In case you’re unaware, college sweethearts Prince William and Kate Middleton will wed at Westminster Abbey on Friday. Love stories can inspire even the most cynical folks, but many Americans wish royal wedding coverage had a smaller presence in the United States.
There might be greater interest in the royal wedding’s potential disasters or mishaps, in addition to ceremony parodies, according to Debra Caruso, founder and head of DJC Communications.
“More of us are waiting to see how Jon Stewart, David Letterman and Stephen Colbert will frame the event,” Caruso told the Christian Science Monitor. “We’re attracted to the negative. Will there be a slip-up? Will someone mouth words on camera that will make headlines? Guaranteed, the fashion ‘don’ts’ will make more news than the fashion ‘dos.'”
Some don’t even want to hear satirical coverage of the ceremony. British historian and Harvard University professor Niall Ferguson told The Daily Caller that he did not wish to comment on the royal wedding at all because it was of no interest to him.
“Sorry to say I am not talking about the royal wedding, which really doesn’t interest me in the slightest,” Ferguson wrote in an email to TheDC.
When reminded by TheDC that he criticized the upcoming nuptials during a Monday MSNBC appearance, Ferguson wrote, [‘”Morning Joe’ host] Joe Scarborough and I were exchanging a few pleasantries about it, but that wasn’t the main topic of our conversation!”
During Ferguson’s “Morning Joe” visit, he said the royal wedding makes him feel ill.
“I must admit, I have great difficulty talking about this subject without waves of nausea sweeping over me,” Ferguson said. “Even more than the Clinton wedding, I want to throw up. And I’m leaving the country tomorrow morning.”
Though “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski asked Ferguson, “Please talk about your nausea, it’s good,” Scarborough inquired about Ferguson’s predictions on Middleton’s gown.
“I think [the wedding] is trivial to the point of disappearing,” Ferguson said. “Compared with what is happening because it’s a holiday today, I mean, by the way, these people that you see in the background are not British. The British have fled to the seaside, and only tourists and the American media are here in London today … I felt the same way about the last royal wedding. It always makes me feel very queasy, I don’t believe it has any economic significance at all, that’s why I don’t want to talk about it, please, please.”
“You’re such a curmudgeon,” Brzezinski said.
[WATCH: Ferguson get worked up over the royal wedding]
Ferguson is not the first to publicly berate the royal wedding. Others have pointed fingers at the betrothed couple for being showy and extravagant.
“Kate and William would impress me if they had a nice, quiet normal wedding in a nice English church and then released a video of it around the world and sent the proceeds to Japanese tsunami-earthquake victims, or even East L.A.,” a female Czech immigrant named Mrs. Hunt told the Christian Science Monitor. “Do you know how much money they are spending just on security?”
Setting aside the visible expenses, some are just burned out by the amount of attention the media has paid to the royal wedding.
David J. Phillips of the United Kingdom told CBS News of the wedding, “It’s just noise — more noise — and a lot of noise. That’s it.”
“The NoNonsense Man” Marc H. Rudov, a radio and television personality, told TheDC that the “royal wedding obsession is mystifying” since so many Americans are staying single rather than tying the knot.
“So, many folks are clueless about the historical significance of the British monarchy — let alone any monarchy,” Rudov said, citing a Marist poll that found 26 percent of Americans do not know that America won independence from England. “In my opinion, the key reason people will watch the Royal Wedding is that, like ‘American Idol,’ it’s a big show on TV, driven by buzz, glitz, peer pressure and vicarious envy.”
According to a recent CBS poll, only three in 10 Americans say they’re very or somewhat engaged with the pre-wedding news. Thirty percent report they’re following it, but not intensely, and 42 percent say they’re not paying any attention to the spectacle.