From 'giving hope' to 'f—ing grifters': A timeline of Harry & Meghan in La-La Land
From 'giving hope' to 'f—ing grifters': A timeline of Harry & Meghan in La-La Land
Harry & Meghan were the toast of the town when they arrived in California. Now, they're being slagged from all sides.
It’s June 27, and this issue explores the timeline of Harry & Meghan’s tumultuous entertainment career (I switched the subject of this week’s post on Monday due to so much breaking news, so my apologies for its lateness.)
The Sussexes’ odyssey in La-La Land
The last few days have seen a deluge of devastatingly critical articles published by major business media outlets in the U.S., all aimed at the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s new careers in the entertainment industry.
As it can be hard to keep track of the various announcements, cancellations and premieres, to say nothing of the growing frustrations expressed by industry insiders, I’ve created a timeline of Harry and Meghan’s plunge into a cutthroat world of contracts, CEOs, and content.
Note: Aside from the bombshell Oprah interview, which reportedly did not please Spotify and Netflix especially given they’d just paid millions for exclusive content, my focus is on the industry itself. For now, I’m not including other events, such as their car chase in New York City. (I’ll add new content as needed to this timeline).
2020
March: Harry, Meghan & Archie fly from their temporary home on Vancouver Island to Los Angeles, California, ahead of Canada and the United States closing their borders to non-essential travel at the beginning of the pandemic.
April 2020: (month here and below included in the timeline even when there is no industry-related activity)
May 2020:
June 2020:
July 2020:
August 2020:
September 2, 2020: The New York Times reveals that Netflix has signed an exclusive multi-year deal with Harry and Meghan to make “documentaries, docu-series, feature films, scripted shows and children’s programming.” The deal is estimated to be worth US$100 million and goes to 2025.
“Our focus will be on creating content that informs but also gives hope,” the Sussexes explain in a statement that the New York Times publishes. “As new parents, making inspirational family programming is also important to us.”
October 2020:
November 2020:
December 15, 2020: Podcasting giant Spotify announces that it has signed an exclusive multi-year partnership with Archewell Audio, “a newly-formed audio-first production company created by Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex. Their focus is “telling and listening to uplifting and entertaining stories,” the press release states.
“In 2021, The Duke and Duchess will produce and host podcasts that build community through shared experiences and values… The first complete series from Archewell Audio and Spotify is expected next year”
The entire deal is estimated to be worth up to US$20 million.
December 29, 2020: Harry and Meghan release a standalone “Holiday Special” podcast episode on Spotify in which they reflect on the “year that changed everything” along with guests including Tyler Perry, Elton John, and Naomi Osaka.
2021
January 2021:
February 2021:
March 8, 2021: Harry and Meghan sit down to a 90 minute interview with Oprah Winfrey that airs on CBS. The interview is a bombshell, as they make explosive allegations about the royal family and its staff. (The couple are not paid for the interview.)
April 6, 2021: The Invictus Games Foundation announces a docu-series called Heart of Invictus that will follow competitors on the road to the Invictus Games to be held in The Hague in 2022.
“As Archewell Productions’ first series with Netflix, in partnership with the Invictus Games Foundation, I couldn’t be more excited for the journey ahead or prouder of the Invictus community for continuously inspiring global healing, human potential and continued service,” said Prince Harry.
May 2021:
June 8, 2021: Penguin Random House publishes Bench, a children’s book about a father-son relationship that is written by Meghan. It debuts at No. 1 on the New York Times’ children’s picture book list on June 27 and spends three weeks in the Top 10.
July 14, 2021: Netflix greenlights Pearl, an animated children’s series about the adventures of a 12-year-old girl who “is on a journey of self-discovery as she tries to overcome life’s daily challenges,” explains Meghan, adding that the series “celebrates extraordinary women throughout history.” She will create the series and act as an executive producer, along with David Furnish and others.
July 19, 2021: Penguin Random House announces that it will publish Prince Harry’s memoir. Though no details are announced, there are reports it’s a multi-book deal worth US$20 million (numbers vary, depending on the source).
