DYNASTY: The Royal Family’s Most Challenging Year

Vanity Fair
  • 3.8 (100)
  • SOCIETY & CULTURE
  • UPDATED WEEKLY
DYNASTY: The Royal Family’s Most Challenging Year

Unimaginable secrets. Unyielding power. Devastating rifts and shocking allegiances. With surprising new interviews as well as historic sound, Vanity Fair’s DYNASTY examines the ties that bind the one of the most influential families in the world today, taking you inside their lives for a glimpse at the inner workings of privilege.  DYNASTY goes deep on the modern Windsors with Vanity Fair’s royal correspondent Katie Nicholl and staff writer Erin Vanderhoof, who reexamine the complex, sometimes fiery family dynamics—from the intimate side of the queen’s early reign to Harry and Meghan’s royal split to Prince Andrew’s shameful scandal to the reign of King Charles—with razor-sharp insights, fresh reportage, and exclusive guests. For more on DYNASTY, visit vf.com/dynasty

  1. AUG 1

    Kate Middleton and the Future of the Monarchy

    This spring, Catherine, Princess of Wales, ended a long silence and rampant public speculation with a solemn video announcing her cancer diagnosis. In the final episode of DYNASTY: The Windsors’ Most Difficult Year, hosts Claire Howorth, Katie Nicholl, and Erin Vanderhoof explain why the message that accompanied her diagnosis was the most important speech of her royal career, and what it says about the Catherine we will see in the future. After a year of struggle, is the monarchy emerging into a new, calmer era? And what lessons will the Windsors take away from their brushes with ill-health and public speculation?

    44 min

  2. JUL 25

    The Truth About Meghan, Harry, and Their California Dream

    It’s been four years since Meghan Markle and Prince Harry walked away from their royal roles, sparking an endless stream of media attention and second-guessing in the UK. This year, the biggest headlines—from historic health challenges for Kate Middleton and King Charles III to royal banquets and honor ceremonies—have been coming from Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace. Meanwhile, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been carving out their own luxurious, semi-royal, and very philanthropic path thousands of miles away, in the court of Montecito.

    44 min

  3. JUL 18

    Has This Year Changed King Charles?

    When King Charles III announced his cancer diagnosis in February, there was an outpouring of emotion in the UK, along with some concern about what it would look like if the monarch not wasn’t able to greet his public on a daily basis. From the beginning, the king balanced his treatments with his duties, and privately he told his medical team that attending Trooping the Colour, the parade that marks his birthday, was nonnegotiable. By the time the June celebration rolled around, the king was out on the Buckingham Palace balcony with Queen Camilla at his side, and the clouds over the Windsors’ future seemed to part. On this week’s episode of DYNASTY: The Royal Family’s Most Challenging Year, hosts Claire Howorth, Katie Nicholl, and Erin Vanderhoof return to the unprecedented events of the year, and Charles’ embrace of radical (for royals, anyway) transparency.

    36 min

  4. JUL 11

    Prince William’s New Role In the Family

    After a year in which the British Royal Family has been forced to foreground its humanity and vulnerability, DYNASTY is returning for a special four-episode series to examine the events and share behind-the-scenes details. On this inaugural episode, hosts Claire Howorth, Katie Nicholl, and Erin Vanderhoof discuss Prince William’s role as the royal responsible for holding the family together amid a maelstrom of illness and personal rifts. How has William balanced his public role with his private challenges? Has he recovered from the hit to his reputation when Harry spilled  in his memoir, Spare? And if his reign were to come sooner than anyone imagined, would he be ready?

    41 min

  5. FEB 15

    Introducing: This is Uncomfortable

    At what point do you walk away from your dreams? Kashy gave himself a deadline: if he didn’t become a pop star by the time he turned 25, he’d give up music. But years after he left his music career behind, the universe gave him a second chance, thousands of miles from home.

    36 min

  6. JAN 30

    From In the Dark: The Runaway Princesses

    The wives and daughters of Dubai’s ruler live in unbelievable luxury. So why do the women in Sheikh Mohammed’s family keep trying to run away? The New Yorker staff writer Heidi Blake joins In the Dark’s Madeleine Baran to tell the story of the royal women who risked everything to flee the brutality of one of the world’s most powerful men. In four episodes, drawing on thousands of pages of secret correspondence and never-before-heard audio recordings, “The Runaway Princesses” takes listeners behind palace walls, revealing a story of astonishing courage and cruelty.“The Runaway Princesses” is a four-part narrative series from In the Dark and The New Yorker. To keep listening, follow In the Dark wherever you get your podcasts or via this link https://link.chtbl.com/itd_f

    14 min

  7. 2023-05-16

    The Rebranding of King Charles

    The king’s speech? That may mean far less than what has so far gone unsaid over the days of celebration and circumstance. What comes next for the man and his family?

    33 min

  8. 2023-05-08

    The King, the Queen, and Their Country

    The DYNASTY hosts recap King Charles’s coronation, the highs and lows, and the Prince Harry of it all

    36 min
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Unimaginable secrets. Unyielding power. Devastating rifts and shocking allegiances. With surprising new interviews as well as historic sound, Vanity Fair’s DYNASTY examines the ties that bind the one of the most influential families in the world today, taking you inside their lives for a glimpse at the inner workings of privilege.  DYNASTY goes deep on the modern Windsors with Vanity Fair’s royal correspondent Katie Nicholl and staff writer Erin Vanderhoof, who reexamine the complex, sometimes fiery family dynamics—from the intimate side of the queen’s early reign to Harry and Meghan’s royal split to Prince Andrew’s shameful scandal to the reign of King Charles—with razor-sharp insights, fresh reportage, and exclusive guests. For more on DYNASTY, visit vf.com/dynasty

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