Michael Usher has opened up about his awkward interactions with Sarah Ferguson.
The Channel Seven reporter joined in Nova 96.9’s Fitzy & Wippa met Kate Ritchie on Thursday to review the big news stories of 2024.
During the chat, Michael “Wippa” Wipfli recalled Michael’s interview with 65-year-old Sarah from a 2011 episode of 60 Minutes.
“Wasn’t that a hot mess!” Wippa said, before co-host Kate Ritchie added, “I’ve never seen it, I want to hear you guys talk about it.”
During the car crash interview, the Duchess walked away mid-interview before returning to speak to Michael.
‘I had to call her Duchess. She didn’t want me to call her Sarah, lots of charisma and grace,” the veteran journalist said.
Michael Usher (pictured) has opened up about his awkward interactions with Sarah Ferguson
During the car crash interview, the Duchess (pictured) walked away mid-interview before returning to speak to Michael. ‘I had to call her Duchess. She didn’t want me to call her Sarah, lots of charisma and grace,” the veteran journalist said.
‘But she was doing well, and she was relatively sweet. But then there was this exact moment… she turned around and it was crazy to get her back in the chair.
“She came back and continued the interview, and then it was a different personality again,” he added.
The reporter then said that after the awkward interview, he and his crew were walking outside when the Duchess of York came running up behind them.
‘We walked outside and the Duchess came running after me. She took off her heels and stood on the lawn in her stockings. He said, “Michael, how was that?”
“At that point I just said, ‘Sarah, if I were you, I would ask to go back to the room and do that interview all over again because I don’t know what happened.’
‘Then she says, ‘Oh yeah, who wants to sign some books anyway? I’ll sign your book for you. And now, what are your children’s names?’ And from there she went away.
It comes just weeks after the Duchess opened up about the late Queen Elizabeth II’s motherly nature.
Appearing on the Jess Rowe Big Talk Show podcast, Sarah revealed the Queen was “more my mother than my own mother” as she paid tribute to the “legendary” late monarch.
‘We walked outside and the Duchess came running after me. She took off her heels and stood on the lawn in her stockings. He said, “Michael, how was that?”
Speaking to host Jess Rowe, Sarah – whose own mother died in a car crash in Argentina in 1998 – explained how the royal family was a mother figure in her life.
She said: ‘The special thing about the Queen was that she was more my mother than my own mother.
“The Queen was an iconic, legendary, tough, steadfast, invisible hand of love behind your back.”
Although they had a loving relationship, Sarah admitted she had to ‘keep her head down’ when she was with the Queen.
She continued, “I mean, she was the grandmother of the nation. She was the fortitude of an extraordinary pillar of strength for the Commonwealth, for the nation, for Australia, for the world.”
Additionally, the Duchess also provided an update on the Queen’s two beloved corgis Muick and Sandy, who now live with Sarah and Prince Andrew at Royal Lodge in Windsor.
“They’re national treasures,” Sarah said. ‘So they are very spoiled.’
Sarah also recently showed off her sense of humor in her latest TikTok video, joking that she is “a bride every day” as she filmed herself getting ready for a book signing in Perth.
‘A bride every day! A bride every day,” she laughed in the light-hearted post, as her makeup was touched up ahead of the event.
‘Life is too short to be serious all the time!’ she added in the caption of the video, which showed a medley of humorous moments.
Royal fans rushed to social media to praise the Duchess for ‘her great sense of humour’.
They wrote: ‘Love Sarah, she is so real’;
‘Love Fergie, she’s so down to earth’;
‘I love your wit! You’re so cute. Thank you for joining TikTok! What great messages. always down to earth and you sprinkle everything with sunshine!’