Looking out for mom! Tom Parker Bowles defended his mother, Queen Consort Camilla, for her controversial history with now-husband King Charles III.
“She’s our mother and I think change happens. But I don’t care what anyone says — this wasn’t any sort of end game,” the food writer, 48, said during a Thursday, April 20 episode of the “News Agents” podcast while discussing his mom’s role in Charles’ upcoming coronation. “She married the person she loved and this is what happened.”
Before Camilla, 75, and Charles, 74, tied the knot in 2005, she was married to Andrew Parker Bowles from 1973 to 1995. Along with Tom, the former couple share daughter Laura Lopes. The monarch, for his part, welcomed sons Prince William and Prince Harry with the late Princess Diana before their 1996 divorce. (The Princess of Wales died in a Paris car crash one year later.)
Charles and Camilla — who initially dated in their younger years — began seeing each other again while they were still married to their respective partners. After their divorces, Charles and Camilla took their relationship public — but their past continues to spark debate among fans of the royal family.
In his tell-all memoir, Spare, the Duke of Sussex, 38, recalled how he felt about his father moving on after Diana’s death — and revealed his feelings toward his stepmother. “I even wanted Camilla to be happy. Maybe she’d be less dangerous if she was happy,” he penned.
Before Spare hit shelves in January, Harry explained to Anderson Cooper why he considered Camilla to be a threat to his family.
“Because of the need for her to rehabilitate her image. That made her dangerous because of the connections that she was forging within the British press,” the prince said during a 60 Minutes interview. “And there was open willingness on both sides to trade off information. And with a family built on hierarchy, and with her, on the way to being Queen Consort, there was gonna be people or bodies left in the street because of that.”
As the retired military pilot spoke out against members of the royal family, a source exclusively told Us Weekly that Charles was “distraught” over Harry airing “many embarrassing and damaging assertions” about himself and Camilla.
The former Prince of Wales’ official coronation ceremony will take place in May, and Camilla will be crowned alongside her husband following the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022. Despite ruffling feathers with his bombshell book, Harry will attend the royal event. His wife, Meghan Markle, will remain at home with their two children: Archie, who turns 4 the day of the ceremony, and Lili, 22 months.
