ‘the bird is freed’. He’s sacked its top executives, removing all the woke Lefties who had overseen its blatant political bias (pictured)

Vets tell us never to dress up our pets in dangerous Halloween costumes. My moggie Ted won’t be wearing a devil suit: when I put him in an elf costume one Christmas, he ripped it to pieces and pushed over the tree.

 Lissom singer Taylor Swift has had to re-edit her latest music video to change a scene where she stands on the bathroom scales which, instead of giving her actual weight (probably about 5 st), show the word ‘fat’. Young women who suffer from overeating issues accused her of ‘fatphobia’. I’m with them! I’d like scales that never register beyond 9 st (a couple of stone short of my actual weight) when I step on them.

Taylor Swift has had to re-edit her latest music video to change a scene where she stands on the bathroom scales which, instead of giving her actual weight (probably about 5 st), show the word ‘fat’

Jayde Adams said after she was booted off Strictly that she’d been maliciously trolled during her time on the show. We all condemn trolls, but don’t confuse them with Strictly superfans like me, who just thought she was a terrible dancer. Given she’s a super-plus-sized lady with no ballroom grace, surely this brilliant comedian should have known the joke was always on her.

• In Rishi’s speech to the 1922 Committee he called for unity, saying: ‘We’ve got the talent, the energy and the ideas; but we get one shot.’ An unfortunate expression given it took him just one stab in the back to destroy Boris’s legitimate Premiership and create this chaos in the first place.

• Plaudits to Liz Truss’s husband Hugh O’Leary, a perfect political partner: rarely seen, never heard, appearing briefly by her side at the Tory conference, then as she left Downing Street. I’m betting he’s as relieved as we are that the sham is over.

• Has anyone ever set back the cause for women in politics more than Liz Truss and Penny Mordaunt? It was agonising to watch as their incompetence in their desperate scrap for power was matched only by their self-delusion. Sadly, it’s destroyed any chance of another Tory female PM for a generation.

In Rishi’s speech to the 1922 Committee he called for unity, saying: ‘We’ve got the talent, the energy and the ideas; but we get one shot’

Plaudits to Liz Truss’s husband Hugh O’Leary, a perfect political partner: rarely seen, never heard, appearing briefly by her side at the Tory conference, then as she left Downing Street

Waitrose has dropped Phillip Schofield’s When In Rome wine range after customers declared it undrinkable. Is it really that people find his £24.99 boxes of plonk hard to swallow? Or do they feel duped by his happy-family TV persona given that he upped and left his family to ‘find’ himself as a bachelor?

Maybe Phil’s fruity Frascati personal life just left a sour taste in their mouths.

Waitrose has dropped Phillip Schofield’s When In Rome wine range after customers declared it undrinkable

After he failed to win a scholarship to Winchester College, now £46,000-a-year, Rishi Sunak says his parents struggled to fund his education and ‘he felt shame as a schoolboy having to wear a second-hand uniform’. At my £100-a-year Methodist Ladies College it was a badge of honour to wear hand-me-downs from the school shop. Unlike Rishi (today, in his £3,500 suits) I never felt the need to shame my parents over them.

Iranian Amou Haji was dubbed the world’s dirtiest man as he hadn’t showered for 67 years. Kindly neighbours did finally manage to give him a bath at the ‘ripe’ age of 94, whereupon he died. They insist he went not of cleanliness but loneliness — adding that he never found lasting female companionship.

You don’t say!

Radio 4’s flagship Today show has lost 600,000 listeners since last year. Just a coincidence that the loss of 9 per cent of its audience coincides with the arrival of self-indulgent, bejewelled, sarf London hipster Amol Rajan, who thinks broadcasting is one long Bette Midler moment — in other words, all about him.

London hipster Amol Rajan (pictured) thinks broadcasting is one long Bette Midler moment — in other words, all about him