He has become a beloved, if not slightly eccentric, member of the royal family, often sharing information about the Firm on his social media.
And although she is now seen as a doting grandmother, a resurfaced clip of Sarah Ferguson storming out of a TV interview 13 years ago has gone viral, shocking royal fans.
The Duchess of York, who was married to Prince Andrew from 1986 to 1996, stormed out of a TV interview after being questioned about the “cash for access” scandal.
The mother of Princess Beatrice and Eugenie sat down for an interview with 60 Minutes Australia host Michael Usher in 2011.
During the interview about the car accident, the Duchess walked out mid-interview because she didn’t like the line of questioning, before returning to speak to Michael.
It appeared the interview began to go awry when the Duchess was forced to watch recorded footage of her offering “cash for access” services to her ex-husband Prince Andrew.
In May 2010, Sarah was filmed by the now-closed News of the World newspaper offering access to Prince Andrew for £500,000 to an undercover reporter posing as an Indian businessman.
She can clearly be heard in the footage saying: “£500,000 when you can, for me, open doors.”
Sarah Ferguson stormed out of a 60 Minutes Australia TV interview after being questioned about her “cash for access” scandal in resurfaced footage.
In the clip, Michael asked Sarah: ‘Did you accept the money? At one point, you had $4,000 in cash in front of you, did you accept it?
Sarah replied: “Absolutely yes, they gave it to me, I put it in the car and returned it immediately.”
Michael added: ‘Once the scandal broke?’ Looking frustrated, Sarah added: “As soon as I knew it was a scandal, not once it broke Michael.”
‘Don’t try to trick me now because I’m not going to play this game. Delete that bit. I must not follow this path.’
The duchess then turned to her Australian agent John, who was off-screen, and expressed that she did not want to continue with that line of questioning.
After Michael pressed her to continue the interview, Sarah said, “Okay, thank you, let’s move on to the next question.”
The Duchess of York sat down for an interview with 60 Minutes Australia host Michael Usher in 2011, and it appears the uncomfortable clip has resurfaced on YouTube channels.
‘We went out and the duchess came running after me. She took off her heels and is in her stockings on the grass. “Michael, how was that?” he said.
After being asked if the scandal helped her ‘take a look at her life,’ Sarah said: ‘I was very grateful to be in that position in some ways, because when I hit rock bottom it woke me up.’
Then Sarah looked back off-camera at her agent and said, ‘Remember, remember, Cindy, yeah… I’m going to take five minutes.’
The duchess then got up and left the interview, before returning later, but still seemed cold towards the interviewer.
During a radio interview, Michael opened up about his awkward interaction with Sarah.
The Channel Seven reporter joined Nova 96.9’s Fitzy & Wippa with Kate Ritchie on Thursday to talk about the big news of 2024.
During the talk, Michael ‘Wippa’ Wipfli recalled Michael’s 2011 interview with Sarah.
‘Wasn’t it a disaster?’ Wippa said, before co-presenter Kate Ritchie added: “I’ve never seen it, I want to hear them talk about it.”
‘I had to call her Duchess. She wouldn’t let me call her Sarah, with many airs of grace,” said the veteran journalist.
Michael Usher (pictured) has opened up about his awkward interactions with Sarah Ferguson.
But she was fine and relatively sweet. But then that moment came… he turned around and sitting back down in the chair was crazy.
“She came back and continued the interview, and then she had a different personality again,” he added.
The journalist then said that after the awkward interview, he and his team walked outside when the Duchess of York ran after them.
‘We went out and the duchess came running after me. She took off her heels and is in her stockings on the grass. “Michael, how was that?” he said.
“At that point, I just said, ‘Sarah, if I were you, I would ask you to go back in the room and do that interview again, because I don’t know what happened.’
“Then he says, ‘Oh, well, anyway, who wants to sign some books?’ I’ll sign yours. And now, what are your children’s names?” And he left from there.
The duchess’s representative in Australia, John Scott, stated at the time that the images were cynically taken out of context and demanded that the network withdraw advertising from the program and delete scenes from the interview.
He told Sydney’s Daily Telegraph newspaper: ‘We had gone through all the questions and topics beforehand and filmed all the footage of the park walks before sitting down.
‘She came out when they ambushed her – no, it was a set-up – but after she calmed down she said, ‘Fuck you, let’s do this,’ and she did, but it was a banal interview and her behavior reflects that.’
John said the duchess was surprised when she was asked to watch the News of the World footage again during the 60 Minutes interview.
He said making the Duchess sit back and watch the footage was unnecessary, because she had obviously already seen it and agreed to answer questions about it.
But 60 Minutes producer Mr Thomson said: “She agreed to talk about it, as she has done at length, so it certainly wasn’t a setup.”