Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s interview with Oprah Winfrey was definitely a telltale one! The couple didn’t hold anything back. Winfrey was, obviously, correct: No topic was off-limits.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex talked about everything—why they decided to step back from their duties as senior members of the royal family, their relationship with the Queen, the infamously brutal British tabloids, and much more.
Meghan says Kate made her cry in the bridesmaid dress incident, not the reverse.
Despite tabloid rumors for more than a year that she had terrorized her future sister-in-law to the point of tears during the wedding planning process, Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, revealed in an interview with Oprah on Sunday that it was actually the other way around — she was the one brought to tears.
Kate Middeton, the Duchess of Cambridge, made her cry during a discussion about the bridesmaid outfit that her daughter, Princess Charlotte, would wear.
“And I don’t say that to be disparaging to anyone, because it was a really hard week of the wedding. And she was upset about something, but she owned it, and she apologized. And she brought me flowers and a note, apologizing. And she did what I would do if I knew that I hurt someone, right, to just take accountability for it.”
Markle says she’s forgiven Middleton and has moved on, but “What was hard to get over was being blamed for something that not only I didn’t do, but that happened to me. And the people who were a part of our wedding going to our comms team and saying, ‘I know this didn’t happen.’“
Meghan says she never Googled Harry.
“I will say I went into [this marriage] naively because I didn’t grow up knowing much about the royal family… My mom even said to me a couple of months ago, “Did Diana ever do an interview?”
Adding that “of course” she was aware of the royals, Markle said she didn’t do any research before her marriage. “I’ve never looked up my husband online,” she said.
“Everything we thought I needed to know, he was telling me.” She also told Winfrey that she didn’t “fully understand” what it meant to be a working royal before her marriage.
She also expressed gratitude that she hadn’t researched the family more as it helped her get rid of nerves before her first interactions with the Queen and other members of the royal family.
“There wasn’t a lot of anxiety about meeting the queen,” Meghan Markle.
“She was one of the first people I met. There wasn’t actually a huge formality the first time I met Her Majesty The Queen. We were going to lunch at Royal Lodge, which is where some of the other members of the family lived, specifically Andrew and Fergie and Eugenie and Beatrice.
Eugenie and I had known each other before I knew Harry, so that was comfortable. It turned out the queen was finishing a church service there in Windsor, and she was gonna be at the house.
I remember Harry and I were in the car. He [was like, ‘My grandmother’s here, so you’re gonna meet her.” [I said], ‘Oh, great. I loved my grandmother. I used to take care of her.”
Then Prince Harry asked Markle if she knew how to curtsy. “I thought, genuinely, that was what happened outside. I thought that was part of the fanfare,” Markle said. “I didn’t know that’s what happens inside.” “But it’s your grandmother,” Markle said, to which Prince Harry said, “It’s the queen.”
Later in the interview, Meghan said of the Queen: “She’s always been warm and inviting and really welcoming,” and revealed that she received a beautiful set of pearl earrings and a matching necklace from Harry’s grandmother.
Prince Harry and Meghan were married 3 days before their “Royal Wedding.”
“Three days before our wedding, we got married,” Markle revealed. “Nobody knows that.” She and Harry called the Archbishop of Canterbury and told him that the royal wedding was a “spectacle” for the world—and they wanted an authentic ceremony with just the two of them in their backyard.
She added that the marriage certificate that hangs in her home has the date of the private ceremony.
On the fanfare of the royal wedding:
“It was like having an out-of-body experience that I was very present for. The night before, I slept through the night entirely, which in and of itself is a little bit of a miracle.”
“I just tried to make it fun and light and remind ourselves this was our day, but I think we were both aware even in advance that this wasn’t ‘our’ day. This was a day that was planned for the world.”
On the conversation about Meghan being “different”:
“Well, I thought about it because they made me think about it,” she said about the media coverage. Now, upon reflection, she’s happy all of those things were true. “Thank God I had those life experiences…I’ve always worked, I’ve always valued independence. I’ve always advocated for women’s rights.” The sad irony, she added, is that she’s always advocated for women but spent the last four years being silenced.
“I could not feel lonelier,” Meghan said about her time with the royal family.
On a more serious note, she revealed she was “silenced” by the royal family. “Everyone in my world was given a very clear directive to say no comment,” she said.
“Even as things started to roll out in the media… I said ‘Don’t worry, I’m being protected. I believed that and that was really hard to reconcile because it was only once we were married and things started to worsen that I realized I was not being protected but they were willing to lie to protect other members of the family but they weren’t prepared to tell the truth to protect me.”
