Montecito (California):In an interview with American talk show Oprah Winfrey, Meghan Markle revealed that members of the British royal family expressed concern to her husband Prince Harry about the potential skin colour of the couple's first child.
The interview with Oprah Winfrey was the couple's first since they stepped down from royal duties and the two-hour special included numerous revelations likely to reverberate on both sides of the Atlantic.
- REVELATION 1 | Trapped within the system, says Harry
Harry said he wouldn't have left royal life if not for his wife, the actor formerly known as Meghan Markle who starred in the TV drama Suits. He said their relationship revealed the strictures of royal life. "I wouldn't have been able to, because I myself was trapped," Harry said. "I didn't see a way out. "I was trapped, but I didn't know I was trapped," Harry said, before adding, "My father and my brother, they are trapped. They don't get to leave and I have compassion for that," said Harry.
- REVELATION 2 | Meghan says Kate made her cry
Oprah asked Meghan about an incident reported in the British tabloids that Meghan made her sister-in-law Catherine cry. But Meghan said the situation was actually the reverse. According to Meghan, Catherine was the one who made Meghan cry about flower girl dresses, and Catherine apologized later and brought her flowers and a note.
- REVELATION 3 | 'Conversations' about Archie's skin colour
Meghan, who is biracial, described that when she was first pregnant with son Archie, there were "concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be when he's born." The statement led Winfrey to ask "What," incredulously and sit in silence for a moment. Meghan said that her son Archie was denied a royal title and royal protection and the palace decreed that Archie would not have any title, a move she says was "different from the protocol." When Harry and Meghan were married in May 2018, Queen Elizabeth gave them the titles of Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Archie was entitled to the "courtesy title," Earl of Dumbarton.
- REVELATION 4 | Things changed after the Australia tour
Harry says his family was welcoming of Meghan but it changed after the Australia tour. When Oprah asks if there was jealousy after the Australia tour by Meghan's popularity; Harry says he wishes they would "all learn from the past."
- REVELATION 5 | Meghan says she was silenced
Meghan says she was silenced and wasn't protected by the royal institution. Meghan said that she had been silenced after she got married and joined the royal family. It was only when she joined the institution that she understood she "wasn't being protected," she said. "They were willing to lie to protect other members of the family, but they weren't willing to tell the truth to protect me and my husband," she said.
- REVELATION 6 | Family and the institution are two different things
Meghan said she had been welcomed into the family, and that the family members are different from "the people running the institution." She said, "The Queen has always been wonderful to me," she said. On their first joint engagement, the Queen gave her a gift of pearl earrings and a matching necklace. In the car between engagements, the Queen had a blanket across her knees for warmth -- and "she said, 'Meghan, come on,' and put it across my knees as well," said Meghan. "It made me think of my grandma as well."
- REVELATION 7 | Meghan on quickly learning to curtsy before her first meeting with the Queen
Meghan describing how naive she was about the ground rules of royal life before she married her husband, Harry, nearly three years ago. "I didn't fully understand what the job was," she said. She also noted that she did not know how to curtsy before meeting Queen Elizabeth II for the first time, and didn't realize it would be necessary. Before she met the Queen for the first time, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, said she was taught to curtsy. "I thought genuinely that that was what happens outside, I thought that was part of the fanfare. I didn't think that's what happens inside. And I said, 'But it's your grandmother.' [Harry] goes, 'It's the Queen,'" she told Oprah Winfrey in the interview. "That was really the first moment that the penny dropped," she added. She said she practiced it quickly with Harry before the meeting and did a "very deep curtsy" in front of the Queen. "We just sat there and we chatted. And it was lovely and easy," she said of their first meeting.
- REVELATION 8 | Meghan and Harry got married three days before the royal wedding
Meghan told Oprah that she and Harry got married three days before the royal wedding that captured the world's attention. The vows framed in their home shows the two of them during their private wedding, Meghan said. Life now in their new home has been "really fulfilling," she added -- the couple has been able to focus on "getting back down to basics."
- REVELATION 9 | Harry on his relationship with father and brother
A rift between Prince Harry and his father so deep that Harry said his father, Prince Charles, at one point "stopped taking my calls." Harry also said that "there's a lot to work through" with his father and he feels really let down. Harry acknowledged that he does not have a close relationship presently with his brother William, who is heir to the throne after their father.
- REVELATION 10 | Meghan on pressure of being linked to the prestigious royal family.
Meghan said she and Harry were aligned during their courtship because of their "cause-driven" work. But she did not fully comprehend the pressure of being linked to the prestigious royal family. "It's easy to have an image of it that is so far from reality," she said. "And that's what was really tricky over those past few years, is when the perception and the reality are two very different things. And you're being judged on the perception, but you're living the reality of it. There's a complete misalignment and there's no way to explain that to people."
- REVELATION 11 | Meghan on suicidal thoughts
In a heartbreaking moment, Meghan revealed that she was having "methodical" thoughts about suicide while she was in the royal family. "That was a very clear and real and frightening thought," Meghan said. "I couldn't be left alone." According to Meghan, she went to the "Institution," meaning several senior officials, to receive help for her suicidal thoughts, or to be checked into a hospital, but she was told it wouldn't be good for optics. After being rebuffed, Meghan said she reached out to one of Princess Diana's best friends, but continued to have those thoughts, which she called a breaking point. She also described feeling captive, as her license, passport, and credit cards were taken after her wedding and were unavailable to her. Clearly emotional, the Duchess said her life in the palace was an example of why people should be kind, since you never know what people are going through "behind closed doors."
Harry and Meghan's departure from royal life was supposed to be reviewed after a year. On Feb. 19, Buckingham Palace confirmed that the couple would not return to royal duties and Harry would relinquish his honorary military titles - a decision that made formal, and final, the couple's split from the royal family.
