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Palace attack “lies” of Harry & Meghan

Prince William will reportedly “never” watch Harry & Meghan, the Netflix show made by the Sussexes about their love story and glamorous, gilded world of persecution and good works, which has managed to piss off the royals even if—at least in its first batch of three episodes—it managed to reveal nothing that scandalous or negative about them.

A friend told The Sunday Times: “He (William) says he will never watch it and I know he definitely won’t.”

The paper also reports that the palace claims a number of claims made by Meghan Markle and Prince Harry during the first three episodes were false. A source described as “a total lie” the claim Meghan was left utterly in the dark over royal protocol.

It’s “a total lie,” a royal source told the Times. “There was prep for everything, walkabouts—even though she was engaged to someone who’d done hundreds of them—clothes, everything. The level of support was intense.”

The Times says that before they married in May 2018, Harry’s then private secretary, Ed Lane Fox, known as “Elf,” gave Meghan a 30-point dossier, with a full guide to the royal life she was taking on, with advice and contacts included.

A royal source also told the Times that it was incorrect to claim, as Meghan did, that she was encouraged not to invite her niece, Ashleigh Hale, to the wedding.

“That just didn’t happen,” a source said. “We never gave any advice, steer or guidance on who of her family or friends should or shouldn’t come to her wedding. I have a very clear memory of her [Meghan] saying that she had a niece who she would in other circumstances have liked to invite, but she didn’t want to invite her because it would have put her under intense scrutiny. It was not a question she put to us. We would never tell her not to invite her own niece to the wedding and we would never get involved in any management of personal relationships.”

Royal sources say that Meghan’s claim that her and Harry’s engagement interview with BBC presenter Mishal Husain was an “orchestrated reality show” was also untrue. “Every word of that interview was what they wanted to say. She controlled every micro-detail of how their engagement publicly went.”

The palace also took note of Harry’s perceived diss that “for so many people in the family, especially the men, there can be a temptation or an urge to marry someone who would fit the mold as opposed to somebody who perhaps you are destined to be with. The difference between making decisions with your head or heart.”

An old friend of both brothers told the Times: “That was so cheeky, that’s a love match if ever there was one. Catherine doesn’t even fit the mould—she’s not an earl’s daughter or blue-blooded. The sadness is Harry was so close to Catherine.”

However, with all the anger around the documentary there is a silver lining of an old royal tradition. The Times reports that William and Kate have bought Christmas presents for Harry and Meghan’s kids Archie and Lilibet, while Harry and Meghan have bought presents for George, Charlotte, and Louis.

Harry and Meghan are “ready to move on”

The reviews for Harry & Meghan have not been great, with Variety, for example, highlighting a “sort of narrative stuckness,” adding: “There’s an air of duty about the entire enterprise of Harry & Meghan, as if they’re honor-bound to keep reciting their personal story until we eventually lose interest.”

The Sussexes are rejecting the naysayers, however, with a friend telling the Daily Telegraph: “Some of the most beloved movies have the worst reviews.”

“People at least feel like they know them a little bit better or they understand why they're so in love and why they're so protective of one another,” one source close to Harry and Meghan said. “They’ve proved it’s not a sham.”

The source adds: “This is the end…They are ready to move on.”

But there is the small matter of Harry’s memoir, Spare, out in January.

“Once that’s out there, they’re said and done,” one source close to the couple told the Telegraph.

“Let’s see,” a palace aide said.

Popularity contest

Harry and Meghan’s Netflix series appears to have not done much for their polling numbers in the U.K., with the country divided over whether they should not be invited to King Charles’ coronation in May.

A poll for the Mail on Sunday found that the British public are almost equally split on if the pair should be barred from the coronation of King Charles III. 28 per cent, think they should be disallowed from attending the coronation, with 31 percent disagreeing. 44 percent of Brits now think they should lose their titles while 19 percent think they should keep them.

