Oprah Winfrey has built her extraordinary brand into one of the most valuable entertainment franchises on the planet by being a keen student and skilful exponent of human nature—and creating a safe space for famous people to spill.
But she is also a powerful advocate for equity and justice, and likes to be seen as such. Ethical behavior is central to Oprah’s worldview.
It is, therefore, quite impossible to imagine Oprah, now that Meghan Markle is facing multiple allegations of workplace bullying, not using her powerful platform to challenge her.
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Oprah conducted her interview, set to be broadcast on Sunday night, before the allegations of bullying broke, but Oprah still has time to tape an add-on to the interview and, as she has the access for a true journalistic scoop, she should ask for that extra time to ask Meghan a detailed set of questions about the allegations.
The bullying was allegedly so severe that it reportedly led two highly professional staffers to resign, others so seriously suffering from a form of post-traumatic stress that they have formed an informal support group, for others to be reduced to tears—and now for 10 staffers to break cover and reveal they are ready to assist a Buckingham Palace investigation into the bullying.
However, as of the time of writing, Oprah is planning to completely ignore the allegations.
The Daily Beast can reveal that despite the allegations crashing around Meghan, there are currently no plans for Meghan and Harry to answer a few extra questions on the subject for Sunday’s hotly anticipated interview.
According to insiders, the interview that will be aired on CBS on Sunday evening is the same one that was recorded two weeks ago, despite the world’s impression of the context around Meghan’s departure from the British royal family having been completely upended by events since then.
The fact that Harry and Meghan have so far chosen only friends as their big-name interviewers—James Corden interviewed Harry last week, Oprah is a friend of Meghan’s and both attended their wedding—undermines their oft-stated commitment to responsible journalism.
It was notable that Corden, for example, did not even ask Harry whether he was saying he was relaxed about Netflix’s portrayal of his family in The Crown because he and Meghan recently signed a $100m deal with them.
If Oprah completely ignores the shocking allegations in The Times of London that Meghan systematically bullied staff at Kensington Palace, especially as they are now the subject of a formal investigation by Buckingham Palace’s HR department, it would undermine the intention of performing a no-holds-barred interview.
Another very pertinent issue raised in the Times story is that Meghan’s people lied to the press about the provenance of a $500,000 pair of earrings Meghan wore in Fiji. She is said to have concealed that they were a gift from Saudi despot Mohammed bin Salman, even though she wore them several weeks after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi.
Maybe there is an innocent explanation. Maybe Meghan didn’t know who the half-million dollar earrings were from. Maybe she didn’t know about Khashoggi and believed, like so many of us, that MBS really was a reformer committed to improving women’s terrible human rights in Saudi Arabia. The point is that the questions should be asked.
The reality is that barring an eleventh hour change of heart by Oprah, they won’t.
That’s too bad: viewers deserve an interview, not a conversation between friends.
So, what else could Oprah ask Harry and Meghan? We have some suggestions.
“Meghan, did you experience racism at the palace, and if so, how and from whom?”
If Meghan alleges she experienced racism at the palace, and actually identifies specific incidents or names names, it will likely be the most explosive part of the sit-down.
That Meghan will use the CBS special to discuss racial prejudice in general in the U.K. seems to be a given: Chris Ship, the royal editor for ITV News, which will be screening the interview in the U.K., told Good Morning Britain Tuesday: “She’s going to raise the issue of race in Britain.”
Meghan has repeatedly been subject to racial slurs in the British media. One of the most notorious was a Daily Mail headline that claimed, “Prince Harry’s girl is (almost) straight outta Compton.” The interview was recorded before a senior editor at the Daily Mail said on the radio this week, when attacking Meghan, “Do you look at her… and see a Black woman? Because I don’t. I see a very attractive, a very attractive woman. It’s never occurred to me. I never look at her and think, ‘Gosh she’s Black!’ in the way you look at Oprah Winfrey, you would be in no doubt. When they sit down and do that interview, you will see a Black woman called Oprah Winfrey and you will see a woman who describes [herself] as a woman of color.
But while a general discussion about British racism will no doubt be worthwhile and illuminating, the issue will likely only catch fire if Meghan says that she personally experienced racial slurs or discrimination at the hands of senior palace figures, or seasoned administrators within the institution.
It is notable that the sympathetic biography of the couple, Finding Freedom, did not allege any specific examples of racist abuse.
“What are the lies that the palace told about you and Harry?”
Meghan used fancier language in a clip released this week but her message was crystal clear: “I don’t know how they could expect that, after all of this time, we would still just be silent if there is an active role that ‘the Firm’ is playing in perpetuating falsehoods about us.”
This statement surely deserves a robust follow-up question from Oprah, namely, what exactly are the “falsehoods” that Meghan has in mind? The claim could be related to sources in the Daily Mail claiming that Meghan believed Kate and Camilla were briefing stories to the press, including the story that Meghan made Kate cry during a fitting for Charlotte’s bridesmaid’s dress; and that Harry bawled, “Whatever Meghan wants, Meghan gets,” to Queen Elizabeth’s dresser and confidante Angela Kelly?
“Why didn’t you both go and see your dad right away?”
Way back before Meghan and her dad had become sworn enemies, vowing to see each other in court, and long before he had been caught collaborating with the paparazzi to stage pictures for money, there was no animosity. It’s frankly incomprehensible why Harry didn’t make a quick trip to introduce himself to Thomas Markle on day one or two. There was a window of opportunity that could have and should have been taken.
Matters really began to spiral when the narrative of the wedding was derailed by Thomas Markle’s erratic behavior which culminated in him pulling out of the ceremony. There is no doubt that Thomas behaved cruelly and objectionably to his daughter, trolling her and tormenting her in the press.
But Harry and Meghan should know better than anyone the toll that being besieged constantly by the media for years on end can take on a human being. It is reasonable to expect they should have paid him the courtesy of a simple visit, and invested in security, support and appropriate housing for the father of a future British princess. They didn’t—why not?
“Meghan, has there ever been what you consider fair criticism of you in the media?”
Harry discussed his relationship with the British media in his interview with James Corden on The Late, Late Show last week, saying the “toxic” British press “was destroying my mental health.”
Meghan seems set to unload on the disgraceful antics of the media, emboldened, no doubt, by her recent court victory against Associated Newspapers, the publishers of the Daily Mail, which violated her privacy by publishing a private letter to her father. Meghan and Harry have blacklisted various British publications and seem to only agree to interviews with hand-picked journalists who are either friends or likely to be awed by them.
When they first communicated their policy of “no corroboration and zero engagement” with British tabloids, the couple said the policy was “not about shutting down public conversation or censoring accurate reporting. Media have every right to report on and indeed have an opinion on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, good or bad. But it can’t be based on a lie.”
“Harry, are things as bad between you and your brother as they seem, and how sad does that make you?”
There are always a series of micro-tragedies making up a greater tragedy when a family starts fighting itself. One thinks of the queen not knowing two of her grandchildren, the Sussex kids not knowing their cousins, and Prince Philip, dismayed at 99 to see his life’s work of uniting the royal family unravelling. But the thought of Harry and William at war is one that many of their mother’s fans will find the most tragic of all.
