‘Different directions’: Picture reveals Harry, Meghan going separate ways

A seemingly innocuous new snap of the Duchess of Sussex has revealed a major division with her husband Prince Harry.

We interrupt our normally scheduled programming where I make jokes about Princess Anne’s formidable bouffant for some breaking news: Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex has never looked better.

In a year that has largely seen the duchess avoid lights lime and otherwise (aside from her role as husband Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex and his Invictus Games’ most ardent supporter) Meghan has popped up in the appropriately chic destination of the Hamptons.

The duchess was there over the weekend, joining the great, the good and the vaginally steamed, including Gwyneth Paltrow, Reese Witherspoon, Bobbi Brown, Spanx founder Sara Blakely and Weight Watchers CEO Sima Sistani for the high-powered women-focused G9 Ventures Summer Summit.

Photos shared to Instagram of the event show that Meghan was in the thick of it, demonstrating her linen bonafides and, you’d have to assume, picking up some sage business advice given she’s on the cusp of launching her own Goopy lifestyle empire, American Riviera Orchard.

Photos shared to Instagram of the event show that Meghan was in the thick of it. Picture: Instagram/@jamiekernlima

While Meghan and her Hamptons jaunt were making headlines, so too was her other half.

While the duchess hobnobbed and networked and imbibed all the kale juice that was fit to consume while the word “disrupt” got used with unseemly frequency, Harry has also been all over the press after appearing on camera for a doco called Tabloids on Trial.

In the one-hour special, the duke spoke about his legal battles with British publishers and said his commitment to pursuing them had been central to his falling out with the royal family. “These are the things that we should be doing for the greater good,” he explained.

(A quick bit of background: Last December, Harry won his claim against Mirror Group Newspapers MGN for phone hacking and lawful information gathering, hailing the judgement as a “monumental victory”).

The duke is currently also involved in legal action over alleged phone hacking and lawful information gathering against the Daily Mail’s parent company Associated Newspapers Limited, publisher of the Daily Mail, and News Group Newspapers (NGN), publisher of The

Sun and the defunct News of the World. (NGN is owned by the same parent company as News Corp Australia, publisher of this masthead).

Speaking on camera for Tabloids, Harry said of his ongoing courtroom fights, “the mission continues”.

But how does the duke’s “mission” to right the alleged wrongs of the past sit with, from a brand perspective, the duchess’ relaunch as a West Coast Martha Stewart?

Or to put it another way, while Meghan seems focused on their future and defining herself by her entrepreneurial zest, Harry’s eyes seem to be glued to the rear view mirror.

In early 2023, after Harry & Meghan had aired and Spare had been released, the couple’s then global press secretary Ashley Hansen called these outings “vital ‘look back’ projects” and said the duo’s work would “now look forward”.

Is Harry though?

Harry has been all over the press after appearing on camera for a doco called Tabloids on Trial.

Before we go any further, we have to get one thing straight here. The psychological pain and the torment that Harry and other Tabloids on Trial participants like Hugh Grant and Charlotte Church allegedly suffered as a result of hacking was nothing short of horrific. Every single right thinking person should view the practices that were unearthed by the Leveson Inquiry as gross violations, which did an unknowable amount of harm. The only way hacking can and should be talked about is as completely reprehensible and as morally repugnant.

However, the tricky part comes when we ask, how do Harry and Meghan balance his “mission” with them “now looking forward” brand-wise?

Oh sure, he’s got his Netflix polo series to oversee (“and what’s that red button do again Hank?”) and he and Meghan are working on bringing the hit novel Meet Me At The Lake to the screen but these, at this stage, don’t exactly seem like projects that will reinvigorate and rejuvenate Harry’s image.

The US, if you think about it, should be Harry’s natural environment. Tactical, effusive, warm and charismatic, you would have thought that the duke would have attracted a much broader and more enthusiastic support base than he has.

In May, polling done by Redfield & Wilton for Newsweek showed Harry trailing behind Prince William and Kate, the Prince and Princess of Wales, in terms of favourability with Americans.

When the duke was named as the recipient of the ESPY Awards’ Pat Tillman trophy last month, it resulted in a PR debacle. Mary Tillman criticised the choice of Harry, calling him “a controversial and divisive individual”, and more than 78,000 people signed a petition urging the ESPYs to rethink their choice.

The Duke of Sussex, the Telegraph reported, was “stunned by the vocal backlash”.

Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex visit Nigeria Unconquered, a charity organisation that works in collaboration with the Invictus Games Foundation. Picture: Andrew Esiebo/Getty Images for The Archewell Foundation

Which brings us to the natural question – why have Americans reacted like this? What has Harry come to stand for in the US public imagination? His public service or his readiness to share the myriad failings of Crown Inc, his emotionally barren adolescence and young adulthood and the sins (alleged and otherwise) of the press?

We cannot overlook the race part – the US could be about to re-elect a despicable man who once said “Hitler did some good things” – but it would be impossible to not factor in also, to some degree, Harry’s regular bouts of hauling his family over the coals in full public view.

With Oprah, with Spare and with Harry & Meghan, the duke managed to largely define himself by the slings and arrows he weathered for years inside the prickly bosom of the palace.

Even now, more than three years on since the Sussexes’ Oprah Winfrey interview, there he was in Tabloids, answering questions about the royal family.

Outwardly, he doesn’t seem to be exhibiting the same fervency and eagerness to forge a bright tomorrow full of exciting projects and emails overflowing with exclamation marks as his wife is.

For all we know, this is exactly how Harry and Meghan have planned things – she makes money in the States, he wages a moral crusade back in Blighty. This divvying up of efforts could have been carefully devised by them using several colour felt-tip pens and a flow chart.

However, from the outside, the Sussexes seem to be faced in two different directions and only one of them is coming home with a gift bag and a coupon for a free Gwyneth-approved colonic.

Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.