Comedian selected to represent Australia

Adam Hills will be attending the Coronation on Saturday, officially representing Australia.

The Last Leg presenter is one of 14 countrymen selected to be at Westminster Abbey by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

The Australian government said that ‘outstanding Australians have been chosen to show the world the best of our values: caring for others, serving community and championing progress’.

They also include singer Nick Cave and national football captain and Chelsea star Sam Kerr, who will be the flagbearer.

Cave has been defending his decision to attend following a backlash from some fans,  saying he holds ‘an inexplicable emotional attachment to the Royals’.

Writing in his Red Hand Files newsletter, Cave said: I am not a monarchist, nor am I a royalist, nor am I an ardent republican for that matter; what I am also not is so spectacularly incurious about the world and the way it works, so ideologically captured, so damn grouchy, as to refuse an invitation to what will more than likely be the most important historical event in the UK of your age. Not just the most important, but the strangest, the weirdest."

‘I guess what I am trying to say is that, beyond the interminable but necessary debates about the abolition of the monarchy, I hold an inexplicable emotional attachment to the Royals – the strangeness of them, the deeply eccentric nature of the whole affair that so perfectly reflects the unique weirdness of Britain itself.’

When Hills was first announced as being part of the Australian group, he said: ‘Never thought I’d be attending a Coronation with the Prime Minister and Nick Cave, but here we are. I can’t wait to watch the King of England be crowned, while sitting next to the Prince of Darkness.’

Last year, Hills was appointed an MBE for his services to Paralympic sport and disability awareness. When he picked up his gong from Princess Anne, she told him that Would I Lie To You was her favourite programme – even though the comedian had never been on the panel show.

And in 2019, Hills turned down Charles’s invitation to attend his 70th birthday Party at Buckingham Palace because it clashed with rugby practice.

The following year the comic hosted a fundraising event for Australia’s bushfire victims attended by the then Prince Of Wales – the day before Charles tested positive for Covid-19.

Published: 4 May 2023