Break with his family, frantic race for money, loss of popularity and war with the tabloids: Prince Harry, who publishes his memoirs, is at an impasse.
Through Marc Fourny
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MBut what is Harry really looking for? Three years after his resounding departure from the royal family, he gives the image of a still embittered prince, pouring out his gall against the crown, his father, his brother, the English press, even England as a whole which would have badly received his wife – a shame when you know the enthusiasm caused at the time by his marriage to a young mixed-race woman, especially in the various British immigrant communities. And the imminent release of his biography The Alternateannounced as a settling of accounts, adds a layer with its share of reproaches, resentments cooked and annealed on the Windsors.
The first extracts that have leaked, from the loss of his virginity to his taking cocaine, in any case lower the prince of the blood to a simple people of the kingdom of reality TV. All that for this…
A fallen prince
Only his private life seems to balance it, if we are to believe the images and personal videos broadcast galore in his hagiographic documentary commissioned by Netflix. We see Harry enjoying his life as a father with Archie and Lili Diana as a wasp of the west coast, frolicking on the beach, organizing birthdays, placing Easter eggs in the garden of their luxury villa in Montecito, California… “I do things with my children that would have been impossible to do in Great Britain. Brittany, he explains. If I came here, it’s because I changed. I believe my mother could have ended up living in a place like this…”
But for the rest, the picture resembles the bleak plain of Waterloo… By twirling his sword in all directions, the bubbling son of King Charles ended up alienating everyone: his family, who can’t help it. more repeated attacks; the British tabloids, which have not let go of him since he declared war on them; and British opinion, which sees the Sussexes as spoiled and ungrateful children, reproaching them in particular for having cut ties when the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh were living their last years… According to a poll by the very respectable newspaper Times made after the release of their documentary, 44% of Britons now believe that the prince should be stripped of his titles. This is called a cold shower.
READ ALSOMemoirs of Prince Harry: the appalling unpacking of a “spoiled child”
Infernal spiral
It must be said that the strategy followed by Harry is frankly erratic and contradictory. The prince continually complains about the harassment of the popular press, but he never ceases to give the grain to grind it by his behavior, his positions and the diffusion of ultra-private images of his family – at the reverse of the very discreet attitude of William and Kate. In his latest interviews, he says he wants to reconnect with his brother and his father, but how can you agree to shake the right hand that is extended to you, when the other is sharpening the knife that will stir the wounds?
He criticizes Buckingham for no longer ensuring its security – a budget of around three million dollars a year – but how can we expect a benevolent return from those we attack in the media? As a result, the Sussexes are forced to sign juicy contracts to pay their fees and their star lifestyle, as is the case with Netflix or Spotify (for more than 100 million dollars). But the latter obviously expect a return on investment, and therefore scabrous revelations to make the audience…
READ ALSO“Harry and Meghan”: the financial future of the couple in questionIn this affair, it is the snake that bites its own tail: the more Harry needs money, the more he drools over the Windsors, the more the press gets carried away, the more the family gets annoyed… Here he is bound by contracts sly who lock him up in a dangerous game. And it’s not over: according to the DailyMailthe contract signed with the publishing house Penguin Random House in the amount of 40 million dollars would also include the publication of an autobiographical book of Meghan, where she would have to pull out her claws again and fill her cash drawer.
The question is how long will the combination last? By the time the Sussexes have finished whining and have gone through their grievances, they are likely to tire both their audience and their employers. And to find themselves completely deprived… What will Harry do then on his Californian rock? The prince is well aware of isolating himself more and more: his attacks and his outings come at the worst time, between the deaths of his grandparents and the next coronation of Charles III. Does he realize that he has embarked on a dead end?
In the documentary, the exile of Montecito begins to confide some regrets: “I miss Great Britain, I miss my friends and I lost some friends. And to add: “And these strange family gatherings, where we are all under the same roof, at specific times of the year, that, I miss that…” The first signs of the bitterness of exile ?
READ ALSOHow Charles III buried Harry and Meghan in his Christmas speech