Eyebrows raised after Palace asks media to 'never' use certain poignant scenes from Queen's funeral
LONDON, UK: The Buckingham Palace has asked the British media to remove some of the visuals from the Queen's funeral. The palace has reportedly told them not to ever again use the clips of Prince Edward and Sophie, Countess of Wessex weeping during the state funeral, and Prince George wiping and scratching his nose.
According to Daily Star, the authorities have requested to remove these scenes to protect the privacy of individuals from public eye during the moments of personal grief. The public is also unlikely to watch again the courtier removing the bolts from the Imperial Crown placed on the top of the Queen's coffin and the casket being lowered into the royal vault at St George's Chapel.
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Meanwhile, according to express.co.uk, the Daily Mail columnist Ephraim Hardcastle claimed the scenes of Princess Eugenie and Zara Tindall wiping their eyes will be removed from the video as well. Hardcastle also claimed the political French show 'Quotidien' was defying the Palace's wishes, "replaying every 'forbidden' moment to its millions of viewers in France, Belgium and Switzerland".
According to The Guardian, earlier, broadcasters including BBC, ITV, and Sky News all received messages from royal staff regarding timestamped footage which the palace wouldn't want to appear in future broadcasts and on social media. This led to an uneasiness among the journalists who were dedicated to cover the late monarch's funeral. Some of them questioned the control of royal family over their press coverage and also their relationship with the British media.
There were also a set of instructions given by the royal family on what images and videos were deemed acceptable and the palace specifically emphasized on avoiding intrusion into the privacy of the royal family members while airing them. There were also restrictions to air Queen's funeral's clips on some of the social media platforms including TikTok. There were also requests from the royal authorities that social media clips made from the funeral would be “solemn and dignified”. Another condition was that footage could only be used in news broadcasts and not in entertainment shows.
According to Daily Star, Queen's funeral was watched by more than 37.5 million people in the UK. It was aired across more than 50 channels. The viewership of the Queen's funeral event surpassed the number of people who watched the funeral of Princess Diana in September 1997. However, globally, the viewers count could be more than 4 billion.