King Charles was just completely torn apart by late night talk show host John Oliver over his upcoming coronation right in the middle of a cost of living crisis.
The monarch will be crowned in a lavish ceremony on Saturday – expected to cost hundreds of millions of taxpayer funds – after spending 70 years as the heir to the throne, eight months after his mother’s death.
But, as Oliver noted on his HBO show Last Week Tonight, the timing is “less than ideal”.
After all, the Bank of England’s chief economist recently pointed out that “we’re all worse off” amid the cost of living crisis and soaring inflation, so the display of wealth and extravagance that comes with the traditional crowning feels quite out of place.
Oliver then got personal, calling Charles “the world’s least likeable orphan” after both his parents died over the last two years.
He began: “Yes, the coronation of the world’s least likeable orphan is less than a week away now, meaning they are really going through with this, I guess.
“They’re actually going to print banknotes with the image of a man whose face only a mother could love and only two cousins could produce.”
Queen Elizabeth II and her husband Prince Philip were third cousins, with the same great-great-grandmother of Queen Victoria.
Once the audience’s laughter died down, Oliver also rinsed Charles’ popularity among the younger generation of Brits, pointing to a recent YouGov poll which found only a third of Brits aged between 18 and 24 actively support the monarchy.
The survey also asked if Charles was “out of touch”.
Oliver then asked his viewers: “I don’t know, is this guy out of touch?” Cue an image of Charles in a horse drawn carriage and a top hat on popping up on screen.
“Is this guy?” He asked again, as a formal portrait of Charles back when he was invested as the Prince of Wales wearing a crown, appeared for viewers.
Then Oliver played his trump card and asked the same question again – only for a well-known image of Charles’s brother Prince Andrew to pop up, walking with his-then friend (and convicted sex offender) Jeffrey Epstein.
Cue a wave of shocked laughter from the unsuspecting audience...
Watch the clip here: