Prince Philip warned Kate Middleton against confusing royal prominence with personal celebrity, according to biographer Gyles Brandreth, who linked the late duke's advice to his concerns about Princess Diana's experience inside the monarchy.
The account, published in Brandreth's biography "Philip: The Final Portrait" and revisited by InStyle on October 18, describes Philip urging Prince William's wife to keep public attention focused on her duties and the causes she represented.
"If you believe the attention is for you, for you personally, you're going to end up in trouble," Philip told Kate, according to Brandreth. "The attention is for your role, what you do, what you're supporting. It isn't for you as an individual. You are not a celebrity. You are representing the royal family. That's all."
Kate had already spent years under media scrutiny during her relationship with William before their April 2011 wedding. Marriage brought an official position within the royal family, with responsibilities extending beyond the interest in her private life.
Brandreth's account portrays Philip as concerned about how someone entering that role would handle intense public recognition. It also suggests he believed Kate was well equipped for it: the author wrote that Philip welcomed William's choice of a "level-headed girl."
His reported instructions extended to the practical business of appearing before photographers. Rather than acknowledging cameras during engagements, Philip encouraged Kate to concentrate on the people she was meeting.
"Don't look at the camera. The Queen never looks at the camera. Never. Look at who you are talking to. Look at who you've come to see. Diana looked at the camera," Brandreth quoted him as saying.
The comparison reflected Philip's reported interpretation of Diana's public life. Brandreth wrote that both Philip and Queen Elizabeth II had concerns about how her extraordinary popularity affected her relationship with the institution.
"One of the things that saddened, and worried, the Queen and Prince Philip about Diana, Princess of Wales, was not that she was popular, but that she allowed her popularity to go to her head," Brandreth wrote.
That assessment represents the biographer's account of their views. Diana's experience also involved relentless tabloid attention and tensions within the royal household, making popularity only one element of the pressures surrounding her.
The private conversations described in the biography have not been independently confirmed in the supplied reporting. Nor does Brandreth's account establish how much Philip's advice directly influenced Kate's subsequent approach.
Brandreth nevertheless said he had observed her concentrating on the people around her during public appearances. "I have been on walkabout with the Duchess of Cambridge. She does not look at the camera," he wrote.
Philip died in April 2021, aged 99. Kate's more recent engagements have continued to include the kind of direct community contact described in Brandreth's account.
During a September 30 visit to West Sussex Minibus, a volunteer transport service supporting people affected by social isolation, Kate helped passengers board and accompanied elderly residents on their journey, according to InStyle. She also joked that she sometimes becomes so absorbed in visits that she forgets her handbag.
