Former Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown has described Megxit as a ‘disaster for both sides’ and claimed Harry and Meghan caused ‘maximum mayhem’ when leaving the Royal Family because they are ‘addicted to drama’.
Ms Brown, the author of The Palace Papers: Inside The House Of Windsor – The Truth And The Turmoil, made the claims while appearing on New York Times podcast Sway to promote her new book.
She said the couple made ‘bad choices’ and could have left the Royal Family on far better terms if they weren’t as ‘hotheaded’.
Ms Brown also labelled Prince Harry a ‘very impetuous man’ and revealed how Palace advisors ‘always thought he would leave’.
She said she was told it was because ‘he was so fragile, so combustible, he was so unhappy, frankly, in the constraints of the royal family’.
However, she also noted that the couple’s exit from royal life was a ‘disaster all round’.
She said: ‘I actually think there is a Harry-shaped hole in the royal family now. And Harry was beloved, actually, by the British people. And people adored Meghan when she came into the mix.
‘So it was actually very, very sad for everybody that it went so wrong because they actually need Harry and Meghan now. You should see, the queen is failing, and she’s very frail. They kind of need Harry and Meghan to bring that star power and to be on the balcony at the Jubilee. We have to have a royal family up there. We can’t have Andrew up there.’
Harry and Meghan attend the Athletics Competition during day two of the Invictus Games at Zuiderpark on April 17, 2022
Tina Brown said Sussexes made ‘bad choices’ and could have left the Royal Family on far better terms if they weren’t as ‘hotheaded’
Ms Brown also noted that the couple’s exit from royal life was a ‘disaster all round’
Ms Brown believes Prince Harry could return to the royal family after the Queen’s death – though she warned that Meghan ‘disliked’ England.
She said: ‘I think that Harry is going to want to come back when the Queen dies to serve his country. And I think they will find a way to reel him in. And it’s possible that Meghan – maybe they will have a commuter arrangement. I don’t know. I don’t see Meghan ever wanting to go back. She disliked England.’
The Queen and Prince Harry’s father Prince Charles are both said to very ‘keen’ for him, his wife and children to jet in from California to mark the Queen’s 70 years on the throne.
Buckingham Palace is said to have promised the Sussexes full armed security at all Royal Family events in June in a bid to reassure them after Harry said he felt ‘unsafe’ in Britain.
But despite Her Majesty and Prince Charles removing the main obstacle for Harry, Meghan, Archie and Lilibet attending, the Duke of Sussex is still said to be genuinely undecided about whether to jet in to celebrate his grandmother’s 70 years on the throne.
A palace source told the Sunday telegraph that ‘the ball was in his court’, adding: ‘His grandmother and father keen to welcome the Sussexes to “family” events’.
It would mean that the Sussexes would be welcomed onto the Buckingham Palace balcony with the rest of the royals to watch a RAF flypast and the Trooping the Colour on June 2, the Queen’s official birthday.
But they would be unable to attend working elements of the Jubilee, having quit as frontline royals when they emigrated to Canada and then Los Angeles two years ago.
The Sussexes recently caused outrage after Harry claimed in an NBC interview that he wanted to make sure his grandmother was ‘protected’ and had ‘the right people around her’.
In an NBC TV appearance, Harry also opened up on his ‘special’ relationship with his grandmother, and his very public claim that she confides in him things she cannot talk to anyone else about.
Experts branded the comments a ‘gross insult’ to Charles and William, and point out that his and Meghan’s top secret ‘olive branch’ meeting with the Queen at Windsor Castle before the Invictus Games was the first time Harry had seen his grandmother in two years.
The Queen is all smiles as she heads out this morning on the Sandringham Estate
The Queen and Prince Charles are said to be ‘keen’ to welcome Harry and Meghan (pictured during Trooping The Colour 2018) to ‘family’ events at the Jubilee in June but: ‘The ball is in their court’
Discussing the surprise meeting with the Queen, Ms Brown said it could be a sign of things to come.
She said: It’s a sign of a cautious rapprochement, and I actually think that when the queen dies, I would not be at all surprised if some kind of new charter, as it were, with Harry is drawn up, because I think they’re going to feel they do need Harry in some way. And he might get a bit more of what he wanted.
