Sarah's Interviews and Television Appearances

[HighGoalHighDreams]

Could we perhaps dedicate this new thread to discussing Sarah's ongoing interactions with the media (her recent explosion of interviews) and how it is changing public perception of her?

To me at least, her interviews constantly bring up issues I would like to discuss more in depth but that do not fall under the heading of current events concerning Sarah. This includes her comments about Catherine/ William and her daughters. I fear though that if I comment on these issues too in depth it would unfairly derail Sarah's current events thread.

For example, the relationship with her daughters Sarah describes is very interesting, but beside the point of either Sarah or the princesses' current events. A similar issue is her ongoing assessments of Catherine, a woman she has never met. I would love to hear members' more in-depth thoughts on Sarah's interviews and her new show as it airs.

[HighGoalHighDreams]

I'm not sure whether this thread will pick up to discuss Finding Sarah or if we'll just discuss the documentary in the Current Events thread.

The documentary didn't take two seconds to frustrate me. How can she NOT see the contradiction between "I have lost myself because of a life in the public eye" and a documentary on the Oprah network?

"Everyone told us not to [kiss on the balcony] so we did it deliberately." The absolute confirmation that she knew better from the first. Day.

[Mia_mae]

Hey tnks for the thread!
I can't watch it (not in the US) so if you could give some update .

[HighGoalHighDreams]

Of course. I will try to keep my commentary out of my updates, even if I can't help some parenthetical remarks!

-- Beatrice and Eugenie appeared within the first several minutes, and they are giving substantial answers. (It looks like the royal family is on a trashy reality TV show. Ugh ugh ugh.)

-- The show so far has been her with Dr. Phil. She is talking about her childhood, specifically her mother leaving and her mother's death. Her mother was killed in a car accident after refusing to tell Sarah that she loved her. Sarah tells Dr. Phil that her mother was "going to beat the devil out" of her. Dr. Phil asks Sarah if she realizes how wrong this was, and Sarah claims that no, she did not realize this. She also tears up when she tells Dr. Phil that she could never leave her own daughters.

-- Dr. Phil has just described Sarah as "emotionally bankrupt" because she recalled her mother's death like she was "ordering a pizza." (I can't agree with Dr. Phil here.) Dr. Phil explains that being emotionally bankrupt as disconnecting from other people, being depressed/ anxious, and having a emotional meltdowns.

-- Dr. Phil is talking about "personal truths," which seems to mean the basic believes one has about oneself. He says other people wrote on her slates growing up, but the damage comes from believing those things about herself. She says she can't accept her daughters' constant compliments, and it would "make her world" complete if she could. She is says her girls are very confident when asked how she would feel if her own daughters felt that way about themselves, seeming to imply that they never would.

[HighGoalHighDreams]

-- Sarah describes herself as worthless, useless, hideous, etc. a lot.

-- A bit past the half-way point the show switches from Dr. Phil to London. Sarah is shown in a chauffeured BMW eating sweets. She is giving her driver an oral tour of her own experiences in London ("That's my house," referring to BP, "... that's my old room.") Her room was on the second floor, above the balcony (I believe in the US this is called the third floor?) and had a view of the so-called wedding cake, the round statue area outside the gates of the palace.
--- This section lasted less than two minutes.

-- From the first section: She also says she has no sense of the access-to-Andrew scandal being morally wrong.

-- I missed who the new lady they brought in is, but she is apparently some sort of life coach-- name Suzie. They are at Royal Lodge together. She says that she fell in love with Andrew, the man, not because he was a prince. She also says she had no idea how the inner world of royalty works, "I thought I was going to live with my man."

-- She "had to" take an allowance from the Queen because she "married the second son." When they divorced, she "just had to get on with it." She started writing books and worked for Wedgewood.

-- "I don't really understand finances at all." "Trying to keep my head above the water," financially, all the money she made went to paying her staff.

-- After the cash for access scandal, she lost her home, all her jobs, and her staff. She says Andrew is "so generous, he is allowing me to be a guest in his home." The life coach says she needs to make money and be dependent. Sarah owes money to three personal friends and three firms.

- Suzie says Sarah's self-worth is not a problem of her not having money. Sarah demands a straight answer about how to get self-worth, and Suzie says there is no one answer. Suzie says finding the meaning of worth and life is what life is about.

-- Sarah comments that everyone is going to think she is so selfish because she is talking about herself. (Why on earth is she doing a documentary about herself if this bothers her? ) Suzie says who cares what anyone thinks?! Sarah says, "I do," and Suzie says "You won't when you're on your death bed." She says what Sarah will think on her death bed needs to be the focus.

