(2 of 2)
For such royal ceremonies, he commands a fee of about $1,500, once quipped: "What am I supposed to do between coronations—starve?" The joke had a comfortably hollow leg. Dimbleby is the most courted freelance broadcaster in Britain, covers state visits and elections, does two regular weekly shows, owns three provincial newspapers, a 30-acre farm, a 17th century pad, a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce.
With Dick Dimbleby aloft. BBC scored a clear victory over the competing ITV (commercial television), and its coverage was consummately skillful. With a total of 25 cameras inside the Abbey and well-spaced along the streets, British television showed a precision that was enough to jar U.S. pros out of their technical complacence. Handled by TV with grace and unfaltering taste, the wedding was nonetheless a moving and spectacular show, and no spectator was more moved than Richard Dimbleby—described by a colleague as "the only man working in the Abbey [except for the groom] who owns his own morning coat," and by himself as "a monarchist through and through."