What Meghan can learn from Wallis
There’s no sign of bitter carping on Mrs Simpson’s tell-all 50 years ago
From the moment that Meghan Markle became engaged to Prince Harry, similarities have been drawn with Wallis Simpson. History seemed to be repeating itself, as another American divorce´e captured the heart of a British prince and went on to become a royal duchess in exile (albeit self-imposed).
Since explosive clips of the Duke and Duchess’ interview with Oprah Winfrey first broke last week, comparisons have only escalated, with hyperbolic suggestions this could be the biggest crisis to face the monarchy since Edward VIII abdicated in 1936.
Meghan’s look in the Oprah Winfrey interview does seem to be a nod to the Duchess of Windsor.
Her black Armani dress with white flowers and centre-parted dark hair reminiscent of Wallis’ style in a portrait taken in the year Edward gave up his throne to marry her.
And as we wait to see what further incendiary bombshells the
Sussexes lob at the monarchy in their interview on American television tonight, we might well remember we have been here before.
Over 50 years ago, the nation was similarly agog at the blockbuster watch of its day when, on March 27 1970, the exiled Duke and Duchess of Windsor gave a 50-minute “tell-all” interview to esteemed BBC journalist, Kenneth Harris.
Then, as now, the Palace took a dim view of this first sit-down interview with a royal, which seemed equally electrifying and scurrilous at the time.
Certainly, as the brouhaha over the Oprah circus inflicts untold damage on monarchical optics, the Sussexes, with their accusation against The Firm of “falsehoods” and “unsurvivable” experiences, seem hellbent on further alienating themselves from the royal fold.
The Duke of Windsor never recovered from his family’s treatment of his wife; they refused to meet her and would not accord her the HRH title to which she was entitled.
His once close relationship with his beloved brother, Bertie, disintegrated and there was no way back.
How will Harry bridge the widening rift with his once beloved brother, after he and Meghan have had their unvarnished bleat on Oprah?
What might Meghan say or hint at towards the Duchess of Cambridge, with whom, it has been rumoured, considerable tensions exist? It’s a direct echo of the Windsors’ situation decades earlier when the brothers were caught between icy sister-in-law relations.
The late Queen Mother despised Wallis, unfairly blaming her for the abdication, dismissing her as “that woman”.
While Meghan appears to want to up the ante against her in-laws, suggesting she has little to lose by “speaking her truth” because “there is a lot that has been lost already”, Wallis tried to build bridges to the last.
Wallis, who adored her own mother, found it unfathomable that her husband was estranged from his mother, Queen Mary. In August 1942, when Edward was Governor of the Bahamas, his brother, the Duke of Kent was tragically killed in a plane crash in Scotland.
Edward was consumed with grief. Wallis watched his suffering helplessly. She later admitted in her memoir that she had attempted, without her husband’s knowledge, that year to make “one last try to reach his mother and heal the breach between them”. She wrote to Queen Mary, expressing her regret that she had been “the cause of any separation that exists between Mother and Son,” and offering news of the Duke’s wellbeing. Her touching missive received no reply.
When the Windsors spoke to Harris from their Parisian home, you might have imagined that Wallis would seize the opportunity to settle scores against her frosty in-laws. Or that the Duke would finally get his deep-seated grievances against his family off his chest.
It had taken many years for Harris to persuade the former king of England to speak out.
Apparently, the night before the interview was recorded in October 1969, the 75-yearold Duke got cold feet and tried to back out. But it was too late. His reservations are evident throughout the interview, which is an exercise in his discomfiture.
Slumped in a yellow chair, he is constantly looking down at his hands, studying his nails, fidgeting. With his hangdog eyes and stutteringly slow delivery, clocks chiming in the background, it makes for occasionally awkward viewing.
The Duchess, elegant in a cream dress with pale blue scarf, radiates humour and warmth.
From the clips we have seen of Meghan interviewed by Oprah in a lush Californian garden, her sphinx-like poise smacks of artifice. You sense her containment and self-control. In contrast, Wallis appears relaxed and selfdeprecating. Perhaps the most touching moment comes when Wallis says “We’ve been very happy.”
The Duke awkwardly grabs her hand in confirmation. Looking at her adoringly, he agrees “we have”.
In that moment, the most important aspect of the interview is revealed.
What everyone wanted to know was: Was the abdication worth it? The Windsors convey that what bound them together for over 35 years of marriage was, as the Duke’s former equerry Fruity Metcalf witnessed, writing in 1940 of their union, “it is very true and deep stuff”.
When Harris addresses the thorny issue of the Duke’s role, or lack of one, in exile, the couple’s response is textbook diplomacy. Harris asks the Duke: “Why didn’t you get a job, do you think?”
The Windsors laugh and exchange the most telling look of the interview. One of the major gripes the Duke held was that no royal position was ever found for him after the abdication by his unyielding family, who were threatened by his star quality and his public’s adoration. They could not risk him overshadowing his shy, less charismatic brother.
When Harris inquires if they have any regrets, Wallis replies with exquisite understatement the Duchess of Sussex might have done well to take note of. “I wish it could have been different. Naturally, we’ve had some hard times. Who hasn’t?” she asks.
There is no hint of bitterness, rather a sanguine acceptance of what must have seemed her own unsurvivable moments, when, during the abdication crisis, she became the most-hated woman in the world.
Watching this poignant interview now, through the prism of the Sussexes’ explosive offering, which even Oprah concludes is “shocking”, the Windsors could not seem sweeter, or their stance more quaint.
The saddest thing is that Wallis and Edward, despite being banished, were dutiful and patriotic to the end.
The Duke, who died two years later, never once succumbed to public carping about his family.
What a pity that from the teasers we’ve seen, Meghan and Harry seem unlikely to display similar loyalty to the Crown on Oprah.
Meghan and Harry’s interview with Oprah Winfrey will be shown on Three tomorrow at 7.30pm