The SCANDAL Mongers Podcast

According to Princess Diana, Prince Charles once asked her in a towering bad temper: ‘Am I to be the only Prince of Wales not to be allowed a mistress?’

Taking their cue from the landed aristocracy, British royals have for centuries ‘married for the dynasty’ then engaged in semi-official affairs - or even long term parallel relationships - with others in their circle. Those marrying into the family were expected to ‘understand’ and not make a public fuss, and many did (unlike Diana!).

Our guest this week, Tom Sykes, has a very good reason to care about this story. He’s a writer and the royal correspondent for The Daily Beast - and he thinks that his own grandmother, Camilla Sykes (nee Russell) may have had a long term love affair with the King. In fact members of Tom’s family going back several generations have been closely involved with the British royals at their wildest and naughtiest - including Edward VII when he was a most scandalous Prince of Wales. Hearing their stories provides a unique window into the social history of Upper Class Britain.

You can buy books from the authors we feature here in our own Scandal Mongers bookshop

https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/scandalm...

Looking for the perfect gift for a special scandalous someone - or someone you’d like to get scandalous with? We’re here to help.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ScandalM...

Andrew Lownie

/ andrewlownie

Phil Craig

/ philmcraig

Scandal Mongers

/ mongerspodcast

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

'Spy mania' was at its height in the early 1960s when a junior clerk in the Admiralty was revealed to be spying for the Soviet Union, after he had been drugged and then secretly photographed by KGB agents in Moscow while being raped by at least two men.

At a time when sexual relationships between men were illegal, John Vassall was jailed and publicly humiliated, while tabloid newspaper ran stories such as ‘How to Spot a Homo’.

Writer Alex Grant joins Andrew and Phil to discuss his book on John Vassall, and what his life story tells us about both espionage and the social history of the 1960s.

You can buy Alex's book, and books from the other authors we feature here, in our own Scandal Mongers bookshop - along with thousands more. Andrew’s own book on the spy Guy Burgess is also available here.

https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/sex-spies-and-scandal-the-john-vassall-affair-alex-grant/7392845?aid=12054&ean=9781785907883&

Looking for the perfect gift for a special scandalous someone - or someone you’d like to get scandalous with? We’re here to help.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ScandalMongers

*** If you enjoy our work please consider clicking the YouTube subscribe button, even if you listen to us on an audio app. It will help our brand to grow and our content to reach new ears.

The Scandal Mongers Podcast is also available to watch on YouTube...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJgy7_rHwpE&t=23s

Andrew Lownie

https://twitter.com/andrewlownie

Phil Craig

https://twitter.com/philmcraig

Scandal Mongers

https://twitter.com/MongersPodcast

You can get in touch with the show hosts via...

[email protected] (place 'Scandal Mongers' in the heading please).

This show is part of the PodcastWorld.org network. For your own show please get in contact via the email address above.

Production by

Theo X

Kerem Isik

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

With so many new revelations concerning the Jeffrey Epstein scandal we begin this episode with Andrew and Phil’s assessment of what it all means for Prince Andrew and his hopes of returning to public life (and what it may also mean for our Andrew’s book on the Prince!)

Top magazine editor and author Tina Brown then joins us from New York to discuss all things royal. Tina has had an incredible career running, amongst other things, Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Talk. Some of the world’s best reporters have worked for her and she helped create a model for ambitious, high end and beautifully illustrated contemporary writing. Her books on the British royal family are impeccably sourced and packed with insights from real insiders, along with Tina’s own trademark ‘smarts’.

She tells Andrew and Phil where the various feuding factions of the Windsor clan stand in America and the wider world, and where she thinks King Charles is taking the family. And she delivers some typically sharp pen portraits of Andrew, Fergie, William, Kate, Meghan and Harry!

You can buy Tina's books - and many thousands more - at our very own bookstore, which profits shared between podcasters and independent booksellers.

https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-palace-papers-the-sunday-times-bestseller-tina-brown/7008572?aid=12054&ean=9781529158809&

With so many new revelations concerning the Jeffrey Epstein scandal we begin this episode with Andrew and Phil’s assessment of what it all means for Prince Andrew and his hopes of returning to public life (and what it may also mean for our Andrew’s book on the Prince!)

Top magazine editor and author Tina Brown then joins us from New York to discuss all things royal. Tina has had an incredible career running, amongst other things, Tatler, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Talk. Some of the world’s best reporters have worked for her and she helped create a model for ambitious, high end and beautifully illustrated contemporary writing. Her books on the British royal family are impeccably sourced and packed with insights from real insiders, along with Tina’s own trademark ‘smarts’.

