Prince Charming

Although he's very close to his father, William makes it clear that he's in charge of his own life--another marked contrast to Charles's situation at 18. Just before Charles's big birthday, his mother convened a dinner party at Buckingham Palace for her most trusted advisers--including Prime Minister Harold Wilson and the Archbishop of Canterbury. The topic was Charles's future, and a committee formed that night ultimately decided he would enter Cambridge and then the military. The only voice not heard in this discussion was that of Charles. His life plan, at least for the next five or six years, was simply presented to him with no way out.

Flash-forward more than three decades to Charles's quarters in St. James's Palace. Earlier this spring, according to the Daily Mail's Richard Kay, Charles invited a select group to lunch. On the guest list: the Bishop of London, whom Charles has known since Cambridge; a former Tory Party chairman who is also a close friend, and William's housemaster, Andrew Gailey. The goal was to come up with some ideas for William's gap year. When William found out, according to Kay's account, he was furious because Charles had excluded the man William considers his most trusted adviser, a former captain in the Welsh Guards named Mark Dyer. (They met when he served as Charles's equerry; he's also an ex-boyfriend of Tiggy Legge-Bourke's, the woman Charles hired to look after the boys.)

It wasn't the first time William demonstrated his independent streak. Last July, he created a frenzy in his father's office when he invited some young women who were sitting next to him at a party to join a cruise on a yacht owned by Greek billionaire John Latsis. Normally invitations to royal social gatherings are issued many weeks in advance, so that details of protocol can be worked out. That didn't deter William. The guests included Davina Duckworth-Chad, 21, who became famous as the "Deb on the Web" when she appeared in a sexy dress on Country Life magazine's Web site.

The gossip columns reported that William lost his virginity on this cruise--although many royal watchers dismiss that rumor. No one knows for sure whether he's actually had a girlfriend. He does confess to a few vices, like smoking occasionally and drinking too much champagne on New Year's. Although some members of the rich crowd he hangs out with have admitted using drugs (including Camilla's son, Tom Parker Bowles), William seems too sensible and too well supervised to get into trouble. Nonetheless, Charles has reportedly told friends that he worries about his sometimes headstrong son.

William refused to discuss his personal life in the birthday interview: "I like to keep my private life private." He did deny rumors linking him to Britney Spears, who has been quoted as saying she exchanged e-mail with William. "There's been a lot of nonsense put out by PR firms," he says. "I don't like being exploited in this way, but as I get older, it's increasingly hard to prevent."

He is beginning to understand that his best hope for keeping these intrusions at bay is to slowly tame the beast that stalks him--the media. Despite his childhood mistrust of the flashbulbs, he's beginning to find his own way in the spotlight. This April, Nicholas Owen, a correspondent for the British television network ITN, was understandably startled when a royal aide approached him at Klosters, the chic Swiss ski resort favored by Charles and his sons. The aide wanted to know if William and Harry could watch as Owen and his editor looked over their tape of the most recent photo op of the royal family. "The two young men came over and stood alongside me standing behind the editor," Owen says. "They were kidding one another and nudging and joking over their skiing prowess." Both boys, but especially William, asked a lot of questions about the mechanics of editing. When he was finished, the editor asked the princes if there were any inaccuracies. "No, it was great," William replied. And then he politely thanked them for their time and took off down the slopes. On this day at least, even the cynical journalists were charmed. Score one for the prince.

With Ginanne Brownell

© 2000