Former Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown described the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s decision to step away from royal duties as a “disaster” and accused Meghan of having “the worst judgment of anyone in the entire world.”
That verdict may seem a little harsh, but Brown is a royal biographer and wise advisor who met Princess Diana for lunch just two months before her fatal accident in Paris.
As someone who has chronicled Prince Harry and Meghan’s movements since they moved to California, I share some of Brown’s views. So here are ten of the fateful mistakes that I think the former actress has made since ‘Megxit’:
1) The Duke and Duchess of Sussex made the shock announcement that they would be stepping down as senior royals in January 2020, before holding talks with Queen Elizabeth. And they had launched their eye-catching SussexRoyal website, having already ordered the brand for 100 items, including pencils and bookmarks, six months earlier. This was wildly presumptuous and offensive to Harry’s grandmother, who deserved the respect she had earned during her decades on the throne. The late Queen duly forbade them from using the “royal” title.
Meghan and Harry launched an eye-catching SussexRoyal website after stepping down as senior royals in January 2020.
2) Meghan apparently hoped that her interview with Oprah Winfrey, whom she had been courting since before she married Harry, would announce her entry into Hollywood. In fact, the explosive March 2021 couch chat may have helped kill her chances of being accepted by the United States. Going on national television to attack the family she married into, when she was already estranged from most of her people, backfired terribly. And choosing to go ahead with the interview even though Prince Philip was seriously ill in hospital rubbed salt into the royal wounds.
The explosive talk of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex with Oprah Winfrey in March 2021
3) Choosing to name his daughter Lilibet, who was born three months later, was a crude decision. Lilibet was Queen Elizabeth’s affectionate nickname from childhood, used only by the closest members of her family. Harry and Meghan claimed they chose it as a tribute, but a palace source told the BBC that the Queen had not been asked beforehand. This was denied by the couple’s spokesperson. Whatever the case, it was no surprise that the Queen did not pose for a photograph with her great-granddaughter when she visited the Sussex family at Frogmore Cottage during her visit for the Platinum Jubilee celebrations a year later. She was reportedly so upset by Harry and Meghan’s Lilibet decision that she told her aides: “The only thing I have is my name.” And now they’ve taken that away.’
The Sussexes’ daughter Lilibet, whose name they claimed was a tribute to Queen Elizabeth.
4) After the Duke and Duchess signed their $20m (£15.4m) deal with audio giant Spotify in December 2020, they both appeared on the pilot episode of their podcast, along with a series from famous guests including Sir Elton John, James Corden and Tyler Perry. However, when his first podcast series, called Archetypes, finally aired in August 2022, Harry was conspicuous by his absence. Meghan’s decision to host the series alone was a mistake. Spotify thought it was hiring a power couple, not a whiny former actress. The first series was also the last for Spotify, with one of its executives branding the Sussexes “fucking scammers”.
5) One of the most surprising moments in Netflix’s six-part 2022 documentary series, Harry and Meghan, was the duchess’ overly elaborate bow to show how she had greeted Queen Elizabeth on their first meeting. Meghan may have intended to show how keen she was to impress Harry’s grandmother, but it came off as mocking. And Harry’s awkward grimace as he watched her performance lingers in the memory for a long time.
One of the most surprising moments of the 2022 Netflix documentary series Harry and Meghan was the overly elaborate bow the Duchess performed to show how she first greeted the Queen.
6) One of the ways Queen Elizabeth tried to make the most of Meghan’s talents was by inviting her to lead Commonwealth organisations, giving her an international role. Meghan was named vice-president of the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, and Harry was named president. And as they stepped down from their royal duties, the couple declared they would continue to “honour our duty to the Commonwealth”. However, her Netflix series attacked the Queen’s beloved Commonwealth, with one contributor calling the voluntary organization of nation states “Empire 2.0.” As Conservative MP Sir Hugo Swire said at the time, this was “either deliberate mischief or astonishing ignorance”.
7) Appearances at the scenes of tragedies are always a sensitive matter for members of the Royal Family, but Meghan’s visit in 2022 to meet the parents of the victims of a school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, ran the risk from being seen as a public relations exercise. . Instead of waiting for a decent amount of time to pass, the former actress went to the scene two days after the massacre, laying flowers in front of the cameras. The fact that her close aide Mandana Dayani recently cited the visit as an example of Meghan’s compassion made it seem like an attempt to burnish the duchess’s tarnished image.
Meghan lays flowers at a makeshift memorial in Uvalde, Texas, two days after a gunman killed 19 students and two teachers and wounded 17 others in May 2022.
8) A lot of thought goes into what female members of the Royal Family wear when on duty, as Meghan has publicly acknowledged. So was her $7,629 (£5,891) outfit really appropriate for a 2021 visit to disadvantaged children at a school in Harlem, New York? The duchess wore a $5,268 (£4,068) Loro Piana pajama-style burgundy cashmere loose-fitting coat with matching $1,779 (£1,374) trousers and $581 (£449) red Manolo Blahnik stilettos. Public records show that 94 percent of the school’s children qualified for free meals.
9) Everyone knows that Harry and Meghan despise the popular press, but that hatred can lead them to make stupid decisions. I contacted Meghan’s office in March to let them know that she was planning to publish an article about her plans to launch a lifestyle company called American Riviera Orchard. Meghan was apparently so desperate for the news not to appear first in the Daily Mail that she immediately launched her company’s Instagram page, complete with a stunning video. Eight months later, the company still hasn’t started selling any products and interest appears to be waning. A textbook example of how not to start a business.
Branding for Meghan’s lifestyle company, American Riviera Orchard
10) Nothing highlights the demise of the Duke and Duchess’ aspirations to be a “power couple” than Meghan’s solo appearances on Los Angeles red carpets. While her Hollywood agents might have advised her that she needed to be seen, her royal status diminishes every time she competes for camera attention with the massive ranks of American stars, sometimes in less than regal outfits.
Nothing highlights the demise of the Duke and Duchess’ aspirations to be a “power couple” than Meghan’s solo appearances on Los Angeles red carpets.
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