She tells Andrew and Phil where the various feuding factions of the Windsor clan stand in America and the wider world, and where she thinks King Charles is taking the family. And she delivers some typically sharp pen portraits of Andrew, Fergie, William, Kate, Meghan and Harry.

You can buy Tina's books - and many thousands more - at our very own bookstore, which profits shared between podcasters and independent booksellers.

https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-palace-papers-the-sunday-times-bestseller-tina-brown/7008572?aid=12054&ean=9781529158809&

And we now have a store where you can obtain your very own scandalous gifts!

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ScandalMongers

Andrew Lownie.

https://twitter.com/andrewlownie

Phil Craig.

https://twitter.com/philmcraig

https://twitter.com/MongersPodcast

Scandal Mongers is available to watch on yuoube

You can get in touch with the show hosts via...

[email protected] (place 'Scandal Mongers' in the heading please).

This show is part of the PodcastWorld.org network. For your own show please get in contact via the email address above.

Production by

Theo X

Kerem Isik

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

According to the court reports last week, Prince Andrew, Duke of York, and Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, pocketed more than £1 million from an allegedly corrupt financier acting on behalf of a Turkish millionaire. And nobody can say why. It’s one of many obscure stories of cash flowing into royal coffers that our Andrew - Lownie - has been trying to investigate for years.

In this special episode Andrew shares some of his theories about what has been happening here - and asks questions about Prince Andrew’s time as a ’trade envoy’. Just who was he representing on these expensive foreign trips? His country or his own family? We also discuss the wider issues of royal finance and the public’s right to know about it.

Andrew has spent many frustrating months battling for access to royal and other official documents about Prince Andrew and others, but Britain’s Freedom of Information system does not appear to be very helpful.

Later in the episode we talk to the guru of freedom of information (in Britain and elsewhere) about all this - ex BBC journalist Martin Rosenbaum.

Martin Rosenbaum has also written a guide book to your rights to information

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Freedom-Info...

You can buy Andrew and Phil’s books, and work from the other authors we feature here, in our own Scandal Mongers bookshop - along with thousands more.

https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/scandalmongers

Looking for the perfect gift for a special scandalous someone - or someone you’d like to get scandalous with? We’re here to help.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ScandalMongers

*** If you enjoy our work please consider clicking the YouTube subscribe button, even if you listen to us on an audio app. It will help our brand to grow and our content to reach new ears.

The Scandal Mongers Podcast is also available to watch on YouTube...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJgy7_rHwpE&t=23s

Andrew Lownie

https://twitter.com/andrewlownie

Phil Craig

https://twitter.com/philmcraig

Scandal Mongers

https://twitter.com/MongersPodcast

You can get in touch with the show hosts via...

[email protected] (place 'Scandal Mongers' in the heading please).

This show is part of the PodcastWorld.org network. For your own show please get in contact via the email address above.

Production by

Theo X

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Andrew Gold joins us this week to talk about his brand new book and his life as a 'heretic' podcaster and reporter. In recent months Andrew has established himself a leading voice in the anti-woke free speech broadcasting community, talking provocatively to natural rebels such as Robbie Williams, David Baddiel, John McWhorter, Jon Ronson, Amanda Knox, Richard Dawkins and Helen Lewis. Whether it's the excesses of the trans-rights movement, the campaign to close down debate about Covid or the politics of the great royal rift, Andrew has something interesting to say.

For his fascinating new book he interviewed dozens of people with secrets - including cult members, fraudsters and violent prisoners - and he writes powerfully about how our ideas about secrecy, trust and exposure help define our world.

If you want to support what we do and help us grow this podcast we now have a THANKYOU option on YouTube for donations starting at 2 UK pounds - find it by clicking on the 'three dots' next to the 'download' button.

You can buy books from the authors we feature in our own bookshop, along with thousands of others. All profit are shared between podcasters and independent booksellers.

https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-psychology-of-secrets-adventures-among-cults-psychopaths-and-murderers-andrew-gold/7525492?aid=12054&ean=9781035002597&

This is a better link for anyone outside the UK looking to buy Andrew Gold's book

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Psychology-Secrets-Adventures-Murderers-Influencers/dp/1035002590/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

Looking for the perfect gift for a special scandalous someone - or someone you'd like to get scandalous with? We're here to help.

https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ScandalMongers

*** If you enjoy our work please consider clicking the YouTube subscribe button, even if you listen to us on an audio app. It will help our brand to grow and our content to reach new ears.

Andrew Lownie...

https://twitter.com/andrewlownie

Phil Craig...

https://twitter.com/philmcraig

The Scandal Mongers...

https://twitter.com/MongersPodcast

You can get in touch with the show hosts via...

[email protected]

(place 'Scandal Mongers' in the heading please).

Production by

Theo X

Kerem Isik

Produced by...

PodcastWorld.org

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.