Prince Harry and Meghan Markle reveal royal scandals in 'bombshell' interview
CBS had promised Oprah's interview with Harry and Meghan would be a "bombshell", and they did not disappoint.
Video / CBS ...
Video Player is loading.
Current Time 0:00
/
Duration 0:00
Loaded: 0%
0:00
Stream Type LIVE
Remaining Time -0:00
1x
Chapters
descriptions off, selected
captions settings, opens captions settings dialog
captions off, selected
This is a modal window.
Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window.
End of dialog window.
This is a modal window. This modal can be closed by pressing the Escape key or activating the close button.
Graham Norton makes surprise appearance at Auckland supermarket
UP NEXT:
Autoplay in
4
Disable Autoplay
Cancel Video
CBS had promised Oprah's interview with Harry and Meghan would be a "bombshell", and they did not disappoint.
Video / CBS
NOW PLAYING • Prince Harry and Meghan Markle reveal royal scandals in 'bombshell' interview
CBS had promised Oprah's interview with Harry and Meghan would be a "bombshell", and they did not disappoint.
Video / CBS ...
Oprah Winfrey's interview with Harry and Meghan was so tightly packed with newsworthy information that CBS spent a good chunk of this morning sharing explosive new excerpts that couldn't even fit in the two-hour broadcast.
The couple faced a barrage of incisive questions, and addressed most of them directly.
Even so, believe it or not, we have been left with some important unanswered questions. They're listed below in rough order of significance.
WHO DENIED MEGHAN'S REQUEST FOR TREATMENT?
Buckingham Palace has already announced one investigation, focusing on last week's allegations that Meghan bullied her staff while she was in the United Kingdom.
Here is something else it should investigate immediately: Who denied the Duchess' requests to get treatment for her mental health?
This is the single most important question to come from the interview.
After revealing that she suffered from suicidal thoughts, Meghan alleged that she "begged" palace staff, including "one of the most senior people", to get her help.
"I was ashamed to admit it at the time, and admit it to Harry, because of how much loss he's suffered, but I knew that I didn't want to be alive anymore. That was a very clear, and real, and frightening, constant thought," Meghan said.
"I went to the institution, and I said that I needed to go somewhere to get help. I said that I'd never felt this way before, and I need to go somewhere. And I was told that I couldn't, that it wouldn't be good for the institution."
Prince Harry and Meghan, The Duchess of Sussex, in conversation with Oprah Winfrey. Photo / AP
Oprah sought more detail on who, exactly, Meghan had gone to.
"So, the institution is never a person. Or is it a series of people?" she asked.
"No, it's a person. It's several people, but I went to one of the most senior people to get help," Meghan responded.
"So I went to human resources. And I said, 'I just really need help.' Because in my old job there was a union, and they'd protect me. And I remember this conversation like it was yesterday, because they said, 'My heart goes out to you, because I see how bad it is. But there's nothing we can do to protect you, because you're not a paid employee of the institution.'
"This wasn't a choice. This was emails, and begging for help, saying very specifically, 'I am concerned for my mental welfare.' And people going, 'Oh yes, yes, it's disproportionately terrible, we see out there, compared to anyone else.'
"But nothing was ever done. So we had to find a solution."
Who did Meghan ask for help? How did those people handle the request? When did these conversations happen? Were any members of the royal family informed?
The palace is fully capable of finding the answers to these questions. According to Meghan, emails were exchanged on the subject, so there's even an easy paper trail to follow.
It is, unfortunately, entirely plausible that the palace would stop Meghan from seeking treatment in a hospital, where the public might catch wind of it. But surely treatment could have been brought to her instead. Why didn't that happen?
On a related point, we need more information about the involvement of senior royals, and how much they knew about Meghan's mental health struggles.
Oprah tried to drill down on this point during an extended discussion of the Sussexes' reason for leaving the UK – a lack of support from the family, and of course, the "institution" that surrounds it.