August 2021:
September 2021:
October 2021:
November 2021:
December 2021:
2022
January 25, 2022: Variety reports that Gimlet, a podcast studio owned by Spotify is “hiring a new team to produce a weekly show with Archewell featuring ‘high-profile women,’” and includes the job postings.
February 2022:
March 2022:
April 2022:
May 1, 2022: Netflix drops Pearl, the children’s animated series in development, as part of a wave of cutbacks at the streaming service.
June 2022:
July 2022:
August 23, 2022: The Archetypes podcast series launches on Spotify. The 12-part series, hosted by Meghan, promises to investigate “the labels that try to hold women back.” Tennis great Serena Williams guests in the first weekly episode, which goes to the top of the Spotify podcast chart (some individual episodes entered well down their list.) The last episode airs in November.
September 2022:
October 2022:
November 2022:
December 8, 2022: Netflix debuts the first content created by the couple: three episodes of Harry & Meghan; the final three airing a week later on December 15. Using interviews as well as intimate footage and private photographs, it chronicles in exhaustive detail the couple’s romance and marriage, as well as their life inside and outside the royal family.
December 13, 2022: Netflix announces that the first three episodes of Harry & Meghan was the top documentary debut of all time for Netflix, with 81.55 million hours watched around the world in its first week. While a massive hit for Netflix, it wasn’t the top TV or movie program of the week (during that same week, Wednesday has 174 million hours viewed) or for 2022 (that list was released on December 27).
December 31, 2022: Harry and Meghan host a documentary series called Live to Lead on Netflix, taping introductions to the episodes. It did not reach the Top 10, according to the Wall Street Journal.
2023
January 9, 2023: Bill Simmons, head of podcast innovation and monetization at Spotify, tears into Prince Harry on his own podcast, The Ringer. (There’s no sign of Harry’s podcast series, now 25 months after the Archewell Audio deal was signed.)
Shoot this guy to the sun. I'm so tired of this guy. What does he bring to the table? He just whines about shit and keeps giving interviews. Who gives a shit? Who cares about your life? You weren’t even the favourite son.
I can’t stand him. So tired. I’m so embarrassed I f—ing have to share Spotify with him, the guy sucks.It's embarassing that he's on our platform.
What does he do? What’s your talent? Why are we listening to you? So you were born into the royal family and then you left.
You live in f—ing Montecito and you just sell documentaries and podcasts and nobody cares what you have to say about anything unless you talk about the royal family and you just complain about them. He's got a book? What did he write a book about? Honestly, he’s the worst.
January 10, 2023: Penguin Random House publishes Prince Harry’s memoir, Spare. It sells 470,000 hard copies in its first week — the fastest selling non-fiction book since the industry tracked such records — and is No. 1 on the New York Times’ hardcover non-fiction best sellers list for seven weeks (from its debut on January 29 to March 12).
February 2023:
March 2023:
April 27, 2023: Variety reveals that Meghan has signed with WME and that the “powerhouse agency team will focus on building Meghan's global enterprise.” The article included a quote from a previous Variety cover story, in which Meghan seemed to be suggesting that they were branching out from their spate of royal-related projects: “For scripted, we want to think about how we can evolve from that same space and do something fun. It doesn’t always have to be so serious.”
May 2023:
June 15, 2023: The Wall Street Journal reveals that Spotify is not renewing the Archetypes series for a second season and also is ending the three-year deal with Harry and Meghan. “The couple hasn’t met the productivity benchmarks required to receive the full payout from the deal,” reports the newspaper. After that breaking news, Spotify and Archewell confirm they have parted ways.
June 16, 2023: Bill Simmons, head of podcast innovation and monetization at Spotify, again slams the Sussexes on his podcast, The Ringer.
The f—cking grifters. That’s the podcast we shoulda launched with them.
I gotta get drunk one night and tell the story of the Zoom I had with Harry to try and help him with a podcast idea. It’s one of my best stories.
June 17, 2023: The Sun tabloid in the U.K. quotes an industry source saying that Netflix was unlikely to renew its deal: “There is a less friendly attitude from some at the top. The feeling is that the lemon has been fully squeezed.
