Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are a royal hit with audiences.
The new “Harry & Meghan” Netflix
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documentary series, which traces the story of the couple and their complicated relationship with the paparazzi and the British royal family, is drawing a much larger viewership so far than the network’s fifth season of “The Crown,” a dramatic series based on events in the royal family’s life. [What’s more, the current “Crown” season focuses heavily on the troubled marriage and subsequent divorce of Prince (now King) Charles and Princess Diana — Harry’s parents.]
The first three episodes of “Harry & Meghan” dropped on Dec. 8, drawing 2.4 million U.K. viewers on its first day, far surpassing the 1.1 million who watched the current season of “The Crown” on its debut. Those figures come courtesy of the British streaming monitoring service Barb.
In the U.S., Samba TV, another monitoring service, reported that 1 million households tuned into “Harry & Meghan” on the day it premiered. Forbes noted that was almost double the audience for the first episode of the new season of “The Crown.”
“It seems young people would rather watch real-life royals than dramatizations about them,” Forbes suggested.
It should be noted that the lower numbers posted by “The Crown” could also stem from the series — which has 21 Emmy wins under its belt — losing some fan fervor now that it’s in its fifth season. There’s also 10 episodes in this season of “The Crown,” which is a longer binge-watching commitment than the three episodes featured in the first half of “Harry & Meghan.”
Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex and second-born child of Charles and Diana, married Meghan Markle, a Canadian-born biracial actress, in a much-celebrated ceremony in 2018. But the pair soon found life as a royal couple to be a challenge, and they stepped down from their royal duties in 2020, opting to live at least part of the time in America.
In a 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, the couple spoke openly of the issues they faced with the royal family, from a general lack of support to issues of racism. The Netflix docuseries has given the couple a platform to share more of their side of the story.
The second volume of “Harry & Meghan” episodes will be released on Thursday.
The popularity of “Harry & Meghan” doesn’t come as a surprise to Aly Walansky, a veteran journalist who has written extensively about the royal family. She says the fact that Harry and Meghan have broken with the royal family’s hush-hush private nature is what’s resonating with viewers.
“They are sharing deeply personal, non-styled, blunt but poignant truths,” Walansky said. “Ultimately, it’s made Harry and Meghan seem a lot more real, and human, and relatable than the rest of the family.”
Either way, one thing is clear: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are certainly doing well financially in their post-royal chapter. The Wall Street Journal recently noted that the couple has netted $120 million in deals with Netflix and Spotify
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Prince Harry also has a much-anticipated book, “Spare,” coming out next month.
This post was originally published on Market Watch