[sliver_bic]

I just found out I have it. The show is just ending (8 minutes left) but will be up again at 11. I'll see what I can before going off to bed and I'll try to jump in on it.

[HighGoalHighDreams]

-- Suzie asks if Sarah likes herself and Sarah emphatically replies "Of course not!"

-- Sarah says she doesn't keep in touch with the royal family because she is divorced and "not invited" (but the question was just asking about contact.) Sarah says that it adds to her lack of self worth that they ostracize her. It seems as if she making an appeal to be included in the family-- (will her comments on Oprah change anything?!)

-- Bea and Eugenie did not appear again after their comments at the beginning of the show.

-- Suzie says she wasn't expecting to like Sarah but she did.

--"I'm 51 and I have no self worth an I have to find it."

-- In the preview for upcoming shows Beatrice is seen saying, "Every time I wasn't with you something bad would happen, and I wouldn't be there to fix it."

That's the end of this episode.

[Mermaid1962]

The child parenting the parent.

Originally Posted by HighGoalHighDreams

-- In the preview for upcoming shows Beatrice is seen saying, "Every time I wasn't with you something bad would happen, and I wouldn't be there to fix it."

[Kellydofc]

I actually have a lot of sympathy for Sarah after seeing this part maybe because I have been through such similar things myself.

[roseroyal]

All I will/can say is that I have a lot more sympathy for Sarah after watching the first part, than I have had for a long time.
No wonder she is broken after such an awful childhood. A lot of people would say " Move forward, grow up." I do not believe it is that simple.

[Donna B.]

I have trouble believing her. I get the impression she is a master manipulator.

[sndral]

I only saw the first bit. Beatrice and Eugenie looked very uncomfortable, sitting on a couch, saying their mother was very generous and not very good with money. I can't believe that the Queen and P. Phillip are going to like involving the Princesses in this tawdry soap opera trash, and if Andrew approved, he's thicker than I thought possible. They can't approve of Sarah using the girls to save her own bacon.
I found the whole moral compass conversation interesting. When Dr. Phil (whom I have never watched before) asks Sarah if the money for access thing offended her moral compass before she knew it was a set up, she had a blank look on her face - she didn"t get it, she danced around the question and finally claimed that it wasn't a bribe and that she knew that taking a bribe was wrong, and as she'd never take a bribe, it wasn't a bribe.
I'll have to watch the whole thing, but I'm getting the feeling that she's a narcissist, hardly surprising, given that her mother seemed to be self absorbed as well.
From the bit I saw I was grow up already. Maybe I'll feel differently when I have the chance to watch the whole thing.

[maria-olivia]

I Belgian we saw on TV Sarah in a car passing before Buckingham Palace . She was eating and eating sweets and speaking during eating she said :
That was my room on the second floor and ....

[Diarist]

Ah, I've just found this thread - and it has answered the questions I was asking on the other thread.

I will start by saying that in the UK papers this weekend, Sarah is quoted as saying that she wasn't in fact abused and that this is the wrong impression people are getting. I am unclear whether Sarah is 'backpedalling' i.e. having claimed she was abused is now seeking to change her mind, or whether she is claiming that 'Finding Sarah' has been edited in such a way as to make it look like she has been abused when she has not... There is also a suggestion that parts of the programme had to be re-edited when OW decided that they were 'not sensational enough'. If this 're-editing claim' is accurate - then oh dear me!

I have not seen the programme of course, and so can only comment on what others have said, but I have to say that my immediate impression is not good and that Sarah - and I hate to say it - is being manipulative.

'Cash for Access': If Sarah did not think it was wrong, why then did she set up the rendezvous secretly, without the knowledge of her staff? [in fact, didn't one of her senior executive staff resign in disgust when news of the sting came out?]People here have suggested that it is not a crime to set up introductions and receive money for so-doing as it is common in business. I agree - in the commercial world you can 'introduce people' but it isin these particular cirumstances it is 'selling access' to a member of the royal family and that is not commercial, it is bribery. I am sorry, but I am convinced that Sarah knew she was doing wrong.

Appearance of her children in the documentary: I am sure that the Queen will be horrified: I think they should be 'left out' rather than being used to try to justify their mother's failings. In fact, I am quite sure that this will hasten B+E's 'relegation' to 'ordinary citizens'. The move away from 'being royal' has started with the removal of their police protection; I wonder, do forum members now think that the Queen might remove the girls' titles [which has been done with other members of the royal family in the past] to enable them to live more 'private lives'.

