London”•Prince Harry and his wife Meghan’s explosive tell-all interview with Oprah Winfrey went much further than expected and will be hugely damaging to the royal family, British media said Monday.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, as they are formally known, delivered “enough bombshells to sink a flotilla”, reported The Daily Telegraph, as the dust settled on the broadcast in the United States on Sunday night.
“And possibly, some might fear, do similar damage to the British monarchy,” it added.
“Whatever the royal family was expecting from this interview, this was worse,” another traditionally “establishment” newspaper, The Times, said.
Chris Ship, the royal editor of ITV, which is to air the interview in Britain on Monday night, said he was “momentarily paralysed” by the sheer volume of revelations.
“The couple had effectively loaded up a B-52 bomber, flew it over Buckingham Palace and then unloaded their arsenal right above it, bomb by heavily-loaded bomb,” he added.
Buckingham Palace now faced “two very serious questions” — first, Meghan’s claim of racist comments about her baby’s potential skin colour, and that she received no support while having suicidal thoughts.
‘Self-obsessed’
Queen Elizabeth II was the only member of the royal family to “emerge unscathed,” wrote The Daily Telegraph.
Yet Ship said since the couple voice such grave concerns about the family, “surely their severe criticisms of it extend to the Queen herself?”
The couple have set out a “new narrative”, The Times reported. Yet there was also criticism of the couple for giving the interview.
The Daily Mail tabloid, which has been highly critical of Meghan, quoted royal expert Robert Jobson as saying that the couple were “self-obsessed”.
And he called their interview at times “terribly self-indulgent”.
Several media outlets questioned the specifics, including Meghan’s suggestion that the royal family changed their rules to refuse their son Archie the title of “prince” because of his skin colour.
“This is a complex area — there are rules laid down that Archie would not be a prince at birth, but would be a prince when Charles (Harry’s father) becomes king,” wrote The Times.
Archie could have taken a title, the Earl of Dumbarton, but his parents chose not to, royal expert Robert Hardman told BBC radio.
The Telegraph meanwhile accused US chat show queen Winfrey of taking the couple’s answers as “gospel”, despite “obvious contradictions.”
The palace has not commented — and it is not immediately clear whether they will.
The family’s “position will be to take it on the chin and you get on,” said Hardman.
