Prince Harry and Meghan Markles fresh Hollywood blow: Biggest losers

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are finishing up the year with unfortunate new titles.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been branded two of 2023’s “biggest losers” in an industry power ranking compiled by The Hollywood Reporter.

Their inclusion on the showbiz bible’s list follows a turbulent year for the couple, with the cancellation of their Spotify deal and unflattering depictions in popular animated series South Park and Family Guy.

“After a whiny Netflix documentary, a whiny biography (Spare — even the title is a pouty gripe) and an inert podcast, the Harry and Meghan brand swelled into a sanctimonious bubble just begging to be popped — and South Park was the pin,” the blistering THR description read, before conceding: “Still, all the scorn and mockery beats otherwise having to attend 200-plus official royal family engagements a year, which sounds hellish.”

The writer added that the royal pair had failed “to cash in their celebrity status in the States” after moving to Montecito.

Harry and Meghan joined the likes of Disney, TV series Yellowstone, the Scream franchise and AI characters on the “losers” side of the list, while Taylor Swift and Barbie’s Margot Robbie and Greta Gerwig were among the “winners”.

In keeping with the dramatic start to their year, fuelled by the release of Harry’s jaw-droppingly candid memoir in January, the duo are now also ending the year in the midst of fresh drama, thanks to another explosive tell-all.

Late last month, the two royals allegedly at the centre of the race scandal which has engulfed the monarchy over the past two years appeared to be identified in “error” in the Dutch edition of Omid Scobie’s book, Endgame.

The accusations of racism – or “unconscious bias”, as Harry later put it – originally stemmed from his and Meghan’s 2021 Oprah Winfrey interview, in which the duchess claimed that there had been “concerns and conversations” about “how dark” her unborn child’s skin might be while she was pregnant in 2019.

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The names of the two senior royals allegedly identified in a private letter exchange between Meghan and King Charles in the aftermath of the interview were then reportedly included in only the Dutch edition of the book, sparking an uproar.

Mr Scobie insisted it was a “translation error”, but the book’s translator has refuted that, insisting the words were there on the page in “black and white”.

Meanwhile, sources close to the Sussexes have insisted that Meghan “never intended” for those involved in the race conversations to be “publicly identified”.

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