In what’s become an epic royal battle for maximum publicity and the moral high ground, a royal expert says that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle “deliberately” timed Thursday morning’s release of the trailer for their hotly anticipated Netflix docuseries to “take away” attention from Prince William and Kate Middleton’s landmark trip to Boston.
Calling the Duke and Duchess of Sussex “unpredictable,” Richard Fitzwilliams told the Daily Mail that the release of the trailer for their explosive new series “Harry and Meghan” was “obviously timed” to grab attention from William and Kate’s trip. Fitzwilliams said that Harry and Meghan “like to control their narrative,” and the stylishly produced trailer suggests that they will air longstanding grievances against the royal establishment as they offer their reasons for stepping away from royal life and moving to the United States.
Certainly, news about the trailer dominated headlines Thursday, as William and Kate are reportedly trying to “keep calm and carry on” on the second day of their three-day U.S. trip, the Daily Beast reported. The Prince and Princess of Wales, in Boston to present a prestigious environmental award Friday night, are especially keen to not get bogged down in the racism scandal storming in the U.K., which involves Lady Susan Hussey, a longtime lady-in-waiting to the late Queen Elizabeth II, who was caught saying “unacceptable” things to a Black guest at a Buckingham Palace reception.
“William ultimately subscribes to his grandmother’s ‘keep calm and carry on’ school of thinking, and that is what he will be doing, trying to get the focus back on the award,” a friend of William’s told the Daily Beast.
But keeping peoples’ focus on Friday night’s Earthshot Prize ceremony could prove difficult, with the highly dramatic trailer for the multimillion-dollar Netflix series suggesting that the Sussexes will offer their side of their conflict with William and Kate and could again raise concerns about racism and dysfunction in the monarchy.
A brief clip shows Harry being asked why he wanted to make the series. “No one sees what’s happening behind closed doors,” he answers. “I had to do everything I could to protect my family.” Images featured in the trailer also show the pair looking upset, including several appearing to show Meghan in tears. There also is an image of a stony-faced William and Kate, sitting in front of Harry and a heavily-pregnant Meghan, looking miserable at a royal event in 2019.
“When the stakes are this high, doesn’t it make more sense to hear our story from us?” Meghan also says in a clip.
Fitzwilliams said the photos showing Meghan looking distressed strongly suggest that the Sussexes will have things to say about how they felt “they were treated by the royal family.”
He also said the timing of the trailer’s release is “certainly unhelpful” to William and Kate, who are in Boston to present the Earthshot Prize, an annual environmental award handed out by the Royal Foundation, an organization William founded to help entrepreneurs with solutions to climate change and environmental issues. William and Kate will be joined at the star-studded Earthshot Prize ceremony at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library by the late president’s daughter, Caroline Kennedy.