42 percent say Harry should be excluded from the line of succession, while 23% say he should keep his position.

Fascinatingly the poll, which saw over 2,000 people questioned by findoutnow, shows a huge split in views by age.

51 percent of over-65s think they should be stripped of their titles while only 16 per cent of those aged 25-34 believe they should face such humiliation.

The Daily Beast reported this week that there are no plans to try and remove their duke and duchess titles, which could in any event only be achieved by an act of Parliament, but Charles may ask them to renounce their princely status.

Chris Holbrook, founder of findoutnow, told the Mail on Sunday: “More than two million people in the U.K. watched the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s TV series. So it is a ratings hit for Netflix.

“It is less clear that it has changed people’s perceptions of the couple or the Royal Family. If anything, each side is becoming more entrenched. If you already liked Harry and Meghan over the royal family, you still do, only a bit more so. If you are inclined to side with the traditional royal family, this series makes you feel even more strongly.”

Inclusion of Diana interview angers William

In further fallout from the big TV event of the week, Prince William is said to be “infuriated” in a report in the Daily Mail that his brother Harry allowed a clip from Princess Diana’s interview with Martin Bashir to be used in Harry & Meghan, which William explicitly stated he believes should never be shown again.

William has claimed that the misleading way that Bashir obtained the interview, which included lying to Diana and generating fake bank statements to feed her paranoia has invalidated the entire interview.

However, Prince Harry seems to have a more nuanced view, saying in the film that although the interview was obtained by underhand methods, Diana’s comments made in that film still have legitimacy.

Although the series was directed by a third-party, Liz Garbus, Harry and Meghan’s firm, Archewell, is a production partner with credits at the end of the show, and it is inconceivable that the footage of the Diana interview would have been included without Harry’s tacit consent.

In comments made just before the clip is shown, Harry says, “I think we all know now that she was deceived into giving the interview, but at the same time she spoke the truth of her experience.”

Netflix used such a small extract of the interview that they would not have required the permission of the BBC to use it, as short clips of previously broadcast material can be exempt from copyright law.

William said at the time of a report into the documentary, “It is my firm view that this Panorama program holds no legitimacy and it should never be aired again.”

Thomas Markle: Yes, it was me sending messages

An oddly large amount of airtime in Harry & Meghan was devoted to attacking Meghan’s dad and her half-sister Samantha. Meghan and Harry insinuated, among other things, that the phone of her father Thomas had been compromised.

Meghan dramatically fell out with Thomas at the time of her wedding after he participated in staged paparazzi photographs. Now he has denied the claims by Meghan and Harry that messages sent from his phone around the time of the wedding were not from him.

In the show, Meghan said, “It was really weird. You know how people text, right? My dad used a lot of emojis and a lot of ellipses… and this was just the opposite.

“He calls me Meghan and I was like, ‘He’s never called me Meghan any day that I’ve lived on this planet.’ Meg, all my friends call me Meg and my parents called me Meg and I was like, ‘ That’s not my dad.’ So then we knew his phone had been compromised.”

However, Thomas told the Mail on Sunday, “I wrote every word that I sent from the phone which is still in my possession. For her to claim my phone was compromised is simply not true….I have used Meghan’s full name before when things are serious. It’s not true to say I’ve never used her full name. I use it when I’m serious, when there are serious issues involved.”

Of the staged photos, Thomas added, “I made a terrible mistake for which I have apologized many times… Harry and Meghan are now doing everything they told me not to do. They told me never to talk. I believe what they are doing now is far worse than anything I ever did.”

This week in royal history

Lest you think modern royals had the monopoly on drama, on December 11, 1936, Edward VIII abdicated and his brother George VI became king—the father of Queen Elizabeth.

Unanswered questions

Will the final three episodes of Harry & Meghan finally turn real firepower on the royals, when it comes to Megxit and allegations of royal racism? Or will it be as uneventful as the first batch?

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