The first time paparazzi followed Meghan Markle after learning about her relationship with Prince Harry, she smiled at them and politely wished them a good day.
A reaction that her future husband immediately advised against: “You can’t talk to them.
Because otherwise the British media will say you like it”.
This is the main idea of the second episode of
Harry & Meghan
, the documentary produced by the couple for Netflix, whose first three parts (out of six) were unveiled on December 5: how Meghan Markle, an actress and activist with a big heart , fell in love with a prince.
And saw his ideals, his naturalness and his goodwill come up against the voracity, and racism, of the English tabloids.
In video, the trailer for the Netflix documentary
Harry & Meghan
A happy childhood
To come back to her childhood, Meghan Markle notably has her mother, Doria Ragland, testify, who very rarely speaks in public.
She recognizes it right away: “The last five years have been difficult”.
Namely, what has happened since her daughter met Prince Harry.
Because before, everything seemed almost idyllic.
In the documentary, mother and daughter return to the Los Angeles neighborhood where Meghan grew up, a quiet street where she was raised by "a beautiful community of women" (including her grandmother and aunt).
The future Duchess of Sussex is a “very pleasant and appreciated” child, “full of empathy”: maternal compliments to which are added those of her primary school principal, whom Meghan comes to visit.
Read also
Harry & Meghan
: the first cutesy and smooth episode of the Netflix documentary
The only downside: a feeling of loneliness due to the fact that his parents are separated.
If Meghan Markle spent a lot of time with her father Thomas (photos in support, perhaps temporarily rehabilitating the image of a man whose speeches in the press deprived him of attending the wedding of his daughter), she felt isolated.
And recites today from memory, facing the camera and a bewildered gaze, a poem written when she was 12 years old: "I would like to live a life without blues / with a happy father and his wife / a fence, a hairy dog / A chimney where the wood crackles: But it's a dream, not a reality / I can neither cry nor shout”.
Touching moment.
Or a bit awkward.
A life of your own
A caring, intelligent, and committed young woman.
This is the portrait painted, with the help of testimonials from relatives and archive images, episode 2 of
Harry & Meghan
.
The ex-actress recalls, as she did recently in her podcast, that as a child she was not considered "the pretty girl", but rather the "intellectual" service.
And returns to the (famous) episode of the advertisement for dishwashing liquid, deemed sexist, which she had managed to modify when she was only 11 years old.
Read alsoImages of Meghan Markle at 11, already full of confidence
Meghan Markle and her loved ones insist: she already had a busy life before meeting Prince Harry.
A life shared between the set of the
Suits
series (of which she was, of course, one of the rays of sunshine) and her humanitarian commitments: between two shoots (and the time taken by her lifestyle advice blog, The Tig), Meghan isn't looking to land a role in "an awesome indie movie that'll win her an Oscar."
No, Meghan is going to India, Rwanda, or as part of her role with the United Nations.
It is this openness to the world, and the fact of being an accomplished woman, which contributes to Prince Harry falling in love with her.
And the marriage proposal, in a setting of electric candles and roast chicken.
Meghan, happy, confident and naive, tells herself that everything will be fine.
Yes, she bows too deeply the first time she meets Queen Elizabeth (reproduced facing the camera under the somewhat puzzled eyes of her husband).
But for sure, she will get better.
That said, she didn't expect the "very formal" side of Kate Middleton and Prince William the first time she met them at a simple dinner: the American "hug" collided to the coldness of the English.
And in the documentary, the seeds of the feud between the two duchesses are planted.
A toxic environment
“A rite of passage” is, according to Harry, how the royal family has described the tabloid harassment that Meghan has suffered.
The prince even adding, images of Lady Di, Sarah Ferguson and Kate Middleton in support, that his male parents would have told him that “their wives had been there, so why would it be any different for your girlfriend?
Why should she be protected?”
Meghan Markle's husband replied: "The difference is the question of race."
This is the other theme addressed by this second episode: how the media pressure, inevitable when you are part of the royal family (and even encouraged by the latter, according to Meghan and Harry), took on frankly nauseating overtones because Meghan Markle was mixed-race.
In addition to the fact that the latter talks extensively about her difficulty "finding her place" in the world, and the racism she suffered in her childhood (such as the first time she heard the "n-word" addressed to his mother), the British writer and historian David Olusoga analyses, not without relevance, the mechanisms of the tabloid press applied to the new royal couple: defined as "a white industry" of which only "0.2% of journalists" would be blacks, she would decide on her own “what goes too far and what is racist.”
A "toxic" point of view exacerbated, in 2016 (the year the couple's relationship was exposed in the press), by tensions due to Brexit and the attitude towards foreigners in England.
she suffered in her childhood (like the first time she heard the "n-word" addressed to her mother), the British writer and historian David Olusoga analyzes, not without relevance, the mechanisms of the tabloid press applied to the new royal couple: defined as “a white industry” of which only “0.2% of journalists” would be black, it would decide on its own “what goes too far and what is racist.”
A "toxic" point of view exacerbated, in 2016 (the year the couple's relationship was exposed in the press), by tensions due to Brexit and the attitude towards foreigners in England.
she suffered in her childhood (like the first time she heard the "n-word" addressed to her mother), the British writer and historian David Olusoga analyzes, not without relevance, the mechanisms of the tabloid press applied to the new royal couple: defined as “a white industry” of which only “0.2% of journalists” would be black, it would decide on its own “what goes too far and what is racist.”
A "toxic" point of view exacerbated, in 2016 (the year the couple's relationship was exposed in the press), by tensions due to Brexit and the attitude towards foreigners in England.
defined as “a white industry” of which only “0.2% of journalists” would be black, it would decide on its own “what goes too far and what is racist.”
A "toxic" point of view exacerbated, in 2016 (the year the couple's relationship was exposed in the press), by tensions due to Brexit and the attitude towards foreigners in England.
defined as “a white industry” of which only “0.2% of journalists” would be black, it would decide on its own “what goes too far and what is racist.”
A "toxic" point of view exacerbated, in 2016 (the year the couple's relationship was exposed in the press), by tensions due to Brexit and the attitude towards foreigners in England.
Read alsoThe five little lies of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in the trailer of their documentary
This is perhaps the (only?) interesting point of this episode, which could otherwise be reduced to a long hagiography of Meghan Markle, without new information or particular revelations: how the questions of sexism and racism entered in the media debate at the precise moment when the couple, doomed no matter what happens to be overexposed, entered the light.
What these tensions say about our time and our relationship to celebrity.
The answer, in
Harry and Meghan
, only attaches to the pain she caused them.
Which, if it remains legitimate, continues to be their only subject.