Meghan Markle has addressed her controversial Netflix show in a rare appearance with her husband Prince Harry. Attending the TIME100 Summit in New York, she said: “I didn’t want a reality show”. The Duchess of Sussex embarked on her first public outing with her husband since her Netflix show With Love, Meghan debuted on the platform in March this week – and spoke openly onstage about her behind-the-scenes decisions for the project.
She told the crowd at New York’s Lincoln Centre that she “didn’t want a reality show” and had worked to ensure the series didn’t feel like a “typical” offering in the genre. When journalist Jessica Sibley questioned the decision to film in a rented house rather than welcoming viewers into the Montecito estate she shares with Harry and their two children, Meghan also emphasised her effort to shield Archie, 5, and Lilibet, 3, from public scrutiny. “Eighty people in the kitchen isn’t really the childhood memory I’d like them to have,” she said.
Between juggling the Netflix release, her new podcast and a highly-publicised product range from her rebranded company, As Ever, the mum-of-two also admitted to making some mistakes, sharing that she had “given herself grace” to trip up every now and then.
“There were three projects that we were launching really at the same time,” she told the crowd. “The past year-and-a-half have been incredibly busy and ambitious.
“Then you see it all come to life and try to give yourself the space and the grace to make mistakes, to know you’re not doing it right every day.”
The duchess wore a $5,000 Ralph Lauren suit to the glitzy event, which also featured interviews with A-Listers including Serena Williams and Ed Sheeran.
Meghan also reflected on the mixed response to her blitz of new releases on her podcast, Confessions of a Female Founder, which insiders have said is in crisis mode after just three episodes – with no eponymous founders “picking up the phone”.
She said the decision to change the name of her lifestlye brand from American Riviera Orchard to the more simplistic As Ever wasn’t as abrupt as it had seemed, telling Kadi Lee, a hair brand entrepreneur, that she had secured the latter as a would-be name back in 2022.
“I said, ‘I like American Riviera as an umbrella’, and then be able to have verticals beneath it,” she said. “And maybe have the ‘Orchard’ really small. But when that’s not feasible…. suddenly it became this world salad. I didn’t love that so much.
“I was like, ‘Ok, let’s go back to the thing that I’ve always loved. Let’s use the name that I protected for a reason that had sort of been under wraps.'”
