When beginning a brand new life, it is at all times useful to have the assist of shut associates. And if the chums in query are the previous president of the USA and his spouse, a lot the higher — as Prince Harry and spouse Meghan are discovering.
Because the Mail revealed final yr, the couple have been taking recommendation from Barack and Michelle Obama about life exterior the Royal Household.
Harry has recognized them for years, bonding over humanitarian and army points, in addition to his inspirational Invictus Video games for injured army personnel and veterans.
Meghan is a big admirer of the previous U.S. First Woman, secretly attending a chat Michelle gave in London in 2018.
So when launching their new life within the U.S., no surprise it was to the Obamas that Harry and Meghan appeared for inspiration.
Since leaving the White Home in 2017, they’ve earned a fortune by promoting rights to their autobiographies, embarking on profitable talking excursions and establishing a manufacturing firm and charitable basis.
The couple are actually stated to be value $135 million (£97 million), and everybody loves them.
Who can blame the Sussexes for adopting a remarkably related blueprint? E-book offers, podcasts, Netflix offers, charitable deeds — they’re matching them step for step. Absolutely a run on the presidency is barely a matter of time . . .
When beginning a brand new life, it is at all times useful to have the assist of shut associates. And if the chums in query are the previous president of the USA and his spouse, a lot the higher — as Prince Harry and spouse Meghan are discovering
FROM NETFLIX TO MEGFLIX
In 2018, the Obamas signed a $50 million (£35 million) multi-year deal to provide movies and documentaries for Netflix. Tasks embody a documentary of Michelle’s arena-filling ebook tour and a biopic about Tenzing Norgay, the Sherpa mountaineer who, together with Sir Edmund Hillary, turned the primary to climb to the highest of Mount Everest, in 1953.
However Harry and Meghan’s deal is claimed to be double that, at an eye-watering $100 million (£70 million).
One in every of their first choices might be a collaboration between Meghan and David Furnish — husband of Elton John — to provide an animated present known as Pearl about ‘a 12-year-old lady who finds inspiration in influential ladies’. Some have speculated the collection might be primarily based on Meghan’s personal life.
PODCAST PLUTOCRATS
The Obamas’ multi-million-dollar take care of audio-streaming large Spotify in 2019 was adopted final July by the premiere of The Michelle Obama Podcast, through which the previous First Woman discusses relationships with key individuals in her life.
Then, earlier this yr, Renegades: Born In The USA was launched, that includes long-time associates Obama and rock legend Bruce Springsteen chewing the fats about all the pieces from trendy manhood to the state of present-day America.
At £18 million the Sussexes’ deal is claimed to be one of many largest ever signed for a brand new podcast. Up to now the content material contains a 35-minute ‘vacation particular’ episode.
PECKING ORDER IN POLITICS
When a pal just lately requested Michelle Obama whether or not she may ever be persuaded to run for president, she replied: ‘Completely not. I really like the life I am having now.’
However what about Meghan? Ever because the couple moved throughout the Atlantic, hypothesis has been rising that she is eying up a spot within the historical past books — as America’s first lady president.
The couple have made little secret of their political opinions.
In the course of the U.S. election final yr they levelled a thinly veiled assault on Donald Trump by urging voters to ‘reject hate speech’.
And earlier this yr there have been stories that Meghan had been networking amongst senior Democrats with a view to constructing a marketing campaign and fundraising groups for a tilt on the U.S. presidency. Watch this area? Sure we will!
BIRTHDAY TWINNING
On August 4, Barack Obama celebrates his sixtieth birthday — and Meghan her fortieth. The previous president is claimed to be marking the day with a lavish celebration at his Martha’s Winery vacation house.
How Meghan intends to have fun is unclear. However, with Oprah Winfrey and George Clooney reportedly on the Obama visitor listing, there’s the chance of previous associates falling out over shared associates . . .
IN STEP WHEN IT COMES TO STYLE
If additional proof had been wanted as to how highly effective a muse Michelle is to Meghan, take a peek of their wardrobes.
By no means can there be a much bigger praise than somebody copying you frock-for-frock.
The placing, yellow Jason Wu sheath costume Michelle wore on a tour of Italy in 2009 (left) is strikingly just like the £1,150 Brandon Maxwell crepe midi costume worn by Meghan to a Commonwealth Youth reception in 2018 (proper).
The placing, yellow Jason Wu sheath costume Michelle wore on a tour of Italy in 2009 (left) is strikingly just like the £1,150 Brandon Maxwell crepe midi costume worn by Meghan to a Commonwealth Youth reception in 2018 (proper)
Extra glamorous nonetheless was the then First Woman’s black £2,500 Michael Kors one shoulder costume worn for a 2012 dinner for Shimon Peres, the late Israeli president. The look was mirrored by Meghan in 2018 with a £10,000 black velvet Clare Waight Keller on the London Style Awards.
Then there are the turquoise attire — worn first by Michelle in 2012 as she met members of the U.S. Olympic crew and adopted by Meghan’s related Victoria Beckham quantity in London final yr at a operate.
THE PLUSH PALACES
With their new-found wealth in 2019, the Obamas enlarged their property portfolio, buying a swanky $11.75 million (£8.5 million) waterfront house in Martha’s Winery, Massachusetts, the summer season playground for America’s rich East Coast elite. It has seven bedrooms, a pool and sits in 30 acres of land.
Over on the West Coast, the Sussexes splashed out on a mansion of their very own. Costing $14.65 million (£10.6 million), their house in Santa Barbara, California, boasts 9 bedrooms, a library, workplace, spa, wine cellar and five-car storage. So who will get the primary invite?
