Woman who watched ‘savage’ Andrew Mountbatten musical berates ‘grotesque’ moment

Channel 4 controversially aired ‘Prince Andrew: The Musical’ back in 2022 – but how does it hold up now Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has been stripped of his titles…

Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has frequently been in the headlines since being wrapped up in the Jeffery Epstein scandal. Most recently, Andrew has been stripped of his royal titles and is being turfed out of his plush dwellings.

The former prince’s fall from grace was powered by his links to paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew,65, was accused of having sexual relations with a then 17 year old Virginia Giuffre. Giuffre claimed that she was trafficked by businessman Epstein and circulated among his friends for sex.

Andrew has vehemently denied all allegations brought against him. However, that didn’t stop a musical from being aired on Channel 4 where they poked ‘fun’ at the former Prince and his controversies.

‘Prince Andrew: The Musical’ was first shown on screens back in December 2022, with fans of the broadcaster majorly divided on the show.

However, how does it hold up now? Here, Frankie Collins, reporter from the Express, details her first viewing of ‘Prince Andrew: The Musical’ and was left shocked at one thing in particular.

I sat down expecting Channel 4’s Prince Andrew: The Musical to be outrageous, irreverent and a bit unhinged — but even with the bar already low, one moment genuinely floored me. I can handle satire. I can handle royals being mocked, skewered and torn apart — especially Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, who has given the nation more than enough raw material. But I wasn’t prepared for the moment the musical burst into a full-blown, upbeat song about Jeffrey Epstein.

That was the point where I stopped laughing. Because while Andrew himself is fair game, turning Epstein into a comedy hook felt like a tone-deaf leap into territory that should never be played for laughs. Even The Guardian’s Lucy Mangan pointed out the same thing at the time: the Epstein scandal is “played for laughs in a way that is not OK.” She was right — and watching it now, with Andrew stripped of his HRH and using the surname Mountbatten-Windsor, it lands even more uncomfortably.

The show retraces Andrew’s fall with brutal precision, flicking from his disastrous Newsnight interview to his friendship with Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.

But the moment the cast started cheerfully singing “A Different Kind of Duty” — a number built around Andrew being introduced to Epstein — it became impossible to ignore how grotesque the real-life context is.

Musical satire has limits, and that felt like one we shouldn’t be leaping over. What made it even more surreal is that the musical is actually very good at exposing Andrew’s delusion.

One early number sees him and Emily Maitlis both believing they “nailed” the Newsnight interview, which is funny only because we know what followed: titles gone, patronages gone, reputation gone.

Seeing that recreated now — knowing the man is Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor because he no longer has the right to use HRH — feels sharper, more brutal, and more revealing than it did in 2022.

But the wildest moment of all came right near the end, when Andrew launches into “You’re Always Gonna Need an Andrew,” insisting the Royal Family must keep him around as a permanent scapegoat.

It’s played for comedy, but the sting is real: the joke works because you can absolutely imagine him thinking it.

What struck me most is how the musical exposes the sheer delusion running through Andrew’s story. The jokes aren’t exaggerated — they’re pulled from things he genuinely said or believed.

And seeing that played out through song only widens the gap between the man he thinks he is and the reality the rest of us can see.

Satire should challenge, provoke and entertain — but it should also understand where the line is. And for me, the gleeful musicalisation of the Epstein chapter crossed it.

Mocking Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor is one thing. But the Epstein scandal isn’t a joke — it’s too horrific, too painful, and far too real for musical theatre treatment. That was the moment Channel 4’s sharpest royal roast crossed a line.