after eight months of leading the British Monarchy following the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth
King Charles III will have his official coronation which is a commemorative crowning this weekend
Aaron Vanderhoof staff writer for Vanity Fair and the co-host of the podcast Dynasty is here
to talk to me about what to expect Erin thank you for joining me thank you for having me Nicole as
this family continues to make headlines some of the tea that everybody's talking about is
who will and won't be at the coronation what do we know about who will be there and who won't be
there and do you think that that will be fodder for more conversation the last coordination that
happened was 8 000 different people were invited and now it's the end of 2000 so necessarily they
were going to have to be some some cuts to the invite list Prince Harry has been estranged from
the family and he and his wife Megan The Duchess of Sussex they were both invited Megan will be
staying at home but one thing that was a bit of a surprise but I think says a lot about the
direction that Charles and his Reign want to go in is that a lot of the peers so his extended family
in some cases the people with titles you know I said the Dukes the Dutch says aristocracy didn't
get an invite instead a lot of Charity workers and people who supported the nation through the
pandemic people who got awards for their charity work are going to be invited to the coronation
instead of you know a long list of the various like upper level government people and a long
list of you know hereditary uh Aristocrats what does this flux and change in the list
of invitees sort of signal or tell us about the direction that the British Monarchy is going in
and how the world perspective informs that well I mean over the last 100 years and even over the
last 70 years the idea of a hereditary monarchy has gotten way stranger to you know increasingly
democratized countries but at the same time as it becomes more and more unusual I think it becomes
one of those things that Britain is holding on to because it is unique even the other European
monarchies don't do coordination ceremonies like this Britain is like the last place where this
1000 year old ceremony has remained pretty much the same and there are just so many different
reasons that people have kind of come to love the British Monarchy you know for on the one hand even
people who maybe philosophically would have been opposed to it really found a lot of great things
to say about the lake Queen Elizabeth and you know as long as they're seen as people who are adding
some value to Britain I think that it's going to be a lot harder to see that going away what are
the opposing sides of of this in terms of who's excited about a coronation and who has you know
very little to say or strong opinions about why it shouldn't be a thing
you know recent polling has indicated that about a third of people are very excited for
the coronation and a third of people are just sort of like eh who cares and we will see some protests
and things like that but I think what's the most telling is that instead of it just being this one
ceremony you know they're keeping the ceremony pretty short this time it's just it's just 60
Minutes you know Queen Elizabeth the first in the you know 16th century had three hours
but we're seeing a weekend of events that are sort of trying to make this a bit more culturally
British a little bit more pop culture a bit more fun so you're getting big coronation lunches and
the palace is recommended that people make a coronation quiche which is a broad bean and
spinach quiche they actually had pre-leaf of the Great British Bake Off she got a chance to
try it you know we're seeing an attempt to make it more than just about the government and the
church of England and Charles as a person but more about a moment of unity and celebration about all
the things that make the country distinctive and make being a British person like a point of pride
what is the main challenge that King Charles III has been dealing with and will deal with
the last eight months have seen a lot of upheaval in the British economy in British politics and you
know for Charles the biggest challenge that he's been dealing with is kind of serving as counter
programming for that you know as the head of state he does have a role to play with the government
but he doesn't have a political role at all and so when things are going on in Parliament when people
are facing things like a cost of living crisis there isn't much he can do per se but his role
of being there meeting with diplomats that's the Big Challenge and as these problems in the
British economy and in British politics continue you know he a lot of his success as a monarch is
going to depend on things that have almost nothing to do with him a lot of people see these kinds of
events as just a lot of Pomp and Circumstance is this a way of him making this ceremony his own the
ceremony itself kind of exists as part of you know solidifying the king's role as the head of state
as CEO of the monarchy and as you know ahead of a family and so we're seeing him make homages to
all of those different things throughout the throughout the ceremony he's the head of the
Church of England but he wants his role to also be a person who's promoting faith of all faiths
and so I think one way you're going to see that in the ceremony you know that there is a really
more sacred elements than usual are going into the ceremony uh for example the anointing oil so
it's not coming from civets or whales this time as it has in the past it's coming from hand pressed
olive oil that's been blessed in Jerusalem to be brought back here why do approval ratings
matter in a role that doesn't have any political power what's at stake because the monarchy is so
aligned with and I feel like it's hard to say this to Americans I feel like Americans don't always
get this but the monarchy is so aligned with the history of democracy in Britain that there's a
sense that the monarchy is serving at the pleasure of British people and that if they didn't want
it anymore that's when they get rid of it but they feel like they want to keep proving that
that they're giving value to the country Aaron Vanderhoof staff writer for Vanity Fair and the
co-host of Dynasty podcast thank you for joining us thank you for the PBS NewsHour I'm Nicole Ellis