I’m bored to tears with the “Meghan is a bully” character assassination. It’s been eight years since then-Meghan Markle met a charismatic prince, and an entire national press has smeared her, abused her, tormented her and gaslighted her ever since. Enough. Give it a f–king rest. They’re still desperately trying to claim her and abuse her from afar. The “bully” story was given a second life on September 12th when the Hollywood Reporter mimicked all of the old British smears but claimed that they were being told the same thing by Archewell staffers. Meghan’s rebuttal was to organize a cover story in Us Weekly, wherein her staffers went on the record about what she’s really like as a boss – a lovely person who gives gifts, is understanding about giving people time off, and a boss who gives clear direction. Then the Daily Beast’s Tom Sykes decided to – bizarrely – get in contact with Harry and Meghan’s former staffers in the UK, meaning people who used to or still work for Prince William and Kate. So we’re back to years-old smears from salty, lazy people who were reduced to tears at being assigned tasks by a Black woman. Of course they had unhinged things to say about Meghan being a “psycho.” I bring up that Sykes piece because the Sunday Times decided to give Sykes more space in their paper. Some highlights from yet another idiotic hit piece:
Why Sykes decided to regurgitate the old smears: The outpouring of love that had emerged in Us Weekly was served up by Meghan’s comms team, to push back against The Hollywood Reporter article. After reading this rather odd piece, I decided to call up a number of individuals who worked for Meghan back in Blighty, when she was still a royal. It’s fair to say that their recollections varied. “There definitely were bad, very bad, even psycho moments. I witnessed people being chewed up in person and over the phone and made to feel like s***,” one courtier who worked for Meghan and Harry told me, adding: “It was an incredibly fraught time and I’m inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt. She has said herself she was suicidal at times.”
Meghan screamed at a florist over the phone? Another person who worked with Meghan in the run-up to her wedding told me: “I always thought she was a classic narcissist and getting her staff to tell a magazine how amazing she is only confirms that in my mind. She is lovely when it is all going her way but a demon when the worm turns.” And a third source told me the story of a florist who was “screamed at down the phone” for half an hour after posting insignificant detail online about a bouquet they were working on for Meghan (without identifying that Meghan was the client). “They vowed never to work with her again, despite the prestige of having her as a client. If you were working for her, you were often treated like a tradesman who could be treated like s***.”
The Us Weekly story was one-sided, unlike all of the British reporting!! But the ridiculously one-sided article in Us Weekly gave the media the perfect opportunity to revive these dormant controversies. Yet again, the melodrama had overtaken the good works.
Harry’s trip to the UK: Much more important [than the WellChild Awards] to Brand Harry, however, will be whether his father agrees to see him during his sojourn in his homeland. Neither side would definitively tell me whether a meeting is planned on this trip, but all the indications so far are that it is not. The King is in Scotland, gathering his strength for a forthcoming trip to Australia. The Queen, her friends have told me, is keen that Charles doesn’t get unnecessarily stressed out and is not encouraging a meeting. For Harry, there can be no meaningful rehabilitation as a royal without reconciliation. His father’s recent health scare has added a sense of urgency to that quest.
That pathetic Hallmark video: Relations between William and Harry are very poor. Yet because of the king’s health issues, some executive power and influence is already flowing William’s way. If you doubt that, just look at the glossy Instagram video William and Kate published last month to announce her recovery from cancer. Despite relentless messaging from the palace that Charles and Kate’s bond has deepened and strengthened in the course of their separate cancer battles, Charles didn’t even make the final cut. Kate’s parents, Mike and Carole Middleton, did.
Meghan DGAF about the UK: Subtle shifts in power between William and Charles won’t really affect Meghan, who seems to have little interest in spending time with the Windsors and is quite happy to be the commercial arm of Sussex Inc, selling jam and making TV shows.
Harry wants to leave the celebrity stuff behind? But speaking to sources close to Harry, it’s quite clear that he wants to leave behind the celebrity nonsense typified by last week’s debacle with Us magazine, recover his reputation as an honest dealer and become known as a serious philanthropic player. Sources have also been clear to me that Harry does not want his old royal life back: he adores the California sunshine and treasures his wife and family. But he undoubtedly would like to reoccupy the space he briefly held on stage at the Clinton Initiative, and will hold again at WellChild.
Harry must reconcile with the crown? However, it’s going to be incredibly difficult, nigh on impossible, to transform back into a credible quasi-royal unless he reconciles with the crown. If Charles were to welcome Harry back into the fold, the nation would probably follow his lead; the reservoir of affection for Diana’s boy is deep. But unless Harry can switch the narrative away from the kind of tit-for-tat melodrama we’ve seen this month, he may never be able to find his way back.
Let’s take this in pieces. First, the Meghan stuff – they’re mad that the Us Weekly story was “one-sided” or they’re mad that their “unnamed sources” with an ax to grind and zero specific stories can’t compete with named staffers saying that Meghan is a good boss? If “one-sided” is a reason to toss out certain reports, surely we can toss out the overwhelming majority of British royalist reporting? The story about Meghan bitching out a florist… lol. First of all, at least it’s something specific! It took years, but we finally got one story! Now. I don’t believe that she screamed, but I bet Meghan did call the florist and ask the woman to not publicize anything to do with her, and the florist was probably in a snit about it. Sidenote: remember how the Middletons didn’t pay for Kate’s wedding cake and we didn’t find out until years later? Well, at least it wasn’t a curt phone call!
As for the stuff about Harry… he literally has that polo show coming out. He was literally just in New York with a whole lot of business to conduct. He doesn’t “need” to have a connection to those dreadful people. THEY need HIM. They need him to need them. Harry keeps showing everyone how meaningless and awful they are and they keep running after him, screaming “you need us!!”
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images, Instar. Cover courtesy of Us Weekly.