I think that the Queen and Prince Philip will be furious that Sarah has allowed someone connected with the programme to interview her at Royal Lodge [asssuming I read the above review correctly]. I am sure that this will now act to speed Sarah's departure from Royal Lodge.

I feel desperately sorry for anyone who as a child has been abused, but I do wonder whether Sarah is putting this light on things simply to try to dramatise things for the documentary in order to make the product more 'saleable'. To my mind we have had various 'confessionals' from Sarah for the best part of 25 years - why has she never mentioned this before now - is it because she has only just come to terms with it, or because there has been no abuse but Sarah desperately needs something to make the documentary more 'saleable'. Whilst some aspects of Sarah's upbringing might seem cold, it seems to be that it is really the typcal 'upper class' childhood. In fact on the basis of what Sarah has said, it appears that her actual childhood was much cosier than many of her upper class contemporaries - in many households, Sarah's mother would not be much in evidence [which is why I would cast doubt on the 'beating' stories] - this is because upper class children are raised on a day-to-day basis by nannies and tend to see their parents [usually for an hour or two before dinner, when they have been carefully washed and brushed by their nannies] and this hour or two is more 'social' rather than an opportunity for disciplining and correcting etc. Bearing in mind the upper class childhood and that Sarah went away to [boarding] school at eight and that her mother 'bolted' when Sarah was 13 or 14, I doubt whether Sarah even had that much contact with her mother. This might seem severe to many forum memebrs, but belive me, it is not strange for upper-class offspring.

I am sorry, but this does not ring true; I feel that Sarah was not abused at all, but is just trying to 'hang' her behaviour on something.

Incidentally, according to one of the quotations reproduced in the weekend papers here in the UK, Sarah says that she DID speak to her mother on the day that Susan Barrantes was killed and that her mother DID tell her that she loved Sarah.

I just don't feel that Sarah is moving forward at all with this. I think she should keep silent and seek any necessary therapy on the British National Health Service [free!!]

As for the 'I wanted to be with my man'. Well, I am sorry, everyone knows that if you marry a sailor, he is going to go away for periods - and all other naval wives put up with it. I can tell you that the Navy actually deferred to Andrew a lot - for example, they flew him back to the UK when Sarah was having Beatrice - most navy wives do NOT get this privilege. Service life for Sarah cannot have been such a mystery - her father was in the army, after all.

So, Sarah concedes she got an allowance from the Queen? I know that the Queen gave her one as soon as she got engaged: I am pleased Sarah now admits this; it does however make it look bad that she could not manage on what she had been given: as she had no private money of her own, I think that she should have been both grateful and careful with her spending....

Final point: who really knows what goes on in another's marriage? Well, arguably, only those in the marriage really know. As well as having met Sarah, I have met the Duke of York a good few times. And I would say this; he struck me as a 'good sort, albeit not very, very bright'. His only main passions appeared to be golf, a bit of photography and watching videos [DVDs]. This is only my personal opinion, but I am getting the impression that he bored Sarah. I remember how, at a weekend house party, Sarah, whilst pregnant with Beatrice, was sitting on the lap of one Steve Wyatt [the son of texan socialite Lyn Wyatt] and when the hostess and others tried to remove Sarah, Steve Wyatt instead drawled that 'nothing comes between mah woman and me'. Unfortunately for Sarah, there were a lot of guests at the house party and news of her behaviour soon found its way both to the newspapers and back to the Queen.

Incidentally, I have been told - although I do not know whether it is true, but I would not be surprised if it is - that Andrew never reads the papers: on that basis, I would conjecture that he has never really graped exactly what form Sarah's behaviour has taken on occasions.

The above thoughts are only my opinions and I don't wish to offend, but I am getting seriously exasperated with Sarah. I do NOT dislike Sarah, but feel that instead of all this public confessional, she really does need to 'get a grip'.

Alex

[NotAPretender]

Hello - Alex, as always, I enjoy your insight.

HighGoalsHighDreams, thank you for the running commentary.

I saw about 1 minute and a half of it. Last night was chock a block full of fun stuff on TV and this really didn't scream "watch me." The Tonys were on! However, what I saw was:

1. Sarah and Suzie Orman (financial guru here in the US with a good and hard-hitting show) discussing money and "self worth." Sarah kept simply demanding to know "the key" to self worth. Quite honestly, Sarah's look was blank hostility toward Suzie Orman, and several times I thought Sarah was just going to wave a dismissive hand and send Suzie on her peasant way. I did see Suzie's car-talking-head where she said "I think I made a friend today" and speaking warmly of Sarah, which really puzzled me, because Sarah was not at all warm to Ms. Orman and, as I said earlier, actually seemed hostile toward her. Sarahs' face was hard as granite and she looked like she was going to throw down a glove and call for her dueling pistols.

