When things got tough, the royal family’s official line was “no comment,” said former Meghan Markle in her recent interview with Oprah Winfrey. But that is not how we operate here in the Americas – at least as far as her father and her half sister are concerned.
Thomas Markle and Samantha Markle followed Prince Harry and Meghan’s conversation with their own comments. Unsurprisingly, they are not happy with what Meghan said in the two-hour special that drew more than 17 million viewers to CBS on Sunday night.
“I suffer a lot. I mean, I lost my father. I lost a baby. I almost lost my name. I mean, there is a loss of identity, ”said Meghan in the interview. “But I’m still standing, and my hope for people who are learning this is to know that there is another side.”
In a bonus clip – the three-hour, 20-minute conversation was edited to an hour and 25 minutes that aired on TV – she noticed that her mother, Doria Ragland, “remained in dignified silence for four years watching me go through it . ”His father did not behave like that when the media tracked him, however.
About her half-sister Samantha Markle, with whom she shares a father and a half-brother, Meghan said in the bonus clip: “I don’t feel comfortable talking about people I don’t really know. I grew up as an only child, which everyone who grew up around me knows, and I would like to have siblings. I would love to have brothers. “
Thomas Markle placed the blame directly on his daughter’s shoulders, saying that he had not heard of her or Harry since he was lying in a hospital bed after having a heart attack.
“She is practically a ghost of her entire family, on the mother’s side and on my side. So she really had no one to turn to. She would have had us if she had kept us, ”he told Good Morning Britain, which runs on the same network that showed the interview in the UK (Piers Morgan, co-host of“ Good Morning Britain ”since 2014, dropped out of program on Tuesday after complaints about his conduct on the air after the interview broadcast in the US)
Thomas Markle confessed his own bad behavior – selling photos, sharing a personal letter, giving interviews – but insisted that his interactions with the media were overstated by vehicles that took the interviews and spread them globally. Markle, who lives in Mexico, said he gave only half a dozen interviews, thinking that Meghan and Harry might one day respond to him.
He said that sharing Meghan’s letter to him was retaliation after her friends started talking to the media about him. It was, he said, “mostly lies.” But he noted that he apologized for his actions “at least 100 times or more”.
“We all make mistakes,” declared Thomas before attempting some antics from the prince’s past: “But I never played naked billiards and I never dressed like Hitler.”
And we wonder why they don’t all get along.
Meanwhile, Samantha Markle, who is about 16 years older than Meghan, questioned the duchess’s claim that they hadn’t seen each other in 18 or 19 years. Speaking to “Inside Edition”, she produced a photo of the two at a 2008 graduation as proof. That said, taking a picture with a person is not the same as having a relationship with them.
While Meghan said Samantha changed her surname to Markle only after the future duchess started dating the future duke, Samantha screamed and showed her own diploma and documentation of her 1996 name change.
“Markle has always been my name,” said Samantha, who previously used the surname Grant.
Then there was the question of Samantha’s recently released book, “Princess Pushy’s Sister’s Diary: A Memory (Part 1)”.
“I think it would be very difficult to ‘tell everything’ when you don’t know me,” said Meghan of Samantha’s literary effort. “This is a very different situation from my father. Betrayal comes from people with whom you have relationships. ”
The half sisters do not, said Meghan.
Still, Samantha said it was not fair for Meghan to blame the depression for anything. “Depression is not an excuse to treat people like rags and discard them.”
Meanwhile, during the interview with Oprah, Meghan told a story about watching the movie “The Little Mermaid” a few years ago, while she and Harry lived in Nottingham Cottage.
“It came and I thought, ‘Well, I’m just here all the time, so I might as well watch this,'” she said. “And I said, ‘Oh, my God! She falls in love with the prince and therefore has to lose her voice. ‘
“But in the end, she gets her voice back.”
Breaking with its usual policy, the palace finally commented on the difficulties that Meghan mentioned in Oprah’s interview.
“The issues raised, especially regarding race, are worrisome. Although some memories may vary, they are taken very seriously and will be treated by the family in particular, ”said a statement on Tuesday attributed to Queen Elizabeth II. “Harry, Meghan and Archie will always be very dear family members.”