William & Kate

It made me sad.

Anyway, Lifetime’s “William & Kate” is a movie made just for them, depicting their meeting at the University of St. Andrews is Scotland, all the way to their royal engagement. Directed by Mark Rosman (“A Cinderella Story”), it’s royal crap, a rush job that plays like your typical Lifetime romantic comedy: low-budget and light on substance. It just happens that one of its two leads is a genuine prince.

But a biopic it does not feel like; Fran Drescher’s “Beautician and the Beast” is closer, but even that unfunny theatrical release bests this embarrassing, made-for-TV one. Example: When William moves into his dorm room, he finds a CV of the guy across the hall, applying to be his “wingman.”

As Prince William — “Wills” to his fans — Nico Evers-Swindell (“Edge of Darkness”) looks enough like the real deal, only without the goofy grin and male-pattern baldness. As Kate, Camilla Luddington (“Accidentally in Love”) also resembles her real-life counterpart enough: cute, but not drop-dead gorgeous. Their characters, however, are so vapid and empty.

Also appearing are career-ailing thespians like Ben Cross, Victoria Tennant and Charles Shaughnessy. That they have to apply their talents to such a lost-cause venture makes me as sad as I did that morning of April 29. —Rod Lott

This article appears in Jun 8-14, 2011.