Princess Diana, Meghan Markle: Will the Duchess suffer the same fate?
Meghan Markle shares much in common with her late mother-in-law but there’s one major difference that sets them apart.
Entertainment
Don't miss out on the headlines from Entertainment. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Meghan Markle was just 16 years old and living in California in 1997 when her future mother-in-law Princess Diana was killed in a high-speed car crash in Paris.
Twenty-five years later, Markle, now the Duchess of Sussex, could never have imagined the similar path she would tread to the doomed princess within the confines of the bound-by-convention royals.
We look at the similarities between the two in the ways that they both shook up the stuffy royals but differed in how Meghan did not make the mistakes of her mother-in-law.
FAMILY PAIN
Princess Diana may have been a member of Britain’s cloistered aristocracy (the Spencers were close to the royal family for generations – and a young Diana even called the Queen, “Aunt Lilibet”) while Meghan grew up only the child of a TV lighting director and a yoga instructor-turned-social worker but both suffered significant family dysfunction.
Princess Diana’s mother, Frances, left the family to wed Peter Shand Kydd, the heir to a wallpaper fortune, leaving her small children behind with their father, Earl Spencer, who had won a bitter custody battle to keep them. Diana reportedly never really recovered from her parents’ split and later had a difficult relationship with her father’s second wife, Raine.
Towards the end of her life, Diana had a strained relationship with her brother, Charles, who she was reportedly not speaking to at the time of her death when he refused her refuge at Althorp, the Spencer family estate for five centuries. She had wanted privacy and a break from constant press attention.
Meghan tread a similar familial path. Her parents split when she was just two years old and she has had a complicated relationship with her father and half-siblings from whom she is estranged and who, famously, did not attend her wedding.
DIFFERING LIFE EXPERIENCES
Princess Diana was only 20 when she married Prince Charles in 1981 and her life changed overnight. Yes, she was a member of the aristocracy but, at the time of her marriage, she was a kindergarten teacher sharing a London flat with friends. She went from that to being one of the most famous women in the world.
When Meghan married Prince Harry in 2018 at the age of 36, she had already been married before (she divorced her first husband, Trevor Engelson after 18 months in 2013), earned a university degree and had a successful acting career, appearing in the long-running drama, Suits. Separately, before her marriage fell apart, Princess Diana faced the daunting prospect of being Queen; Prince Harry was never going to get close to the throne.
PUBLIC OBSESSION
The director behind HBO’s recent – and brilliant – documentary The Princess (which shows the rise and fall of Princess Diana entirely through news footage) says he was struck by the similarities behind the late Princess of Wales and Meghan in the way the public scrutinised their every move.
“For a space of about a month or two, it seemed like (Harry and Meghan) were the only thing people were talking about,” director Ed Perkins said in a recent interview.
“Very few people were apathetic and it reminded me of the response I was seeing in the archive from 25, 30 years previously, where, for the entirety of Diana’s public life, we were dissecting everything.
People had strong polarised opinions all the way throughout her life and after her death, and it did feel interesting that there was a sort of similar national conversation happening 25 years later,” he said.
Separately, while Princess Diana was persona non grata within the royal family, the “People’s Princess” was beloved by the majority of the British public; while, despite a positive start, Meghan’s popularity with the public plummeted and she has since felt the wrath of Brits who blame her for taking Prince Harry away from his family and country.
THOSE BOMBSHELL INTERVIEWS
Twenty-six years apart, Princess Diana and Meghan sat down for two separate “bombshell” interviews. Meghan, alongside Prince Harry, was in California, ready to tell all to Oprah Winfrey. Princess Diana was in her London living room with the now disgraced BBC journalist, Martin Bashir. Both spoke about their struggles with royal life, voracious press attention and battles with depression.
“You think you have the knowledge of what’s coming ahead,” Princess Diana told Bashir in 1995. “I didn’t fully understand what the job was,” the Duchess of Sussex said to Oprah Winfrey in 2021.
“I seemed to be on the front of a newspaper every single day,” said Diana. “I am everywhere,” Meghan echoed years later.
Princess Diana felt stymied by “people in my environment”. Meghan, meanwhile, spoke of the intangible “institution”.
“I didn’t like myself. I was ashamed because I couldn’t cope with the pressures,” Princess Diana told Bashir. “I was really ashamed to say it at the time,” Meghan said. “But … I just didn’t want to be alive anymore.”
MARRIED LIFE
Indeed, the most symbolic difference between the two women is their vastly different marriages.
Clearly, Meghan is fully supported by her husband and the couple seemingly enjoy a happy marriage that has produced two children, Archie and Lilibet.
Princess Diana’s union to Prince Charles was largely viewed – in hindsight – as a marriage of convenience. At 32, he was viewed as getting on a bit and the royals wanted him married and they wanted an heir. Charles, however, has no interest in marrying Diana and was in love with a married woman (Camilla Parker-Bowles who became his second wife).
After a largely miserable 15 years of marriage, the couple were officially divorced in 1996, the year before Princess Diana’s death and it was reported that the heir to the throne insisted on removing her royal title.
Meghan, however, has total control; ditching royal life and moving home to the US where the family lives in a Los Angeles mansion and rubs shoulders with the likes of Winfrey, Serena Williams, Ellen DeGeneres, George Clooney and Katy Perry.
She and Prince Harry have a multitude of multimillion-dollar deals on the go with the likes of Spotify and Netflix and seem happy to be well away from the royal fishbowl.
More Coverage
Originally published as Princess Diana, Meghan Markle: Will the Duchess suffer the same fate?
Bridget Jones’ star defends ‘age gap’ romance
As Renée Zellweger returns to play Bridget Jones, her new on-screen love interest Leo Woodall addresses the controversy over their characters’ 27 year age difference.
Inside scoop on RHOS new season
Reality star Sally Obermeder reveals her tricks to surviving cocktail showdowns and avoiding pity parties as she returns to the Real Housewives of Sydney.