With their new-found wealth in 2019, the Obamas enlarged their property portfolio, buying a swanky $11.75 million (£8.5 million) waterfront house in Martha’s Winery, Massachusetts, the summer season playground for America’s rich East Coast elite. It has seven bedrooms, a pool and sits in 30 acres of land
Over on the West Coast, the Sussexes splashed out on a mansion of their very own. Costing $14.65 million (£10.6 million), their house in Santa Barbara, California, boasts 9 bedrooms, a library, workplace, spa, wine cellar and five-car storage. So who will get the primary invite?
TWO FIRST LADIES OF TV
Oprah Winfrey signalled an early curiosity in Senator Obama when she endorsed his run for the White Home in 2007. 4 years later, in 2011, she welcomed America’s first black President and First Woman to her well-known couch, marking the primary time a sitting U.S. president and his spouse had appeared collectively on the primetime present.
The trio have change into agency associates, and Barack and Michelle have individually appeared with Oprah many extra occasions since.
The Sussexes’ affiliation with Oprah started even earlier of their relationship — once they invited her to their 2018 wedding ceremony at Windsor Citadel.
US President Barack Obama and First Woman Michelle Obama chat with discuss present host Oprah Winfrey
Duke and Duchess of Sussex throughout their interview with Oprah Winfrey
And, this yr, an enormous 49 million viewers throughout the globe tuned in to the broadcasting coup of 2021 when the Sussexes celebrated discovering freedom from the shackles of royal life — by speaking for 2 hours to TV royalty Oprah in regards to the shackles of royal life.
Oprah With Meghan And Harry: A CBS Primetime Particular dropped a collection of ‘fact bombs’ about racism, neglect and feuding throughout the Home of Windsor — and it was solely the warm-up act for a star-studded documentary collection on psychological well being fronted by Oprah and her new BFF, Prince Harry, for Apple TV.
THE WORTHY CAUSES
With all this discuss of mega-deals, multi-million-pound mansions and designer attire, it could be simple to neglect that the Obamas and the Sussexes do a whole lot of work for charity.
Neither Michelle nor Meghan are afraid to get their fingers soiled — be it the previous serving lunch to the homeless in Washington DC in 2009 or the latter, a decade later, serving to out in The Hubb Group Kitchen in London.
And each {couples} have now arrange their very own charitable organisations with a view to assist unfold their good works.
Michelle Obama serves lunch to the homeless at Miriam’s Kitchen March 5, 2009
Meghan, Duchess of Sussex visits the Hubb Group Kitchen in London on November 21, 2018
Established in 2014, The Obama Basis’s mission is to encourage atypical individuals ‘to take motion’ and to ’empower them to alter their world for the higher’.
Harry and Meghan’s charitable automobile is known as the Archewell Basis. The title, the couple revealed, was impressed by the Greek phrase arche that means ‘supply of motion’.
‘We linked to this idea for the charitable organisation we hoped to construct in the future, and it turned the inspiration for our son’s title,’ they stated of their mission assertion.
‘To do one thing of that means, to do one thing that issues.’
AFTER-DINNER SPEECHES
After leaving workplace, the Obamas signed up with New York-based Harry Walker Company, with the previous president commanding as much as $400,000 (£288,000) for a single speech — a determine reflecting his extraordinary journey from humble roots to change into the primary ever African-American president.
In June final yr, the Duke and Duchess joined the identical company.
After leaving workplace, the Obamas signed up with New York-based Harry Walker Company, with the previous president commanding as much as $400,000 (£288,000) for a single speech — a determine reflecting his extraordinary journey from humble roots to change into the primary ever African-American president. In June final yr, the Duke and Duchess joined the identical company
In February 2020, it emerged that Prince Harry had given a speech for financial institution JP Morgan through which he talked about being in remedy after the dying of his mom.
Consultants imagine the couple will command related if not increased charges than the Obamas.
MONEY-MAKING MEMOIRS…
For his or her memoirs, the Obamas acquired a world-beating $65 million (£47 million) mixed advance from Penguin Random Home.
Michelle justified that early vote of confidence by promoting 15 million copies of her autobiography, Changing into.
The primary quantity of Obama’s presidential memoir, A Promised Land, cleared 887,000 copies on its first day of publication final yr.
To not be outdone, final week Prince Harry introduced his personal ebook take care of the identical writer — stated to be value between £18 million and £29 million and involving as much as 4 books in whole, (though he says the proceeds of the primary will go to charity).
The primary is billed as an ‘correct and wholly truthful’ account of Harry’s life written ‘not because the prince I used to be born however as the person I’ve change into’.
However some speculate that the actual prize is a Meghan memoir — and the prospect of extra dust to be dished on the Royal Household.
AND CHILDREN’S BOOKS TOO
In 2010, Barack wrote Of Thee I Sing, a youngsters’s ebook described as a ‘stunning letter to his daughters’ and a ‘tribute to 13 groundbreaking Individuals and the beliefs which have formed our nation’.
‘Have I informed you the way great you might be? How the sound of your toes operating from afar brings dancing rhythms to my day?’ he wrote. This yr, Meghan revealed her personal youngsters’s ebook entitled The Bench, with the identical publishers.
Additionally illustrated by an award-winning artist, her 169-word lengthy providing was impressed by a bench she purchased for Harry for Father’s Day, on which she inscribed: ‘That is your bench/The place life will start/For you and our son/Our child, our kin.’
In 2010, Barack wrote Of Thee I Sing, a youngsters’s ebook described as a ‘stunning letter to his daughters’ and a ‘tribute to 13 groundbreaking Individuals and the beliefs which have formed our nation’. This yr, Meghan revealed her personal youngsters’s ebook entitled The Bench, with the identical publishers.
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