I’m not really a royalist but then saying that I’m not a republican either. So I guess that I have a status quo bias. I understand that our history and heritage however abhorrent it feels in 2022, still creates a lot of revenue for the UK, and let’s face it, right now the UK needs all the revenue that it can get.

Like most people that lived through the Charles and Diana saga in real time, I feel desperately sorry for Harry and William. Not because they had the weight of the monarchy on their shoulders, but because I, like so many of us, watched two little boys walk behind their mum’s coffin in an abhorrent display of pageantry.

I remember my mum commenting on all the Harry horror headlines back in the day when he was going through his rebellious stage. Now she was a staunch royalist, but she would always express how tough it must have been for him losing his mum at such a young age, and with that matter of fact Welsh knowing explain to me how he was bound to rebel, because he was hurting.

So with that narrative already playing in my mind I sat down last night to watch the first three episodes of the much talked about Harry and Meghan documentary on Netflix.

I’d spent the last few days trawling through social media (as I do) reading up on all the hysterical reporting being put out by the UK tabloids and the usual right-wing TV channels. According to them this documentary was going to bring down the monarchy, the cries of people like Dan Wootton and Piers Morgan were so vitriolic, I was expecting to see a newsflash of them both calling for “their heads”.

A quick side note here about those 2 reporters, one who stands against cancel culture and the other that stands against “wokism”, yet both of them are prepared to sell their souls to the devil in some bizarre Faustian pact with the Murdoch machine.

Now so many people won’t have the luxury of watching the documentary on a paid for streaming channel, so they’ll literally be basing their opinion on the hearsay that the media put out there.

So if any of that demographic are reading this, rest assured to date in the documentary, Harry and Meghan have only given the back story as to why they ended up giving up their public service. They both actually come over as considerate, thoughtful individuals, who put the blame squarely at the feet of the British media, well, so far that is.

They both speak about the archaic monarchy with an understanding that I don’t think I could muster. They’re respectful about the utter nonsense that goes on in all the various castles, and pay reverence to the bigger importance of it all. Meghan does a good line in “bemused American” trying to keep up, and Harry does a good line in explaining how his family sometimes can’t even see what they’re doing is wrong, as they’re all so entrenched in how things usually work.

In fact his line about the males in the family choosing partners based on their suitability for the role I thought was really insightful. Equally his recognition of them not being able to facilitate change because some of the tabloid abuse was simply seen as a rite of passage.

In fact that made me think about drama colleges, and those teachers and creatives that continue to abuse students to this day. Their excuse is always “well it’s how I was taught, and therefore I’m going to pass on the torment”. Negating to notice that the world evolves, and if we have any emotional intelligence at all, we should be evolving with it.

Anyway. . . back to Harry and Meghan. The documentary is edited brilliantly to reveal Harry’s story, from the young family chased by the paps, through his mother’s untimely death entirely caused by the paps, then onto his adult journey of discovery and belonging. Be that as a care giver volunteer in Africa or as a member of the armed forces fighting for his country in Afghanistan.

The stinger of course is when the cycle is due to get repeated. When his chosen and created family are forced through association with him to join the rat race of media manipulation.

Again edited brilliantly, we see how him and Meghan were probably perfect for each other. Both products of broken homes, both with trauma in their past, both had looked to make the world better as opposed to being bitter.

Joe Public probably won’t believe the amount of money some of the papers throw around in order to create a story on a “celeb”. Most will think (like I used to when I was a teenager back in Swansea), if it’s in the papers then it must be true.

Fast forward to being an adult working in theatre, and getting offered large sums of money to tell a story on some “celebratory or another” that you might have worked with or taught, or indeed listened to friends that were currently riding a wave of publicity explain how they were going to “sell a story” on themselves in order to make a few more pounds that month. The story wasn’t true, but it would keep them “current”, and of course in showbiz – all publicity is good publicity isn’t it?

In other words, when watching the documentary, and hearing what they were purporting to be “their side” of the story, and then reading the bizarre inferences that the press were putting on bits of it, I knew who I believed, but I also knew what a large percentage of the country would believe.

Apparently, in the next few episodes, they’re going to explore in more detail the gaslighting that they endured at the hands of the press. They’re going to expose the PR machine that is the palace rota, and they’re going to highlight the racist angle that the PR machine exploited.

2 people that “the system” attempted to manipulate broke free and are fighting back. I sincerely hope that they lay it all out on the table for everybody to digest. It’s not revenge, as the damage has already left it’s imprint, this is justice and accountability.

For people that have read my own ongoing battle for accountability in my fight against Trinity and the alleged lies that they told, lies that contributed to the closure of The MTA, will not be surprised in the slightest to discover that I’m very much on the side of the couple.

I don’t know how you get closure from losing a parent at a young age, from being denied a private life by virtue of royal decree, or from a father selling you out to the press in order to make some money, or indeed from other relatives selling you out in a bid to create a revenue stream for themselves. What I hope though is that this 6 part series finally gives them their voices back.

I also think that it’s the people that live with integrity that are the ones that try to create change in the world, whilst others protect their financial investments with no thought of the individuals that they’re destroying with their false narratives.