Yesterday, the Duchess was interviewed on television for her first interview since Oprah Winfrey’s infamous conversation.
Meghan met with Ellen DeGeneres, American talk-show queen to discuss her family and political campaigns.
And she also took part in a bizarre prank which involved her doing embarrassing actions in public at Miss DeGeneres’ command.
Meghan, who with Prince Harry quit royal life last year and moved to California, gushed about how the pair and children Archie and Lilibet were ‘very happy’.
The duchess, 40, also shared a new picture of her two-year-old son feeding chickens in a garden pen named ‘Archie’s Chick Inn’.
Ellen DeGeneres and the Duchess Of Sussex (left) during the taping of The Ellen DeGeneres show at Warner Bros lot, Burbank.
Jan Moir offers her perspective on one of the most romantic Hollywood love-ins…
Somewhere in the back of the most cynical mind – bear in mind that this mind could possibly be my mind – the end result, and true purpose, of Megxit was always going to be the Duchess of Sussex being the star guest on a daytime chat show on American television, telling darling anecdotes about herself while wearing an expensive blouse and acting like the Hollywood star she never was.
So it was.
Yesterday Meghan appeared on The Ellen Show, where she spoke about returning to California, her new life in her £10million mansion and of course her children’s book, The Bench, which she described as a ‘sweet love story between a family’.
The book briefly became a New York Times bestseller despite the newspaper calling it ‘tortured’, which is the kind of endorsement you might hope for if you had written a thriller and not something aimed at the under-fives.
Never mind. ‘Welcome to my friend Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex,’ drooled Ellen as the masked audience gave the surprise guest a standing ovation.
Sitting on cream armchairs, the two alpha women wasted no time in publicly establishing their friendship by agreeing they were ‘neighbours and see each other a lot’.
From the get-go it was clear that Meghan was in her element, radiant in a pricey Oscar de La Renta top, lobbying for paid parental leave and humble-bragging about how poor she was as a jobbing actress in LA when she couldn’t afford to fix her car.
Ah no! I was thinking. Any minute now we’ll be back in the Sizzler’s salad bar crying over the cucumbers.
This chapter was not included in the carefully planned legend of childhood privations that the Duchess has avoided. And yes, we have heard this climbing-through-the-car-boot anecdote before, but Ellen seemed enthralled.
Meghan was happy and enthusiastic, talking about Hollywood and the previous times she had been to that studio in order to try out for roles.
‘I would park on gate three and I would scoot on over and the security guards would always say “break a leg, I hope you get it”,’ she said.
Some people might not have noticed that this is a reference the Buckingham Palace pre-wedding Tiara Incident, but it’s not.
Neighbors: Ellen DeGeneres & the Duchess
It was just more touching testimony about Meghan’s struggle.
Be prepared, there was an excruciating Candid Camera Interlude in which the Duchess Of Sussex participated in an Ant and De-style Telly Caper on the streets LA.
Ellen was to instruct Ellen, through an earpiece how she should interact with public market traders who sell hot sauces and quartz crystals.
‘Mommy wants some heat,’ Meghan had to say at one point. Next, she was required to stand up straight and touch her nose.
She also complied with an instruction to ‘eat like a chipmunk’. Thank you, God. Sometimes, the House of Windsor may sigh in relief when the Sussexes have been expelled from the royal fold. They are thousands of miles away and living in a bubble of showbiz where such nonsense seems acceptable.
What on earth was going on in Meghan’s mind, not to mention the combined supposed PR smarts of her team of highly paid advisors? It wasn’t funny, and made her look like a bit of a fool.
Those who had hoped for a picture of mysterious daughter Lili were disappointed, although there was another photograph of TBOAH (The Back Of Archie’s Head). The topic of Halloween costumes Lili and Archie wore was brought up, as well as Ellen’s time spent together (presumably with her spouse). ‘We saw you guys, which was great,’ said the duchess.
MeGHAN also talked about Harry’s last Halloween party before their romance was announced.
‘We were able to have one final fun night out,’ she said, adding without irony that the party had ‘a post-apocalyptic theme’.
Archie feeds the Sussexes’ chickens
Further irony was the fact that Meghan chirped away with Ellen, almost without a care in world. However, both women’s public image for being nice and sweet has been tarnished by allegations of bullying and nastiness, which the duchess vigorously refuted.
Don’t mention the bully, please! It was the wrong word to use in this fabulousland-style and superchummy chick talk banquet.
Instead we got corny stuff about selling scrunchies at school, making the Thanksgiving dinner herself, and baby Lili’s teething troubles – all of it, from beginning to end, manufactured to endear the duchess further to the American public, part of what Hollywood calls ‘image crafting’.
Since their arrival in England, the Sussexes have been embracing this philosophy with great enthusiasm. They meticulously care for their character and magnify their status.
With their movements and every movement being continuously filmed by their cameras, it’s easy to wonder what Meghan and Harry really want. That’s what I want to know.
Mommy might need heat for a while, but some decorum and good judgment may not be amiss.