Sarah Ferguson to Oprah on Sting: I Was Drinking
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Britain's Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, has told Oprah Winfrey she was drinking and "in the gutter" during a videotaped sting in which she apparently offered to sell access to her ex-husband, Prince Andrew.
"I'm aware of the fact that I've been drinking, you know, that I was not in my right place," Ferguson said in an interview set to air on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" on Tuesday.
Ferguson said she had seen the video while traveling through airports recently but had not sat down to watch it closely: "I haven't faced the devil in the face. Because I was in the gutter at that moment," she said, according to a transcript released by the show on Monday.
Tape of the sting was posted on the website of London's News of the World, which set up the meeting. In it, Ferguson appears to ask for $40,000 in cash and 500,000 pounds ($718,500) by wire transfer, in exchange for introducing an undercover reporter to the prince.
The newspaper's sting operation has caused a major embarrassment for the 50-year-old Ferguson, who has two daughters with Prince Andrew, the second son of Queen Elizabeth and fourth in line to the throne.
The couple divorced in 1996 and the prince, also known as the Duke of York, acts as Britain's special representative for international trade and investment.
Hey, if I had THAT valuable a commodity to sell -- and I needed the money -- I'd sell it, too!
I feel sorry for her. Apparently she only gets around 15,000 Euros annually as part of her divorce settlement. It's certainly not enough to live on.
It's true that her divorce settlement only gives her £15,000 a year, which is the about the average beginning salary of a secretary in London (yes, really), but she also gets thousands and thousands more for her endorsements, speaking engagements, and children's books. She has a butler, a dresser, and a personal assistant. She's doing way better than any regular citizen, and she doesn't even have to have a job. Her problem is she spends like a drunken sailor and has had very public debt problems for years, the first of which broke in the news back when I was living in London.
After she was caught cheating on Andrew, which caused the separation and divorce filing, she should have gone back to school right away for a qualification. She originally left school at 18, I don't think she had any A levels or qualifications at all, she just figured she'd marry rich, like her mother did, and like her mother did again after she left Sarah's father. Well, she did marry rich, but then she was caught in pictures suntanning topless while a boyfriend was sucking her toes.
I was in London during their divorce, and it came out at that time that she was massively in debt due to living a ridiculously elaborate lifestyle, so she's got a history of this. It took a couple of years, but she managed to pay off her debt through all her highly paid endorsements. But she's still doing it, now living off her daughters' money to support the "royal" lifestyle she feels she deserves. There are lots of minor royals in the UK who have to work for a living, they don't have butlers and dressers. Sarah could have gotten a 2 year qualification through school and started a small business, like a public relations firm. She should have done that right away instead of waiting for stuff to be handed to her. She also should have gotten some cash from the sale of the palace she shared with Andrew, hopefully she'll get a new divorce settlement and she will.
She came across as total trash on that video, drunk and undignified, but she's done similar things in the past, too. The UK public never had much respect for her, she's always come across as trashy and not terribly bright.
If one acts that stupid while drinking, one should keep one's arse at home when imbibing!
Now she is saying she did it for a friend!
Looks like she's making excuses, esp when she is changing up her story.
Not that it matters much, but what kind of meeting were they supposedly arranging-a one on one interview with Andrew? Did Ferguson actually believe that Andrew would go along with an arrangement like that? I'd say it 's grounds for Andrew to get a restraining order against Ferguson. Luckily, it was just a sting operation by a newspaper. But it could have been people wanting to kidnap or kill Andrew. Sarah Ferguson had no way of knowing the true intent of the people bribing her.
I honestly don't think this is a big deal. She was peddling an introduction to someone who is no more than a celebrity title. It's not like she was going to hit up the Prime Minister to influence policy. If I were Andrew though I would stay as far away from her as I could from now on.
On a different topic, I won't be sorry to see Oprah go away. I am sick of the fallen celebrities who run to sit on her couch in tears with their litany of excuses for some sort of bad behavior. It's gotten really old.
(06-03-2010 11:16 AM)Horse Racer Wrote: [ -> ]On a different topic, I won't be sorry to see Oprah go away. I am sick of the fallen celebrities who run to sit on her couch in tears with their litany of excuses for some sort of bad behavior. It's gotten really old.
I don't know that that's her fault though. They run to her to spill their guts and the public eats it up.
I watched the show with Ferggie and was actually fascinated watching her try to explain herself. Total trainwreck.
Obviously, her family did not prepare her for the real world. Too bad she can't seem to be able to know how to manage her money. What a leech on the royal family.
This stupid bitch has been an imbecile all her life. And I heard just the other day one of her daughters said what a terrific role model she is. Really? For what? Slut-drunk of the century?