‘I mean, he could be a kind of commuter royal, I guess. The problem is the money piece. You know, they wanted to make money. And the big tension there was conflict of interest. I mean, how do you work that?’
Ms Brown’s podcast appearance comes after her new book unveiled a list of bombshells on Harry and his relationship with the royal family.
It revealed how Harry ‘vented’ about William and ‘poured out resentments’ about his father Charles to his actress ex-girlfriend Cressida Bonas so much that she recommended he see a therapist, leading the duke to seek advice on the best shrinks from MI6.
The Duke of Sussex grew ‘angry’ as he felt his brother was ‘hogging the best briefs’ around a decade ago – and when he wasn’t obsessing over William would moan about the Prince of Wales.
She claims ‘friction between the brothers escalated’ so much after William became patron of the rhino and elephant charity the Tusk Trust in 2015 that the pair had ‘Olympic rows’ – and quotes a friend of the siblings as calling Harry a ‘very, very angry man’.
Harry and William stand together during the unveiling of a statue they commissioned of their mother Diana in the Sunken Garden at Kensington Palace, London, July 1, 2021
Harry and William with a cheetah at the Mokolodo nature reserve in Gaberone, Botswana on June 15, 2010
The royal expert also claims Harry’s ex-girlfriend Cressida grew ‘tiresome’ of his complaints about his family while they dated between 2012 and 2014, and was apparently the first person to persuade the Queen’s grandson to see a therapist – leading him to take advice from MI6 to find the right person.
After their relationship broke down, Harry wrote the old flame ‘a sweet letter saying ‘I admire you, I wish you well and above all thank you for helping me to address my demons and seek help”, Mrs Brown claims, quoting one of her contacts.
Cressie is said to have also found his resentment towards the Press ‘trying’ – and that while reports played-up the romantic love affair, the ‘bizarre reality of date nights was glumly eating takeaway and watching Netflix at Nottingham Cottage, Harry’s none-too-tidy two-bedroom grace-and-favour bachelor pad in the grounds of Kensington Palace’, Mrs Brown writes.
The tension between Harry and William existed years before Meghan Markle burst onto the scene, Mrs Brown claims. However, her arrival changed ‘everything’ in Harry’s life, and she suggests the pair became ‘drunk on a shared fantasy of being the instruments of global transformation who, once married, would operate in the celebrity stratosphere once inhabited by Princess Diana’.
Mrs Brown has also claimed that Harry and Meghan are ‘addicted to drama’ – and says one day the duke will ‘wake up’ and realise he’s living in Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop.
The Duke of Sussex cheers on competitors during the powerlifting event at the Invictus Games, in the Netherlands
Harry and Meghan during the Invictus Games on April 17, a week after meeting his grandmother the Queen at Windsor
Speaking to the Telegraph, the expert said the pair can’t stop creating dramatic scenes wherever they go – claiming they appeared to be ‘addicted to drama’. And she warned the duke appears to have been ‘completely and utterly taken over by Meghan and his whole personality has changed’.
‘I do question how it will end. ‘[Maybe] he’ll wake up and realise he’s living in Goop and he has to get the hell out, go down the pub and see his friends,’ she added.
The Royal Family was last week left reeling when Harry, appeared to issue a veiled warning to those closest to the Queen when interviewed by a US network, saying he wanted to make sure his grandmother was ‘protected’ and had ‘the right people around her’.
The duke did not elaborate on whether he was referring to royal aides or members of his own family, but his comments may have deepened his rift with his father the Prince of Wales and his brother William and perplexed palace officials.
Harry also risked further fuelling the rift with his estranged older brother by stating that their late mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, was now watching over him from beyond the grave as ‘she’s done her bit’ with William and his family.
In an NBC TV appearance, Harry also opened up on his ‘special’ relationship with his grandmother, and his very public claim that she confides in him things she cannot talk to anyone else about.
And in a barbed comment, he said of his visit: ‘I’m just making sure that she’s protected and got the right people around her’.
Sources have told the Daily Mail that the prince appeared mollified at the plans put in place when he and Meghan visited the Queen at Windsor last week.
