JANET STREET-PORTER: Sorry Anne Robinson, but I can’t see the snarky ‘Queen of Mean’ holding her sharp tongue just because she’s met her elderly Prince Charming (and, no, I’m not jealous)

It might be the season of good cheer and good will to all, but I find it difficult to congratulate Anne Robinson – the Queen of Mean – on her new posh boyfriend, Andrew Parker Bowles. It seems that Anne (79) and the 83-year-old retired army officer have been secretly dating for a year, according to locals in their smart bit of the Cotwolds.

What is it about these ageing lovers that gives me the ‘ick’?

More importantly – am I jealous? Possibly. Single men with all their faculties intact are thin on the ground, especially when you enter your seventies and live in a rural area. Particularly blokes with a hot line to the top tier of the monarchy. What better way to get the latest royal gossip? This relationship is not about the cash or financial security. 

Anne, unlike APB – living on his army pension – earned a fortune hosting game-shows on telly here and in the USA. Even though she claimed her second divorce in 2002 set her back £20 million, she’s continued to work ever since, most recently hosting 265 episodes of Countdown. So this tie-up could be a win-win situation for both participants.

Anne is best known as the host of The Weakest Link (pictured for the show), which she presented from 2000 to 2017.

Andrew divorced Camilla in 1995 after 22 years of marriage, but remain close friends – despite a complicated history which included infidelity on both parts (pictured in 2020)

But every time I look at Anne Robinson, I am reminded of her remark about her first facelift. When viewers of the Weakest Link were confused by the drastic change in her appearance, she told a journalist: ‘It’s a bit like taking a leg of lamb out of the oven – you have to let it rest for a bit’.

Comparing your face to a scrag end of mutton shows a healthy dose of realism, if nothing else. Anne became famous for her no-holds-barred repartee with guests, and once asked a gay chef on a cooking show: ‘What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever put in your mouth?’ On being told that the contestant on one of her shows was an accountant she asked him: ‘Is that as exciting as it sounds?’

Not the kind of brutal putdown King Charles would welcome over a canape.

But a shared love of fox-hunting might paper over any little differences between these two social misfits. We’re told they’ve enjoyed a cosy dinner with another well-connected Cotswold local, former PM ‘Dave’ Cameron, who recently returned to work as Foreign Secretary to ‘help out’ Rishi Sunak.

On paper, I’ve got a lot in common with the two senior lovebirds. Like Anne , I’ve enjoyed a long career as a columnist, edited a national newspaper, hosted TV shows, and am known for speaking my mind. As for Andrew, we share the same birthday! It’s December 27th, in case you would like to send a card. Long before Charles and Camilla became a public couple, I shared a roast dinner with Andrew, who was delightfully witty company.

Andrew Parker Bowles arrives at Westminster Abbey for A memorial service in June of last year

To be truthful, I was invited by my local pub landlord. When six posh blokes (a Lord and several Hons) were staying overnight on a shooting trip (grouse not films) found that I lived down the road, they asked me to join them, probably to experience how common people spoke.

Whatever the reason for my invitation, it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening. Andrew turned out to be a real charmer and rather sexy in the flesh. Viewers of the Crown will also remember he is alleged to have dated Princess Anne (and plenty of other well-connected young fillies) before marrying Camilla. During their marriage, both partners are said to have strayed – as we found out during tampon-gate, when tapes of Camilla’s secret lover Charles revealed our future King babbling on in the most embarrassing way.

Of course, that was centuries ago, but I cannot get enthused about the bizarre spectacle of someone so closely connected to our King and Queen dating a woman even more sarky and common than myself. Who would have thought that Anne – a former chicken gutter (her mum owned a poultry wholesale business) – could snare a chap who remains on best pals with his former wife, the Queen?

JANET STREET-PORTER: What is it about these ageing lovers that gives me the ‘ick’? More importantly – am I jealous? Possibly

Their connection post-divorce remains strong: Andrew was invited to the wedding of Charles and Camilla and the Coronation. He socialises in the highest circles and is known for his good manners, wit and effortless charm. Anne Robinson, on the other hand, has the unfortunate skill of making anyone who comes into contact with her feel on edge. Her period on Countdown was marked by an atmosphere of Arctic frostiness between Queen Anne and the two other female presenters, bubbly Rachel and lovely Dictionary Corner expert Susie Dent.

Once on the Weakest Link, she almost reduced John Noakes to tears by asking ‘what was the end for Shep?’ Shep was the legendary Blue Peter dog Noakes had reared as a treaured pet. Anne once remarked she had nothing to say to celebrities and ‘didn’t want to be a cheesy gameshow host’, but managed to contain her distaste to present celebrity versions of all her gameshows year after year.

I once met Anne Robinson and we were chatting about cooking and I mentioned I owned an Aga. The next day she wrote she was amazed that ‘someone like Janet Street-Porter’ owned such a posh cooker. I should have remembered her first column for the Daily Mirror was entitled The Wednesday Witch.

She also claimed that she was the oldest person on the box who ‘wasn’t judging cakes’. Of course this is untrue – like much of Anne’s throwaway put downs, it’s designed to reinforce your view of her as a strong woman more macho than any bloke who crosses her path. Gloria Hunniford, Angela Rippon, Prue Leith and Anneka Rice would all have something to say about that.

Anne Robinson certainly isn’t a friend of other women: when the Harvey Weinstein affair unfolded in 2017, the #MeToo movement empowered thousands of women to come forward with allegations of sexual harrassment in the workplaces. Anne commented ’40 years ago we had a much more robust attitude to men behaving badly’, and moaned about the ‘fragility’ of women who ‘aren’t able to cope with the treachery of the workplace’.

Camilla, then Duchess of Cornwall, is pictured here chatting to Anne Robinson at the 2013 Man Booker Prize for Fiction

The Queen of Mean’s attitude to Princess Diana might – on the face of it – play well with some of her new royal pals. In 1982, as assistant editor of the Daily Mirror, she ran a scoop claiming that Diana was suffering from anorexia, which turned out to be true. The palace complained and she was taken off any future royal stories by her boss, anxious not to lose readers desperate for Diana stories.

In 2002, the BBC ran a six-part series asking the public to vote for Great Britons. Anne presented the first episode, choosing Jane Austen, with Maggie Thatcher a close second. She wrote in Radio Times that she was absolutely appalled so many viewers voted for Diana, calling it ‘absurd’, adding ‘every time her popularity dropped, she hit another hospice’.

In another interview, Anne announced ‘I don’t do royalty’ – because Prince Philip had asked her to present the Duke of Edinburgh Awards (for nothing) – and when she demanded he appear on The Weakest Link in return, she didn’t get a reply.

So will Anne be reinventing herself as royal-friendly, smoothing off those abrasive corners and learning how to chat politely about absolutely nothing at all- something the upper classes do so well?

I have my doubts. At 79, it’s far too late for the Queen of Mean to become our Lady of Loveliness.

Me, jealous? Of course not.

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