Royal pageantry will be impressive

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

Opinion

Millions of eyes, including a substantial number in New Zealand, will be focused on London tomorrow night for the coronation of King Charles III — a man who has waited most of his life for this moment.

If ever a new monarch had a hard act to follow it is Charles. His mother Elizabeth, who died in September after seven decades on the throne, was widely admired both at home and abroad, even by many who were not royalists.

And in some ways his reign is seen as a kind of interregnum until his more popular son William and wife Kate take over the Crown.

If we are to believe the royal gossip columnists, Charles had a hard early life largely brought up by nannies and then sent to an austere school in Scotland, which he is said to have hated.

Then there was that long period when he seemed to have struggled to find a meaningful role in the shadow of his mother, and was seen as a slightly eccentric man who talked to vegetables and had strong views on architecture.

Add to that his choice of quiche as the main course at the coronation feast.

Then there was the death of his estranged wife the hugely popular Princess Diana in a Paris traffic tunnel in 1997. The initial response of the Queen was seen as being cold and uncaring, while Charles was said to be distraught.

Saturday will be a big day for Queen consort Camilla who was once one of the most hated women in the UK and blamed, probably unjustly, for the break-up of Charles’ marriage. Some of that feeling has dissipated over time and she appears to be the perfect partner for Charles in the challenging next stage of his life.

Where does all this leave New Zealand? Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, who identifies as a republican, was in London meeting Charles and William and managing to show his Hutt-Valley-boy colours by emerging from his meeting with Charles with a bag of sausage rolls.

While his fellow republicans here have been waiting for the death of the Queen, there are no obvious signs of a surge for change and Hipkins himself has said that it’s not on his agenda.

One thing that viewers can be sure of is that nobody can do an event like this as well as the Brits, with supreme pageantry expertise such as mounted cavalry and a gold coach rolling down to Westminster Abbey and back to the palace. It will certainly be colourful TV worthy of the occasion.