The royals - Kitty Kelley [203]
Sarah was not so carefree about her burlesque. She hid in her house for five days so she would not have to face people. One woman took pity and wrote a letter offering a “shoulder of friendship” to cry on.
“I simply felt, ‘Poor thing!’ ” said Theo Ellert, who ran Angels International. The London-based charity raised money for children in Poland with leukemia. “The Duchess was at her lowest ebb, and when I suggested she come with me to Poland, she agreed instantly and said, ‘I need to think of others to take my mind off myself.’ ”
John Bryan seized on the trip as an opportunity to repair her image. He was determined to showcase her as the do-gooding Duchess. “If we had to, we’d pay for the trip ourselves, so no one could accuse us of another Freeloading Fergie number,” he said to her secretary. “Forget the British press. We’ll get this on American television where it counts…. We’ll give exclusive access to someone like Diane Sawyer on Prime Time Live… she’s the best… she needs the ratings… but no personal questions… only a serious interview, substantive, about your work….”
With frenetic energy he started negotiating behind the scenes. “He used a husband-and-wife team to front for him,” recalled the ABC-TV producer for Prime Time Live, “but he was definitely calling the shots.” Bryan told Sarah he would control the interview and the questions she would be asked. Diane Sawyer does not share that recollection. Sawyer’s producer recalled Sarah’s major concern was being asked about her relationship with the Princess of Wales and the rest of the royal family. “That worried her more than the toe-sucking pictures,” said the producer. At the end of the interview, Diane Sawyer slipped in a question about John Bryan. “What is the relationship? What can you tell us about him?”
Sarah was prepared. “He’s done a wonderful job, helping me with all my financial work,” she said on the air, “and he’s been a fantastic friend.”
“But he’s not just a financial adviser,” pressed Sawyer.
“I didn’t say he was. I said he’s been a fantastic friend, helping me with financial work.”
Despite her plucky performance, Angels International dropped her. “She had a bad image and they didn’t want her involved with them,” said Theo Ellert. “I said, ‘If you don’t want her, you can’t have me,’ and my services were dispensed with.” So Theo Ellert helped Sarah start her own charity, Children in Crisis, to raise money for youngsters in poor countries like Albania, Poland, and the former Yugoslavia. With this organization the Duchess finally had a vehicle for respectability. But she couldn’t follow the road map. “Sarah has had everything,” her father wrote in his memoir, “but she threw it away.”
She tried to transform herself into a goodwill ambassador like the Princess of Wales but was criticized as self-serving. “I cannot think of anybody else I would sooner not appoint to this post [United Nations High Commission for Refugees],” said the Tory MP Sir Nicholas Fairbairn. “She is a lady short on looks, absolutely deprived of any dress sense, has a figure like a Jurassic monster, is very greedy when it comes to loot, no tact, and wants to upstage everyone else.” Fergie was not appointed.
The Royal Army Air Corps would not accept her as its honorary Colonel in Chief because, according to a senior officer, she was “dowdy and we didn’t feel she had the right image.”
When she took a group of mentally handicapped youngsters on a climbing expedition