Meghan said it was important to make a distinction between some members of the royal family and the administration that runs the family. For instance, she said the Queen had always been wonderful to her, even going so far as to share a blanket with her during their first press tour.
“Our son needs to be safe,” Meghan reveals the Firm didn’t want to give Archie security.
While Meghan was pregnant with Archie, she was informed that her child would not be given the title of prince or security, something that went against tradition.
He wasn’t going receive security; this went on for the last few months of our pregnancy, where I’m going, ‘Hold on a second.’” Markle said.“He needs to be safe.”
Winfrey asked Markle how she was told Archie wasn’t going to be a prince. “There’s no explanation,” she said. “It was a decision they felt was appropriate.”
She explained further, “They said [he’s not going to get security], because he’s not going to be a prince. Okay, well, he needs to be safe so we’re not saying don’t make him a prince or princess, but if you’re saying the title is what’s going to affect that protection, we haven’t created this monster machine around us in terms of clickbait and tabloid fodder you’ve allowed that to happen which means our son needs to be safe.“
On whether Archie being called a prince was important to her, Markle said, “If it meant he was going to be safe, then of course. All the grandeur surrounding this stuff is an attachment I don’t personally have.”
“The idea of the first member of color in this family not being titled” was something that she says brought a lot of pain to her, not because of convection but because of safety. She mentioned being worried about safe Archie would be, especially given her treatment in the tabloids.
Meghan says there were discussions about “how dark” Archie’s skin color would be –
After Meghan described the conversations about how Archie would not be given the title of prince and how he wouldn’t have security, Meghan said there were discussions while she was pregnant about “how dark” Archie’s skin color would be.
“In the months when I was pregnant, all around the same time, so we have in tandem the conversation of he won’t be given security, he’s not going to be given a title, and also concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be when he’s born.”
Meghan nodded and said “so, um” and Oprah said “hold up there is a conversation,” with Meghan interjecting “there were several conversations” and “with Harry. Oprah finished the question by saying “about how dark your baby is going to be?”
“Potentially and what that would mean and what that would look like,”
Meghan wouldn’t say who it was who had the conversation and said it “would be very damaging to them.”
Toward the end of the interview, Oprah asked Harry to elaborate on the verbiage used. “That conversation, I’m never going to share. But the timing was awkward; I was a bit shocked.”
He added it “was right at the beginning, when [Meghan] wasn’t going to get security when members of my family were suggesting that she carries on acting because there’s not enough money to pay for her. There were some real obvious signs before we got married that this was going to be really hard.”
“I just didn’t want to be alive anymore,” Meghan revealed.
Meghan says the media scrutiny got so bad that she wasn’t okay.
“I was really ashamed to say it at the time and ashamed to have to admit it to Harry, especially because I know how much loss he’s suffered. But I knew that if I didn’t say it, that I would do it,” she says of self-harm. “I just didn’t want to be alive anymore, and that was a very clear and real and frightening constant thought.”
Markle approached a senior member of the royal institution and said she needed to go somewhere to get help, but was told she couldn’t because it would be a bad look for the institution. “I share this because there are so many people who are afraid to voice that they need help,” she says.
She even went to human resources— but was told they couldn’t do anything for her because she wasn’t a paid member of the royal family. “I thought it would have solved everything for everyone,” she says of the suicidal thoughts.
One of Diana’s best friends ended up being a source of comfort. Meghan spoke of a night that she and Harry went to an event at the Royal Albert Hall—earlier that morning, she had told Harry about her suicidal thoughts.
WPA Pool
When he suggested she miss the event, she told him, “I can’t be left alone.” In the photos from that night, you can see how tightly he’s holding my hand to comfort me.”
She also described feeling captive, as her license, passport, and credit cards were taken after her wedding and were unavailable to her.
Harry on Meghan’s suicidal thoughts:
“I wasn’t prepared for that. I went to a very dark place as well. I wanted to be there for her.” He admits he didn’t go to family members to tell them Meghan needed help because he was ashamed of admitting it.
He said the couple has some close friends who have been with them, but the family has the mentality that this life is just how it is. But for him, he said, the difference was “the race element”—it wasn’t just about Meghan as a person, but what she represents for so many people.
“The way that I saw it…there was an opportunity, many opportunities, for my family to show some public support.” For example, he said, “over 70 members of Parliament called out the “colonial undertones’ of the headlines written about Meghan; meanwhile, no members of his family ever said anything. “That hurts.”
Meghan and Prince Harry announce they’re having a girl.