2. I too saw the preview for next week with Eugenie and had the same reaction. The daughter is trying to protect her mother from her own self? Quite honestly, that sounded a lot like the child of an alcoholic, and having formerly been married to the child of an alcoholic, I speak from first hand experience.

3. Sarah looked like she was Sir Paul McCartney's twin sister. I'm serious and not at all being mean or snarky. A couple of times, it was startling. She looked the same age and had the same facial features...everything. My husband actually walked behind me at one point and asked if it was a relative of McCartney's on TV, and why. I hadn't even mentioned it to him in that context.

4. Didn't see anything of the "Dr." Phil segment. For which I am grateful.

5. I think that the Queen is going to blow a gasket when she sees how involved her granddaughters are in this little reality show. I sincerely hope this show is worth the price that Sarah, Eugenie, Beatrice & Andrew are going to pay for it.

[Duchessmary]

I don't think the Queen is going to "blow a gasket". I'm sure Sarah had to explain exactly what was going to be featured on the show. I'm sure HM is probably rolling her eyes.

I'm not sure yet what my take is on this show. It seemed to be depressing and a sort of pity fest but I truly believe Sarah was hurt by the awful press she got, "The Duchess of Pork", a "Terrible mother", etc.

[Lumutqueen]

Finding Sarah: Fergie in tears as she recalls childhood beatings from her mother | Mail Online

[glassary]

Watched and must say I was fascinated by Sarah. Not because I believed all she that she was saying but that she appears to believe it.
It seems she is telling her own version of events to explain her poor choices in behavior. When she spoke of the day her mother left and how she rode her pony, then dads sold the pony. It appeared to be the perfect thing to say to a therapist to explain why she behaves the way she does.
Not sure if I heard correctly but did she actually say she only saw/dated Andrew 3 times before the engagement?
Admit I will be watching all 6 episodes as a guilty pleasure.

[Osipi]

Watching the first episode of "Finding Sarah", it got a little frustrating for me. To start with, Sarah put far too much emphasis on "all things royal" such as her room in BP, the plaque at Royal Lodge to QEQM, and even her attitude to her driver Philip was very condescending I think. Take away those clips and the overly long commercials for OWN and its endorsers, you really had very little actual "Finding Sarah" footage. Maybe that is what the title is all about... finding anything really to do with Sarah in the programming?

The session with Dr. Phil really looked to be too overly rehearsed. Perhaps we just saw edited clips from a longer session but with what Dr. Phil and Sarah were discussing, her attitude and reactions to him, her stony face made the dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief seem coached. Did she not wear make up on purpose to seem "fraught" in this program?

I still don't see the purpose of having her two daughters involved in this at all. It seems like this entire family is wearing blinders. Not only has Sarah said previously that she can't watch the "Cash for Access" tape, it seemed in this episode both Beatrice and Eugenie stated that they've never seen it either. From what I've read today in the forums about Andrew never reading the papers, chances are he's not seen it too. Its all well and good for children to support their parents but in this case, I think the girls were put in to as a carrot to lure in the viewers rather than have any serious impact on Sarah's "journey".

I really think the reported abuse was more stated on Dr. Phil's side rather than Sarah's. She recollected certain times and it was Dr. Phil who stated "You know this is not OK right?" kind of statements. That segment alludes to a lot of things that are never clarified but as been stated before, they stuck to the sensation evoking clips.

Suze was quite hard hitting on Sarah which is exactly what was called for I think. When asked if Sarah liked herself, she shot back "Of course not" without batting an eye. This gets to the crux of the matter. Perhaps if the program had just focused on Sarah herself rather than all these clips about palaces, plaques princesses and pooches, we might have actually gotten a lot more insight into Sarah herself. From the looks of the program so far, it seems to me that if after all 6 episodes are done and finished, if you take just the segments that focus on Sarah and edit them all together, it would all probably fit into an hour show.

Things may get better... we'll see.

[Kastalia]

Originally Posted by Kellydofc

I actually have a lot of sympathy for Sarah after seeing this part maybe because I have been through such similar things myself.

I also have sympathy for Sarah and I donn't understand people's cruelty towards her sometimes.