Spring vows in works for Prince Harry, Meghan
IN THIS TROUBLED AGE, CAN ONE ROYAL WEDDING DELIVER US FROM OUR CYNICISM?
Now is an awkward time for fairy tales.
This is not for lack of magical transformations — those still happen all the time. But at the moment they just all seem to go the wrong way, as beloved pop cultural figures morph overnight into cartoonish monsters. In 2017, it seems like every grandmother is secretly a wolf, every prince a frog, and every romantic storyline subject to scrutiny for problematic expressions of toxic masculinity.
So when news broke that Prince Harry, 33, would marry Meghan Markle, 36, next spring, the royal romance was instantly beset with narrative peril. These days, buying into a fairy tale is just asking for trouble.
As the British press went through the familiar motions of royal worship Monday, you could almost feel the dramatic apprehension — as if, on the stroke of midnight, the Archbishop of Canterbury would turn into Louis CK, the mice would become alt-right Nazis, and the future duchess would once again be just another American working in Toronto.
There were any number of ways this could have proven too good for Fleet Street to let be true. It could have turned because Markle is a commoner. Like Princess Kate before her, she could be mocked for having parents who worked at real jobs, thus revealing the lingering class hierarchy that governs British life.
Or it could have been because Markle is American, which to the British ear translates as crass. Even worse, she might have been seen as trying to pass as British, a crime of manners for which other famous American women, like Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow, have been brutally mocked.
Or maybe it would have been because Markle is divorced — a “bolter,” in the aristocratic lingo — notwithstanding that the groom’s father Charles, the future king, is as well.
Markle’s successful career as an actress brought risks of its own, as traditional fairy tales prefer heroines with limited backstory, like the kindergarten teacher Diana. Indeed, after clips from Markle’s television drama Suits were posted on an X-rated website in the early days of the romance, it was the grotesquely misleading headline in The Sun — “Harry Girl’s on Pornhub” — that prompted the prince to make a public attack on the same kind of media intrusion that tormented his mother.
He said reporters offered bribes to her ex-boyfriend, harassed her mother, tried to gain “illegal entry to her home,” and forced his lawyers into “nightly battles to keep defamatory stories out of papers.”
“Prince Harry is worried about Ms. Markle’s safety and is deeply disappointed that he has not been able to protect her,” his secretary said in a statement at the time.
It would seem a bit silly in 2017 to think a royal marriage could be derailed on the grounds of Markle’s Catholicism. But as of 2015, the law that would have forced him to choose between his wife and his faith has been abolished.
Racism remains, however, and the bigotry of the British aristocracy has already threatened to make Markle, whose mother is African-American, unwelcome in her new country. A prime example came when Rachel Johnson, sister of Foreign Secretary Boris, referred in a newspaper column to Markle’s “exotic DNA,” and wrongly characterized her childhood as some kind of tale of gangland hardship.
Now that the engagement has been announced, all of these potential dramatic pitfalls will arise anew. And with the Queen in her winter years, can the world today really fall for a royal romance?
The answer is obvious. Of course it can. Don’t be silly. Everybody loves this stuff. There are already pictures going around of a footman polishing the windows of the wedding carriage.
Harry’s redemption story offers much of this particular fairy tale’s appeal. He has played the rogue — worn the Nazi costume, partied naked in Vegas, dated socialites and expressed fondness for Calgary bartenders. But he has taken a saintly turn, using his military experience to create the wildly successful Invictus Games, a celebration of wounded soldiers hosted this year in Toronto, at which he and Markle made their first public appearance together.
Since then, his youthful love life has all but eclipsed his older brother’s dreary family life in the public imagination. And though William and Kate are due to have a baby in the new year, thus bumping Harry down the line of succession, his wedding is sure to be the most hotly anticipated royal event of 2018.
Britain has learned its lesson. Downplaying the people’s fondness for the Royal Family simply rouses civic rage, as the Queen learned in failing to adequately mourn the death of Diana.
Even on Monday, when Prime Minister Theresa May said Harry’s big day would not be made a national holiday, her spokesman seemed unprepared for what followed from the British press and people, backtracking to say there were simply “no plans” as of yet.
It fell to the Guardian, that arbiter of British progressive correctness, to write an editorial under a headline that grudgingly acknowledged this national desire for the royals to live happily ever after: “They’re engaged. That’s nice.” Quite.