LONDON – Britain’s “toxic” media has led Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, to leave the royal family and go to the United States, Harry said in a broad interview with his British colleague and TV presenter James Corden which aired on Thursday night.
Sitting on an open bus and drinking tea as he drove through Los Angeles, the countrymen talked about everything from the media intrusion to the popular Netflix series “The Crown”.
Harry also discussed what the future holds for his family after the couple finalized their royal departure last week.
“We all know what the British press can be like and it was destroying my mental health,” Harry said in an interview for “The Late Late Show With James Corden”.
“This is toxic,” he added, saying the media had created a “really difficult” environment for the couple.
“So I did what any husband and father would do – I need to get my family out of here,” he said.
Just over a year after the couple announced they would “back off” from their royal duties, Buckingham Palace said last Friday that it had ended the separation.
“While everyone is saddened by their decision, the duke and duchess remain very dear members of the family,” the newspaper said in a statement.
But while the pair did not return as working members of the royal family, Harry said they “never left”.
“As far as I am concerned, whatever decisions are made on that side, I will never give up. I will always be contributing, but my life is a public service, so wherever I am in the world it will be the same,” he said.
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The final break completes a dramatic journey for the couple, whose fairytale wedding quickly left the script amid rumors of a sibling feud and a tabloid attack, which Meghan supporters say often turns into racist harassment. and intimidation.
The couple moved with their son, Archie, to California last year to live a more independent life and announced on Valentine’s Day that they were expecting their second child.
They signed multimillion-dollar deals with media companies Spotify and Netflix and, in March, will give a “broad” interview to media mogul Oprah Winfrey.
Earlier this month, Meghan won a privacy lawsuit against a British media company, which published parts of a letter she wrote to her distant father, Thomas Markle. In court documents, she said the intrusion caused her “very real sadness” and damaged relationships.
In Corden’s interview, Harry said that he questioned fake news reported as fact, compared to the TV show “The Crown”, which was “obviously fiction”.
“I am much more comfortable with” The Crown “than seeing the written stories about my family, my wife or myself,” he said.
“They don’t pretend to be news – it’s fictional, but it’s loosely based on the truth,” he added, noting that the program gave a “rough idea” of real-life pressures.
This puts him at odds with some British historians and lawmakers who pressured to make it clear that the series, with its trappings and exaggerations of the Windsor family sagas, is fiction – amid fears that it could damage the royal family’s reputation.
The cheerful late-night interview also saw presenter Corden taking Harry to visit the home where the TV show “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” was filmed. Corden, making a video call with the Duchess of Sussex, begged the couple to buy the property.
“I think we’ve moved around enough,” replied Meghan.
Harry also revealed that his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, bought her son, Archie, a waffle maker for Christmas and that she and her husband, Prince Philip, knew how to make Zoom calls.
On Thursday, the 94-year-old Queen encouraged the British public to follow her example and get vaccinated against Covid-19, saying the injection was “very quick” and “quite harmless” and would benefit society.
Both the queen and Philip, 99, – who is currently in a London hospital being treated for an unspecified infection – received Covid-19 vaccines in January.
