When beginning a brand new life, it is all the time 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 identified them for years, bonding over humanitarian and navy points, in addition to his inspirational Invictus Video games for injured navy personnel and veterans.
Meghan is a big admirer of the previous U.S. First Girl, secretly attending a chat Michelle gave in London in 2018.
So when launching their new life within the U.S., no marvel it was to the Obamas that Harry and Meghan seemed 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 comparable blueprint? E-book offers, podcasts, Netflix offers, charitable deeds — they’re matching them step for step. Certainly a run on the presidency is barely a matter of time . . .
When beginning a brand new life, it is all the time 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 embrace a documentary of Michelle’s arena-filling ebook tour and a biopic about Tenzing Norgay, the Sherpa mountaineer who, together with Sir Edmund Hillary, grew to become 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 will likely be a collaboration between Meghan and David Furnish — husband of Elton John — to provide an animated present referred to as Pearl about ‘a 12-year-old woman who finds inspiration in influential ladies’. Some have speculated the collection will likely be based mostly on Meghan’s personal life.
PODCAST PLUTOCRATS
The Obamas’ multi-million-dollar take care of audio-streaming big Spotify in 2019 was adopted final July by the premiere of The Michelle Obama Podcast, by which the previous First Girl 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 every little thing from fashionable 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. So far the content material contains a 35-minute ‘vacation particular’ episode.
PECKING ORDER IN POLITICS
When a buddy 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 for the reason that 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 views.
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 house? 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 social gathering at his Martha’s Winery vacation dwelling.
How Meghan intends to have fun is unclear. However, with Oprah Winfrey and George Clooney reportedly on the Obama visitor record, there’s the danger of outdated 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 putting, 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 putting, 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 Girl’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 staff and adopted by Meghan’s comparable 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 dwelling in Martha’s Winery, Massachusetts, the summer time 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 dwelling 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 dwelling in Martha’s Winery, Massachusetts, the summer time 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 dwelling 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 Girl 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 turn out to be agency associates, and Barack and Michelle have individually appeared with Oprah many extra instances since.
The Sussexes’ affiliation with Oprah started even earlier of their relationship — after they invited her to their 2018 marriage ceremony at Windsor Citadel.
US President Barack Obama and First Girl Michelle Obama chat with speak 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 concerning 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 inside 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 speak of mega-deals, multi-million-pound mansions and designer attire, it could be straightforward to neglect that the Obamas and the Sussexes do numerous work for charity.
Neither Michelle nor Meghan are afraid to get their palms 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 Neighborhood 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 Neighborhood 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 vary their world for the higher’.
Harry and Meghan’s charitable car is known as the Archewell Basis. The title, the couple revealed, was impressed by the Greek phrase arche which means ‘supply of motion’.
‘We related to this idea for the charitable organisation we hoped to construct someday, and it grew to become the inspiration for our son’s title,’ they stated of their mission assertion.
‘To do one thing of which 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 turn out to be 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 turn out to be 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 by which he talked about being in remedy after the demise of his mom.
Specialists imagine the couple will command comparable if not greater charges than the Obamas.
MONEY-MAKING MEMOIRS…
For his or her memoirs, the Obamas obtained 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, Turning 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 complete, (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 turn out to be’.
However some speculate that the true prize is a Meghan memoir — and the prospect of extra grime to be dished on the Royal Household.
AND CHILDREN’S BOOKS TOO
In 2010, Barack wrote Of Thee I Sing, a kids’s ebook described as a ‘lovely letter to his daughters’ and a ‘tribute to 13 groundbreaking Individuals and the beliefs which have formed our nation’.
‘Have I informed you ways fantastic you’re? How the sound of your ft working from afar brings dancing rhythms to my day?’ he wrote. This yr, Meghan revealed her personal kids’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 kids’s ebook described as a ‘lovely 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 kids’s ebook entitled The Bench, with the identical publishers.
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