Prince Harry and Meghan Markle Business Decisions Are Following in 1 Surprising Royal’s Footsteps
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have been marching to their own drum for at least three years. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex stepped down from their roles as working royals back in early 2020, and since then, they have been living in California. And while their business moves might seem like a first-time adventure, they are actually following quite closely in the footsteps of another surprising royal: Prince Edward.
Edward and his wife, Sophie, have made similar moves to Harry and Meghan, but they did so years earlier — and without causing much of a stir.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s business moves mirror Prince Edward’s
Edward is Harry’s uncle, but he wasn’t as notable of a royal family member as Harry’s father, King Charles. That’s because Edward is Queen Elizabeth II’s youngest child, so there was almost no chance that he would ever take the throne. This allowed Edward and his wife, Sophie, to take a bit of a different route in terms of their careers.
According to Express, Edward founded his own production company nearly 30 years before Harry and Meghan signed their deal with Netflix. Edward’s company, Ardent Productions, focused on making documentaries, but the whole business venture didn’t quite pan out. Back in 2002, Edward stepped away from his production company and returned to work alongside the queen. Just seven years later, the company went out of business.
Fast forward to 2020, and Harry and Meghan started talking with Netflix about signing a deal to make documentaries and films of their own. While people might have forgotten about Edward’s venture, it looks like the family is more tied to production and filming than people might have realized. Of course, Harry and Meghan’s deal panned out with the success of their own documentary, but they have hit a few speed bumps along the way. Their animated series, Pearl, was canceled by the streaming service before it even finished production.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s business deals have had mixed reveiews
Since leaving the royal family, Harry and Meghan have hit some great highs and lows in their business dealings. The couple’s documentary was successful but failed to receive an Emmy nomination. And Harry’s “Spare” memoir became an instant bestseller. However, in addition to scrapping the couple’s animated series on Netflix, Meghan hit a snag with Spotify when the streaming service felt her Archetypes podcast didn’t meet the metrics they were looking for. Meghan and Spotify parted ways in mid-2023.
Harry and Meghan have been working on plenty of projects since leaving the royal family, and for the most part, they seem to have secured a place for themselves in the United States where they won’t need to come crawling back to the UK any time soon. Still, they aren’t the first ones to explore the film and production side of things. While it didn’t work out for Edward there is still plenty of time for Harry and Meghan to make a career of it. Harry also recently executive-produced a documentary surrounding his Invictus Games, which premiered in summer 2023.
