The unforgettable day when I came face to face with the Queen of TV
Itoo was interviewed by Oprah. It’s almost 20 years ago now. My novel, I Don’t Know How She Does It, was riding high on every bestseller list in the US (a miracle which a shell-shocked, first-time author found hard to credit). The publicity team at my publisher, Knopf, fought furiously to get me a prized slot on Oprah’s Book Club, which would guarantee another million sales.
I still remember the agonies I went through trying to pick an outfit for the show. I settled on a not-quite-right crimson jacket. Too small for me now, it hangs in the wardrobe and, occasionally, I touch it and am transported back to that terrifying, unforgettable day.
“Miss Pearson, you’re going live in front of 40 million Americans,” a producer whispered in my ear. I stepped out into the blazing cauldron of light and came face to face with the Queen of TV.
“What was she like?” people ask. Honestly, it’s hard to say. She was burnished, immaculately made up, vividly present, yet somehow unreal; more like a hologram of a famous person than a flesh-and-blood human.
She was formidably well-prepared, I remember that much. As an interviewer myself, I knew she had really done her homework. The studio audience of working moms clearly worshipped her. The host was at the height of her powers.
Oprah could command ratings of 40 million back then. Her interview with Meghan (and Mr Markle) on CBS got 17 million, a small fraction of the US TV viewership. (In the UK, it was
11.1 million.) Still, the Sussexes will have been keenly aware that an audience with the Queen of TV is a kind of anointing.
A guest at their 2018 wedding, where famous “friends” didn’t need to actually have met the couple in person, Oprah could be relied upon for a sympathetic hearing. Another benefit is that an American host wouldn’t know to query a factually incorrect assertion about the title of Prince wrongfully being denied to baby Archie.
Make no mistake, the Duke and Duchess only care how their revelations “land” in the States. The havoc and hurt caused in Harry’s homeland is of minor importance. Or so he thinks.
Comparing the reaction to the broadcast in the two countries is revealing. President Biden went so far as to praise Meghan’s “courage”. Britons, I am proud to say, take a dimmer view of the prince we once adored dropping his 94-year-old grandmother (and the institution to which she has devoted her life) in the Brown Windsor soup. Some 47 per cent of us think the interview was inappropriate, against just 21 per cent who approve.
The Sussexes seem to breezily have assumed that, once they’d told their side of the story, that would “draw a line” under it. Trust me, inside Kensington Palace and Windsor Castle right now it doesn’t look as if a line has been drawn. It looks like what a drunken uncle would produce using his nephew’s Spirograph at Christmas.
A scribbly, tangled web of damaging allegations which are hard to refute without making things worse. How on
earth do you fight back against a pregnant woman who says she contemplated taking her own life without looking as heartless as she says you are?
Paralysed with dismay at what a New York friend calls “the Duchess and the dumpster fire”, courtiers have had to carefully weigh up responding to serious allegations versus maintaining a dignified silence. If silence is allowed to be dignified any more, that is. Or are all silences now cold and unfeeling, further evidence that the Royal family is incapable of change and is institutionally racist to boot?
Think how Prince William must be smarting at the snide story about his wife making Meghan cry. It must be even more upsetting for the Prince of Wales. He looked as pleased as punch when he gracefully stepped into the breach and walked his new daughterin-law down the aisle.
The service on that rapturously beautiful spring day, almost three years ago now, was gloriously diverse, from the Kingdom Choir singing Stand By Me to that Chicago-born bishop and his belter of a sermon. Organised by Palace courtiers, with creative input from Prince Charles, the event was not notable for its racism. In fact, it came across as a magical, magnanimous celebration of the best of British, old and new.
People loved it. People loved them, Harry and Meghan. Has any couple ever burned so fast through so much goodwill?
For what it’s worth, I believe the Palace did learn the lessons of the tragic story of the Princess of Wales. When she joined the Royal family, Meghan was not assigned dandruffy stiffs in grey suits. For a while, she had an all-female team, although a couple
soon departed. Allegations that two women staff members were bullied are belatedly under investigation. The fact that complaints were not acted on at the time strongly suggests that, despite what she now claims, the Duchess was being protected and handled with extreme sensitivity.
In her interview with Oprah, Meghan complained that no one had helped her to understand how to fulfil her role. Funny that one senior woman adviser recalled telling the Duchess that she should wear a hat for her first joint engagement with the Queen; Meghan turned up hatless. Did she ever want to fit in? I doubt it.
Although the Duchess told Oprah that she did no research into Prince
Harry, Ninaki Priddy, her best friend from childhood (since expunged from the narrative), said Meghan was obsessed with the Royal family and there was a well-thumbed copy of Diana: Her True Story on her bookshelf: “She wants to be Princess Diana 2.0.”
Even after a 90-minute interview with Oprah, so many questions remain unanswered. How could a person who was heavily involved in the Heads Together mental health campaign not find help for her own serious issues instead of applying to HR at the Palace?
Which senior Royal speculated on the skin tone any child of Harry and Meghan might have? They need to name that individual at once to disperse the ugly cloud of suspicion over innocent heads.
For the Queen, this is a time of peril and uncertainty. Monarchists will side instinctively with the Crown, but many Britons, particularly the young and members of ethnic minorities, will be appalled by the accusations flung at England from California.
The Royal motto, “Never complain, never explain”, has served Her Majesty well for almost 68 years on the throne. But yesterday’s short statement from Buckingham Palace suggests she may not turn the other cheek this time, not with her family under personal and, some would say, unwarranted attack.
It’s not an easy calculation to make. Have the Sussexes reached peak pique? Or is there yet more monogrammed dirty linen to be aired when they need another blast of publicity?
Walled up in the castle of their own righteousness, Meghan and Harry can’t be relied upon to behave with respect towards the institution that gave them their titles and their pulling power.
I know from personal experience that Oprah is a superb interviewer. I can’t help wishing, though, that the Duchess of Sussex would agree to a return match with a British inquisitor – Jeremy Paxman, perhaps.
You can just imagine Paxo’s aghast look, the thoroughbred snort of his nostrils. “What the bloody hell are you on about, woman?” Sadly, I don’t think we’ll get to see that revealing encounter any time soon.
Have the Sussexes reached peak pique? Or is there yet more dirty linen to be aired?