June 23, 2023: In its newsletter Soundbite, Bloomberg reveals the difficulty that Harry had as he searched for a topic for a podcast that he would host:
Harry listened to various ideas from others but mostly stuck by his own — including one about childhood trauma. The concept: Harry would interview a procession of controversial guests, such as Vladimir Putin, Mark Zuckerberg and Donald Trump, about their early formative years and how those experiences resulted in the adults they are today.
Harry also had an idea, the people said, for a show centered on fatherhood. Another one would have tackled major societal conversations episode by episode, ranging from climate change to religion. For the latter, Harry hoped to have Pope Francis on as a guest.
The practicality of these ideas struck some people in the Harry-podcast cosmos as questionable at best, given that people like Putin and Zuckerberg rarely give wide-ranging interviews about the topics they’re passionate about — let alone about their upbringings and personal childhood traumas.
June 24, 2023: The Wall Street Journal publishes a deeply researched article, “Prince Harry and Meghan Markle Produce a Hollywood Flop: Themselves.”
As well as revealing that Meghan tried and failed to get Taylor Swift on her podcast, the article portrays a couple unable to make content “that stretched beyond their own experiences”:
Archewell employees and associates say the company often lacks direction, and that its founders at times seem surprised by the work required to finish entertainment projects. Most potential initiatives, they said, follow a similar route: Big idea, subpar execution.
"Executives at Netflix have groused about Archewell’s output, according to people familiar with the matter, and feel that the success of the ‘Harry & Meghan’ documentary is all the company has to show for the deal,” the Journal said.
“Given their distance from the crown, the sheen Harry and Meghan once lent show-business projects is dimming." The article also says that Netflix has passed on several pitches from Archwell, which is developing a TV show called Bad Manners that is based on Miss Havisham, a character from the Charles Dickens’ novel Great Expectations, though Netflix has not approved it.
June 24, 2023: “When there are enough sources willing to talk for a story like this, it’s possible you didn’t play your cards right,” wrote Kim Masters, the influential editor at large at Hollywood Reporter, in a quote tweet to the WSJ article.
June 24, 2023: The Sun tabloid in the U.K. reports that the couple have been paid half of their reported US$100 million contract. To get the rest, they “have been told to come up with more must-watch shows,” claims the Sun, which says it industry insiders tell the Sun. “The deal’s continually under review which is normal for ones of this magnitude.”
June 25, 2023: United Talent Agency CEO Jeremy Zimmer slams Meghan at the Cannes advertising festival: “Turns out Meghan Markle was not a great audio talent, or necessarily any kind of talent,” Semafor reports. “And, you know, just because you're famous doesn't make you great at something.”
“Despite the public’s ravenous appetite for royals content, Meghan and Harry’s approach to their podcast with Spotify failed to find an audience or a format that worked,” explains Semafor.
June 26, 2023: In New York magazine, senior editor Margaret Hartmann wondered:
But maybe some of this is on Netflix and Spotify executives. It’s unclear why they thought one of the stars of USA Network’s Suits and a guy who’s admittedly spent his life in a royal bubble would be good at churning out relatable TV and audio content.
June 27, 2023: On their popular Pivot podcast, co-host Kara Swisher of Recode references the Semafor article as she labels as a “fail” the trend of podcasters to sign so many famous people rather than professional podcasters as a “fail.” Co-host Scott Galloway, an influential entrepreneur and marketing professor, was even harsher, identifying what he called the “three pillars of truth in technology and media over the last 12 months”: “1: Crypto is a leveraged Ponzi scheme; 2: Headsets don’t work; and 3: Meghan and Harry are talentless f—s.”
June 27, 2023: A Netflix spokesperson tells People: “We value our partnership with Archewell Productions” and “Harry & Meghan was Netflix's biggest documentary debut ever, and we'll continue to work together on a number of projects, including the upcoming documentary series Heart of Invictus.'“ That series, announced in 2021, is expected to air this summer.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to WRITE ROYALTY by Patricia Treble to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.