Members of royal family gather on the balcony of Buckingham Palace in 2018. Photo / AP
Harry did most of the talking here, saying he sought help for Meghan and got nowhere.
"I went to all the places which I thought I should go to to ask for help. We both did, separately and together," he said.
"So you left because you were asking for help and couldn't get it?" said Oprah.
She kept pursuing the subject, pressing for more detail.
"Anybody would ask for help," Harry added a couple of minutes later.
"(You would) ask the system of which you are part. Especially when you know there's a relationship there that they could help, and share some truth, or call the dogs off, whatever you want to call it.
"So 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.'"
This seems clear enough. Harry wanted the palace to call out misinformation about his wife in the British press, and was shot down. "Never complain, never explain," and all that.
When he quotes someone saying, "We've all been through it," you get the impression that he's referring to a conversation with another member of the family.
But then comes this question from Oprah, and Harry's response.
"Did you tell other people in the family, I need to get help for her, we need help for her?" Oprah asked.
"That's just not a conversation that would be had," said Harry.
"Why?" she interjected.
"I guess I was ashamed of admitting it to them. I don't know whether they've had the same feelings or thoughts. I have no idea. It's a very trapping environment that a lot of them are stuck in," he explained.
"You were ashamed of admitting that Meghan needed help?" Oprah said.
"Yeah. I didn't have anyone to turn to. You know, we've got some very close friends that have been with us through this whole process," he told her.
"But for the family, they very much have this mentality of, 'This is just how it is. This is how it's meant to be, you can't change it. We've all been through it.'"
Later, he spoke about engaging in "conversations with senior palace staff" and "with my family" to warn that the media's treatment of Meghan was "not going to end well".
Newspapers are placed on the ground placed by a television crew in front of Buckingham Palace in London. Photo / AP
So what happened here, exactly? Did Harry ask the family for help or not? Was he rebuffed directly by senior royals, or did he merely assume they would do nothing and avoid raising it with them?
This is an important question. If senior members of the royal family actively denied Meghan the help she needed, that's a bigger scandal than if Harry only raised it with palace staff.
Side note: He was ashamed of admitting that Meghan needed help? That is an incredibly shocking thing to say, to the point where I've just gone back and rewatched it twice to make sure I didn't mishear him.
It reveals a lot about the culture of the royal family, and about the stigma that still surrounds mental health more generally. Hopefully the work Harry and Meghan are doing in the mental health space now can help remove some of that stigma.
WHICH ROYAL HAD 'CONCERNS' ABOUT ARCHIE'S SKIN COLOUR?
Beyond the mental health stuff, the most shocking revelation from the interview was Harry and Meghan's claim that someone in the royal family expressed "concerns" about "how dark" their baby's skin might be, and "what that would mean or look like".
Meghan said there had been "several conversations about it", which she heard about through her husband. She did not reveal who the royal in question was.
"You're not going to tell me who had the conversation?" Oprah asked.
"I think that would be very damaging to them," Meghan replied.
Oprah didn't get any further with Harry once he joined the interview.
"That conversation I am never going to share," he told her.
"At the time, it was awkward. I was a bit shocked."
Two questions here: What exactly was said, and who said it?
Harry and Meghan speaking about expecting their second child during an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Photo / AP
Harry and Meghan's decision to mention the incident, but not to discuss it in any more detail, has the unfortunate effect of casting suspicion on several family members.
The couple told Oprah, off camera, that the culprit was neither the Queen nor Prince Philip, the latter of whom does have a history of making unsavoury comments about race.
Nobody else has been ruled out, which means every other royal now has a cloud over them. The public is inevitably going to speculate.
"I didn't fully understand what the job was, what was needed of me. There was no way to understand what the day-to-day was going to be like."
How on earth is this possible?
Surely, at the very least, staff at the palace would have explained what life as a working royal would entail before Meghan joined the family.
William, Kate, Meghan and Harry arrive for the Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey in 2018. Photo / AP
In a normal world, you would also expect her to receive some advice on the subject from existing members of the family, such as William and Kate, or Harry's father Charles.