The couple brought over their own private bodyguards from the US but stayed on the Queen’s Windsor estate and received a Special Escort Group (SEG) detail when travelling outside.
The SEG provides mobile armed protection to both royals and government ministers. This ‘hybrid’ model is now likely to be offered to Harry, Meghan and children, Archie, two, and, Lilibet, ten months, when visiting. It would be funded by taxpayers as the Home Office have made clear that they cannot agree private financial arrangements with anyone receiving Met Police security.
Harry is taking legal action against the Home Office after being stripped of armed police protection. He says he does not feel safe under current security arrangements bringing his family to the UK and has offered to pay for British police bodyguards himself.
The duke’s barrister, Shaheed Fatima QC, previously told the High Court that Harry considers the UK ‘is and always will be his home’ and says he is keen to return to visit family and friends – although the prince this week said in a TV interview that home ‘is in the States’.
A well-placed source told the Mail: ‘Harry was fairly pleased with the way the operation worked [when he and Meghan came to Windsor] and the liaison between his security team and the Met. He believes it means a workable solution can be found, allowing him to come over with his children as early as the Platinum Jubilee.’
The source said they believed Harry would now row back from his legal action.
It came as Donald Trump urged the Queen to strip Prince Harry and Meghan Markle of all their royal titles as he described the Duke of Sussex as being ‘whipped like no person I think I’ve ever seen’ and ‘led around by his nose’.
The former US president admonished Harry for being ‘so disrespectful to the country’ and an ’embarrassment’ – adding that the Queen should ban him from even visiting Britain and tell him: ‘Frankly, don’t come around.’
Mr Trump also said Harry had been ‘led down a path’ and that he wondered whether the Duke – who stepped down as a senior royal in early 2020 with his American wife – would ‘go back on his hands and knees and say “please”.’
He claimed is ‘not a fan’ of Meghan and ‘wasn’t right from the beginning’, telling Piers Morgan on the new channel TalkTV: ‘I’ve been a very good predictor, as you know – I’ve predicted almost everything. It’ll end, and it’ll end bad.’
It was Mr Trump’s latest attack on the couple, with him having previously spoken of his support for the 96-year-old monarch who hosted him with wife Melania in a State Banquet at Buckingham Palace in London in June 2019.
Prince Harry on secret Queen trip, how America is ‘home’ and whether he misses William & Charles
- On visiting the Queen: ‘Being with her, it was great. It was just so nice to see her. You know, she’s on great form. She has always got a great sense of humour with me and I’m just making sure she’s protected and has got the right people around her.’
- On the best thing about the Queen: ‘Her sense of humour and her ability to see the humour in so many different things. We have a really special relationship. We talk about things that she can’t talk about with anybody else, so that is always a nice peace to her. But I think she’s… I think after a certain age you get bored of birthdays.’
- On whether he misses William and Charles: ‘Look I mean, for me at the moment, I’m here focused on these guys and these families and giving everything that I can, 120 per cent to them to make sure they have the experience of a lifetime. That’s my focus here. And when I leave here, I get back and my focus is on my family who I miss massively.’
- On whether he will attend the Platinum Jubilee celebrations: ‘I don’t know yet. There’s lots of things with security issues and everything else. This is what I’m trying to do, trying to make it possible that I can get my kids to meet her.’
- On Archie: ‘He’s into the why stage. Why this? Why that? Why that? And instead of just trying to move it on, I give him the most honest answer I can. And then it goes on and on and on until he’s satisfied. And then that’s it. It’s done. Otherwise it ends up with – because the world is round and that it is the way life is.’
- On America being his new home: ‘Home for me now is, you know, for the time being, it’s in the States. And it feels that way as well.’
- On his late mother Princess Diana: ‘It is almost as though she’s done her bit with my brother and now she’s very much, like, helping me. Got him set up. And now she’s helping me set up. That’s what it feels like, you know? He’s got his kids. I’ve got my kids, you know the circumstances are obviously different. But now, I feel her presence in almost everything that I do now. But definitely more so in the last two years than ever before. Without question. So she’s watching over us.’
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