A major new article by Vanity Fair magazine has looked over the five years that have elapsed since Harry and Meghan stepped down from their senior roles in the British Royal Family.
Despite initially signing major deals with streaming giant, Netflix, and podcaster, Spotify, with one or two exceptions, the couple are widely not considered to have produced any work of note.
Among their rare success stories is the pair’s controversial Netflix docuseries Harry & Meghan, during which they shared information about the Royal Family.
Prince Harry, 40, famously released a memoir Spare, in which he claimed his brother Prince William, 42, physically attacked him and described his hair loss as ‘alarming baldness’.
Other projects have not had as much success. The couple only released one podcast via their Spotify deal – Meghan’s Archetypes – which sought to dismantle the stereotypes put on women and included her interviewing celebrity friends, such as Serena Williams.
Spotify and the pair’s Archewell Audio released a statement confirming they had mutually agreed to part ways in June 2023.
Among the claims made in the article – for which the Sussexes declined to comment – was that some people who worked with Meghan ended up needing therapy.
Here, FEMAIL looks at the top 10 allegations from Vanity Fair’s savage takedown of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex…
1. ‘Staff allegedly needed therapy after working with Meghan ‘
While previously in England, allegations of bullying of staff by Meghan have been made – and strenuously denied by the Duchess – the issue once more popped up in the Vanity Fair piece.
Two unnamed sources claimed that one colleague working on Archetypes took a leave of absence after working on three episodes.
This is before they left Spotify’s Gimlet studio altogether.
It’s claimed others described ‘taking extended breaks from work to escape scrutiny, exiting their job, or undergoing long-term therapy after working with Meghan’.
The source told the writer she felt that if Meghan chose to ‘acknowledge her own shortcomings or personal contributions to situations’ instead of adopting a perpetual victim role, her perception might be ‘better’.
The couple were famously disparaged by podcaster Bill Simmons who worked with the Sussexes at Spotify. In June 2023, he famously referred to the couple as ‘f******* grifters’, adding: ‘I have got to get drunk one night and tell the story of the Zoom I had with Harry to try and help him with a podcast idea. It’s one of my best stories.… F*** them. The grifters.’
2. ‘Slammed by neighbours’
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s neighbours have slammed the duo as the ‘most entitled, disingenuous people on the planet’.
In a series of cutting remarks in the article, wealthy homeowners living in star-studded Montecito near the couple’s $29million mansion criticised Harry and Meghan for turning their once-peaceful neighbourhood into a noisy throng of tourists and fast cars.
One fuming local told Vanity Fair: ‘They moved away from England to get away from the scrutiny of the press and all they do is try and get in the press in the United States.’
A Montecito resident, who has never met the couple, referred to the duo as the prince and ‘the starlet’ to the outlet.
Other negatives attributed to the pair include increased visits from out-of-towners, it being impossible to get a walk-in booking at Lucky’s, a steakhouse the pair have frequented several times, and increased house prices.
3. ‘Meghan did not come up with the idea for Archetypes’, it is alleged
Vanity Fair cites a source who claims that the idea for the Sussexes’ Archetypes came from another employee.
However, the source noted, that the ‘employee didn’t own any of the intellectual property’.
Because of Archewell Audio taking so long to handle production, Spotify’s studio Gimlet was called in, meaning the production was costlier and required more resources from the podcasting giant than expected.
4. ‘Meghan ‘re-parents’ Harry’
A source familiar with the couple described their dynamic as Meghan having a ‘caregiver and facilitator’ role in which she is the one who ‘makes things happen’.
They noted that Harry has changed since entering the relationship, saying he would previously pop into the Palace’s press office, where he may seem a little bored while asking questions, but also keen.
However, they added that they cannot imagine the Harry of today being willing to engage with the media ‘in search of purpose’.
The source concluded: ‘I don’t want to be like, oh, it’s an Oedipus thing or whatever, but it kind of feels like she’s reparenting him in a way.’
5. ‘Harry ‘didn’t understand’ repercussions of tell-all book
A source told Vanity Fair that they believed Prince Harry simply hadn’t believed that selling a tell-all book about his famously private family would have the effect that it did.
This, they added, was particularly impactful as the book was published during the middle of the public relations crisis between the Royal Family and the Sussexes – one which had rumbled on for years.
They added that they wondered if Harry understood the ‘power of the written word, and the power of the narrative’ while undertaking the project.
6. ‘They are the most entitled, disingenuous people on the planet’
A further disgruntled Montecitan described the couple as ‘the most entitled, disingenuous people on the planet’.
They added that while the Sussexes claimed they left England to avoid media scrutiny, they appear to constantly court media attention in the States.
7. ‘I don’t believe she didn’t know she’d have to curtsey for the Queen’
Fashion and cultural commentator Tom Fitzgerald, who also lives in the Sussexes’ home time of Montecito, recalled a story where a server at a restaurant told him Meghan had called the eatery ahead of going there, in order to ask about how private the seating arrangement was.
Because of her reputation for research and planning, Fitzgerald told Vanity Fair that he didn’t find it ‘particularly believable’ that she ‘went into meeting the royal family completely cold, with no research whatsoever’ – adding that his opinion is based on information Meghan has shared about herself.
8. ‘It’s huckerism: they try and monetise everything’
Another project that came under fire in the article was Meghan’s lifestyle brand, American Riviera Orchard.
According to Vanity Fair, it is in fact Santa Barbara that is today known as the American Riviera – with all Montecitans interviewed for the piece saying they hadn’t heard their area referred to in that way.
One resident said: ‘It’s such a kind of hucksterism,’ one resident says. ‘It’s just finding every way she can to monetise something.’
9. ‘They had no ideas’
Despite the major opportunities offered to the Sussexes upon their arrival in California, in the shape of Netflix and Spotify deals, they failed to yield consistent, successful content.
According to a former Spotify employee, Harry and Meghan were unlike other celebrity podcasters, who will ‘turn on the mic and talk’.
Instead, they claimed the couple ‘wanted a big theme that would explain the world, but they had no ideas’.
10. ‘Harry was ‘challenging’ to engage with’
One former Spotify staffer described Prince Harry as ‘challenging to engage with’.
They added that while the couple were interviewing someone for a job, the Duke of Sussex gave off an air of ‘why should I do this?’
This prompted the employee to wonder: ‘Didn’t Spotify pay you a lot of money to do this?’
A person who knows the couple added that it was their belief that Harry would be happy for Meghan to make all the money.
Instead, they think the former royal would prefer not to have to, and to instead concentrate on charity work.