Harry and Meghan reveal they’re having a baby girl. “Amazing,” Harry says. “Just grateful…to have a boy and then a girl, what more can you ask for? We’ve got our family.” They said they’re done after two kids. The baby is due this summer, the couple shared, and also said the plan is to only have two children.
On how Meghan thinks the palace will react to this interview:
“I’m not going to live my life in fear,” Markle said.
“To answer your question, I don’t know how they could expect that after all of this time, we would still just be silent if there was an active role that The Firm is playing in perpetuating falsehoods about us.
At a certain point, you’re gonna go, ‘Guys, just tell the truth.’ If that comes with a risk of losing things, there’s a lot that’s been lost already. I’ve lost my father. I lost a baby. I nearly lost my name.”
The couple lived in Tyler Perry’s house when they first moved to California.
The couple said it gave them breathing room while they found a home of their own–but, more importantly, Perry had offered his security team. This was key because while Meghan and Harry were in Canada in early 2020, they were told with short notice that their U.K. security team would be removed.
Why Meghan and Harry walked away from their royal duties:
“It’s been so spun in the wrong direction as though we quit, we walked away,” Markle says. Prince Harry says, point-blank, they left because they were asking for help and weren’t getting it.
“We never left the family,” Markle says. “ We said specifically, ‘We’re stepping back from senior roles to be just like several [other royals].’” “We weren’t reinventing the wheel here.”
“We were saying, ‘OK, if this isn’t working for everyone. We’re in a lot of pain. You can’t provide us with the help that we need. We can just take a step back. We can do it in a commonwealth country.’”
“I saw history repeating itself,” Harry says about the way Meghan was treated.
Prince Harry says that wanted to take a breath “from this constant barrage” of scrutiny. “My biggest concern was history repeating itself,” Prince Harry said, referring to Princess Diana’s death.
“And what I was seeing was history repeating itself, but far more dangerous because you add race and social media in. To receive no help at all and to be told continuously, ‘This is how it is. This is just how it is. We’ve all been through it’” was frustrating.
Prince Harry says the simplest answer for why they left is, “Lack of support and lack of understanding,” stemming both from the U.K.’s tabloids’ vicious attacks and a lack of support from The Firm.
The queen wasn’t blindsided by the decision, though, as she was rumored to be. He had continually discussed his plans with multiple people, including the Queen.
“I never blindsided my grandmother,” Harry said. “I have too much respect for her.”
“When we were in Canada, I had three conversations with my grandmother and two conversations with my father before he stopped taking my calls, and he said, ‘Can you put this all in writing, what your plan is?’”
There’s an “invisible contract” between the royal family and the press.
Harry told Oprah he understands why his family is scared of the tabloids turning on them. There’s an “invisible contract” behind closed doors—hinting that if certain family members wine, dine, and give access to the tabloids, they’ll get better press. He added that even though this exists he wants everyone to give his family some compassion, because they’re “controlled” by a level of fear.
On the removal of security:
Harry said he never thought he would ever have his security team removed, so it was a shock when that happened in early 2020. Meghan added that she wrote a letter to Harry’s family members to say that she understands why she and Archie could no longer have security but to please keep Harry’s in place. And she was told that’s not possible.
Prince Harry says his family “cut him off” in the first quarter of 2020.
Harry revealed he has what Princess Diana left him, and without that, they couldn’t have forged their own new life in L.A.
“I’m just really relieved and happy to be sitting here, talking to you with my wife by my side because I can’t begin to imagine what it must’ve been like for her going through this process by herself all the years ago,” he said. “It’s been unbelievably tough on the two of us, but at least we have each other.”
On Prince Harry’s relationship with his family:
“I’ve spoken more to my grandmother in the last year than I have for many, many years.” Prince Harry says his father is taking his calls now.” “There’s a lot to work through there,” he says.
“I feel really let down because he’s been through something similar. He knows what pain feels like, and Archie’s his grandson. But at the same time, I will always love him. There’s a lot of hurt that’s happened, and I will continue to make it one of my priorities to try and heal that relationship. They only know what they know, and that’s the thing: I’ve tried to educate them through the process I have been educated.”
On Prince William:
“I love William to bits. He’s my brother; we’ve been through hell together, and have a shared experience. But we are on different paths.”
“We did what we had to do,” Harry and Meghan
Meghan told Oprah that her regret was believing that the royal family would protect her, something she said would have made all the difference. If they had protected us, “we wouldn’t have left,” Harry said.
However, Harry also said that his relationship with Meghan saved him, while Meghan disagreed, instead saying that Harry’s decision saved their entire family.
“We did what we had to do,” Harry said.
What are your thoughts?
H/T: CBS
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