For the lucky few jetting off to attend St George's Chapel for the nuptials of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, these are heady days.
One can well imagine the mad dash to the milliner to pick the perfect fascinator or floral ensemble, or the sprint to the tailor to have a morning suit hand cut – or even the sweet evergreen scent of the bride's myrtle bouquet as she swans past the medieval pews to join her Windsor beau.
The rest of us, however – as the regal "I do's" are cooed on May 19 – must content ourselves with dabbing our misty eyes from the sofa, as we lounge in our yoga pants and perhaps nibble on some shop-bought Battenberg, ensconced in front of the telly.
Well, the royals-obsessed programmers at E! channel have our back – with an exciting line-up leading right up to the altar of this fairy tale wedding, with wall-to-wall coverage live from London and Windsor on the big day.
As handsome as Prince Harry may be with his ginger mane and megawatt smile, long-time royalty watchers anticipate the star of the show will more likely be the freckled California girl, Meghan, as she morphs into a royal.
The two will marry at St George’s Chapel in Windsor, which has been the site of royal weddings in the past including Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, as well as that of the forthcoming wedding of Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank later this year.
But what does becoming a royal entail for a young woman like Markle in 2018?
E! attempts to answer this question at 10pm tonight with The Real Princess Diaries: From Diana to Meghan, a wedding special that breaks down the future of a modern-day princess through a dissection of the lives of three trailblazing women: Diana, Princess of Wales; Kate Middleton, Duchess of Cambridge; and Markle, who is tipped by experts to become, most likely, the next Duchess of Sussex.
The special boasts a roster of royal, pop culture and style experts including: Karamo Brown (Queer Eye); Michelle Lee (Editor-in-Chief, Allure magazine); Melanie Bromley, E! News Chief Correspondent; Zanna Roberts Rassi (Senior Fashion Editor, Marie Claire magazine); Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan (fashion bloggers known collectively as The Fug Girls), and more.
“The special will look at how these modern-day royals are redefining what that means through their lifestyles, fashion, philanthropy and socially,” according to E! publicity.
“Viewers will also get a chance to look back at how Diana set the standard for future generations, how Kate has carried that torch, and how Meghan will further redefine what the world thinks of the British royal family. These royal insiders will revisit the lavish weddings of Diana and Kate, and make predictions of what’s to come for Meghan’s big day.”
In the run-up to the ceremony, starting on Monday, May 14, E! News: Daily Pop will serve up royal bonbons all week. Bromley will report live from London and Windsor, England, with the latest on Prince Harry, 33, and Meghan, 36, and the final preparations for their marriage. Fans can also expect Bromley to dish helpings of gossip from the inevitable revels and parties loaded with A-list celebrities.
We get down to the brass tacks starting 1pm on May 19 with E! Live From the Royal Wedding – with five straight hours of coverage hosted by Rancic, Bromley, celebrity fashion stylist Brad Goreski and E! UK TV personality Sarah-Jane Crawford.
Should you happen to be among the few people who find themselves indisposed that Saturday and don't have five hours to devote to royal romance, then check out the one-hour recap and highlights reel – E! Royal Wedding Rundown – that sums it up at 11pm on Sunday, May 20.
E!'s competition on the royalty beat is the British network ITV Choice, also available from OSN, with A Very Royal Wedding, a 2017 documentary to be broadcast at 5pm and 10pm on Friday, May 11. Before the lavish ceremony for William and Kate, and before Charles and Diana's fairytale nuptials, there was the enchanting wedding of Elizabeth and Philip. A Very Royal Wedding celebrates the 70th anniversary of the Queen and Prince Philip's marriage in November 1947.
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Read more:
Royal wedding: Meghan Markle's parents to visit queen
Royal wedding: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle reveal details of their big day
Beneath a baobab: how Prince Harry and Meghan's love blossomed in Botswana
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On May 18, the night before the Windsor knot-tying, ITV Choice will also present a cosy royal pair. Harry and Meghan: A Very Modern Romance, again to be shown at 5pm and 10pm, will afford viewers a chance to get to know the new couple and their entourage and follow their love story from the its beginning to their engagement and today.
Diana and the Paparazzi, set to follow at 5.55pm and 10.55pm, is a documentary made to mark the 20th anniversary of the death of Princess Diana in car crash in Paris in August 1997. It reveals how Diana learned to manipulate and control the photographers who pursued her ever since she started seeing the heir to the British throne, Prince Charles, in the early 1980s.
On Saturday, ITV Choice unwraps its wedding coverage at 11.20 am with Invitation to a Royal Wedding, a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into planning an event of this magnitude, followed at 12.25pm by Royal Wedding Live, a full afternoon of the nuptials as the ceremony unfolds.