And failing that, why didn't Harry tell her what she was getting herself into?
Meghan's claim that "there was no way to understand" what her day-to-day life would be like makes no sense at all. She was literally surrounded by people who could have told her.
This point also mystified Tina Brown, the biographer who wrote The Diana Chronicles.
"One of the things that Meghan kept saying is that she had absolutely no idea when she married Harry what was really awaiting her," Ms Brown told BBC radio today.
"To which I would say, Meghan, it was all there to be seen. All there. It's been reported a thousand times how incredibly hard it is to join the royal family."
If we take Meghan at her word here, it suggests the royals need a much better process in place to educate men and women who might marry into the family. A royal spouse starter pack, if you will.
THE DECISION NOT TO GIVE ARCHIE A TITLE. WHAT HAPPENED THERE?
When Harry and Meghan's son Archie was born, it was announced that he would simply be called Master Archie. He is not a prince and has no titles.
At the time, it was widely believed that the Sussexes made that decision, the assumption being that they wanted Archie to be normal and free from the burden that comes with a title.
Not so, it turns out. Throughout the interview, it was clear that the decision not to make Archie a prince was a source of resentment for both Harry and Meghan.
They linked it to concerns about his safety – without the title, Archie will not be provided security funded by the British taxpayer when he comes of age.
"They were saying they didn't want him to be a prince or princess, which would be different from protocol. And that he wasn't going to receive security," Meghan said.
"What?" a shocked Oprah interjected.
A man watches a phone screen showing an interview of Harry and Meghan by Oprah Winfrey, in London. Photo / AP
"He wasn't going to receive security. This went on for the last few months of our pregnancy," she answered.
"How did they explain to you that your son, the great-grandson of the Queen, wasn't going to be a prince? And what reasons did they give?" Oprah pressed.
"There's no explanation," Meghan said.
"It's not their right to take away."
She said she was not happy about "the first member of colour in this family not being titled in the same way that other grandchildren would be". She described the prince title as Archie's "birthright".
"Do you think it's because of his race?" asked Oprah.
This was the point at which Meghan brought up the unidentified royal family member's "concerns" about Archie's skin colour, clearly implying that race was a factor.
There is actually a pretty clear explanation here. Under established royal protocols, the children and grandchildren of the reigning king or queen are automatically entitled to be called prince/princess and HRH.
The only other person with that entitlement is the eldest son of the Prince of Wales. At the moment, that is Prince George.
Archie is the Queen's great-grandchild, so he does not qualify. That will change when the Queen dies and Charles becomes king.
The wrinkle here is that the Queen stepped in before George was born to ensure all of William and Kate's children would be called princes and princesses, even though they are her great-grandchildren.
So, the Queen did not "take away" Archie's right to the title, as Meghan claimed. Rather, she declined to make the same exception she had already made for Princess Charlotte (which also applies to Prince Louis).
Following up, Oprah asked Meghan whether she cared about the title.
"If it meant he was going to be safe, then of course. All of the grandeur surrounding this stuff is an attachment that I don't personally have," she said.
"Even though I have a lot of clarity on what comes with the titles, good and bad, and from my experience a lot of pain – I again, wouldn't wish pain on my child. But that is their birthright to then make a choice about."
The broader context here is Prince Charles' push to slim down the monarchy by reducing the number of royals who are reliant on the Sovereign Grant.
Archie is not the only one affected. For example Prince Andrew's daughters, Beatrice and Eugenie, have not had publicly funded security for about a decade now, and they still live in the UK.
Harry and Meghan have funded their own private security since moving to Los Angeles, something they are able to do comfortably, given Harry's sizeable inheritance.
Anyway, while the couple are technically wrong about Archie's "birthright" here, the claims they made in the interview have certainly given people the impression that he was improperly denied a title, perhaps due to his race.
It would be helpful for the palace to clarify the reasoning behind the decision.
