The Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s Netflix docuseries, titled Harry and Meghan, has dropped in part today – unveiling dramatic revelations about their time in the UK.
Here, Sky News highlights the key admissions made by Harry and Meghan, along with a few more surprises.
Episode 1
Harry and Meghan both appear candid from the off and ready to tell their version of events following their 2016 whirlwind romance.
After completing their final stint of royal engagements in March 2020, the 38-year-old prince says it is “really hard to look back on it now and go ‘what on earth happened’? Like, how did we end up here?'”
Prince Harry spoke about women in the Royal Family and said he had learnt “the pain and suffering of women marrying into this institution”.
He said: “I remember thinking how can I ever find someone who is willing and capable to be able to withstand all the baggage that comes with being with me.”
Harassment of Princess Diana
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Prince Harry says his mother, Princess Diana, was “harassed throughout her life”.
He says: “My mum was harassed throughout her life with my dad, but after they separated, the harassment went to new levels.”
Harry goes on to say that the moment his mother divorced, she was “by herself”.
Meeting on Instagram
Meghan reveals she wasn’t looking for a relationship the summer they met.
“I was really intent on being single, and just having fun all the time,” she says. “I had my career, I had my life, I had my path, uh, and then came H – I mean talk about plot twist.”
Then Harry reveals how they actually met…
“Meghan and I met over Instagram,” he says.
“I was just scrolling through my feed and someone who was a friend had this video of the two of them, like a Snapchat, with dog ears. That was the first thing – I was like ‘who is THAT?'”.
Archie heard speaking on TV for first time
The couple’s son, Archie, is heard speaking on TV for the first time six minutes into the episode.
As Meghan looks at the sunset, she asks Archie how he would describe it.
“It’s beautiful,” he says.
Fitting the mould
Harry reveals there was an urge for members of the Royal Family to marry someone who “fit the mould”.
He says: “I think for so many people in the family, especially the men, there could be a temptation or an urge to marry someone who would fit the mould as opposed to someone you are destined to be with.
“The difference between making a decision with your head or your heart.
“And my mum certainly made most of her decisions, if not all of them, from her heart. And I am my mother’s son.”
Public pressures
How different Prince William and Harry were as children is explored in the first episode, and how the Royal Family reacted to the paparazzi.
Harry describes his childhood as “filled with happiness and laughter”, but added that “the majority of my memories are of being swarmed by paparazzi”.
He also describes how the Royal Family reacted to paparazzi: “Rarely did we have a holiday without someone with a camera jumping out of a bush or something. Within the family, within the system, the advice that’s always given is don’t react.
“Don’t feed into it. There was always public pressure, with its fair share of drama, stress and tears. And witnessing those tears. I could always see it on my mum’s face. And that was when I thought hang on what am I, who am I, what am I part of?”
Meghan ‘similar’ to Princess Diana
Speaking about Meghan, Harry says: “So much of how Meghan is, and how she is, is so similar to my mum.
“She has the same compassion, she has the same empathy, she has the same confidence – she has this warmth about her.”
He adds that he accepts “there will be people around the world who fundamentally disagree with what I’ve done and how I’ve done it, but I knew that I had to do everything I could to protect my family”.
“Especially after what happened to my mum. You know I didn’t want history to repeat itself,” he says.
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2:08
Harry and Meghan: Key takeaways
Episode 2
Falling in love
Meghan reveals in episode 2 that the beginning of her relationship with Harry was “long distance” and “guarded”.
She says: “Everything was just texts and FaceTimes and we’d just talk for hours and it just felt exciting which is so weird because it wasn’t exciting in the way that people would assume that it would be.”
The former Suits actress describes the start of their romance as “relaxed and easy”.
She says: “We just got to know each other. Truly, like any other couple when you’re figuring out… What do you like to eat, what do you like to cook? What kind of movies do you like?”
Speaking about the relationship, Harry says: “I got to know her more and more, I was like, ‘I’m really falling in love with this girl’. So in spite of my fear, I just opened my heart to see what’s going to happen.”
Meghan meets William and Kate in ripped jeans
Meghan said she found the Royal Family quite formal upon first meeting them, and revealed she first met Prince William and Kate while wearing a ripped pair of jeans.
She says she has always been a hugger and didn’t realise that was jarring for a lot of British people.
“I guess I started to understand very quickly that the formality on the outside carried through on the inside,” Meghan says.
“That there is a forward-facing way of being and then you close the door and ‘phew I can relax now’ but that formality carries over on both sides. And that was surprising to me.”
Prince Harry says the Queen was the first senior member of the Royal Family who Meghan met.
First death threat
Prince Harry describes the early stages of his relationship as a “combination of car chases, anti-surveillance driving and disguises”.
Meghan describes how she received a death threat while she was in Toronto after the huge surge of media attention she experienced.
She said when she got her first death threat “things changed because I needed to have security”.
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0:33
Prince Harry on ‘race element’
Harry revealed that members of the Royal Family questioned why the Duchess of Sussex should be “protected” when the couple raised newspaper headlines about her.
“The direction from the Palace was don’t say anything,” he says, adding that his family would ask why Meghan should receive “special treatment”.
“I said: ‘The difference here is the race element’.”
Meeting the Queen
In episode two, Meghan says she did not know what meeting the Queen would consist of and describes it as “all a bit of a shock”.
The Duchess of Sussex says: “I didn’t realise I was about to meet Queen, on way to a lunch and Harry asked, ‘You know how to curtsey right?'”
She goes on to say: “Now I’m realising this is a big deal, talks about curtseying and meeting the Queen, it was so intense.”
Speaking about introducing Meghan to his family, Harry says: “I remember my family first meeting her and being incredibly impressed, some of them didn’t know quite what to do with themselves.
“I think they were surprised. They were surprised a ginger could land such a beautiful woman, and such an intelligent woman.”
But he says his family’s judgement may have been clouded by the fact Meghan was an American actress, and thought, “this won’t last”.
Episode 3
Engagement interview
In the third episode, Meghan describes her engagement interview as “an orchestrated reality show”.
She said: “It was, you know, rehearsed, so we did the thing out with the press and then we went right inside, took the coat off, sat down and did the interview. So it was all in that same moment.”
The couple announced their engagement in 2017.
Adapting wardrobes
Meghan explains in episode three that she “rarely wore colour” during her time in the UK as she understood you could not wear the same colour as the Queen in a group event.
“But then you also should never be wearing the same colour as one of the other more senior members of the family. So I was like ‘well, what’s a colour that they’ll probably never wear?'”, she says.
“Camel, beige, white. So I wore a lot of muted tones, but it also was so I could just blend in.
“Like, I’m not trying to stand out here. So there’s no version of me joining this family and trying to not do everything I could to fit in. I don’t want to embarrass the family.”
Unconscious bias in Royal Family
The Duke of Sussex reveals in episode three there is a “huge level of unconscious bias” in the Royal Family, before the documentary refers to when Princess Michael of Kent wore a Blackamoor-style brooch to an event the Duchess of Sussex attended in 2017.
He says: “In this family, sometimes you are part of the problem rather than part of the solution. There is a huge level of unconscious bias.
“The thing with unconscious bias, it is actually no one’s fault. But once it has been pointed out, or identified within yourself you then need to make it right.
“It is education. It is awareness. It is a constant work in progress for everybody, including me.”
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6:08
Prince Harry takes aim at family
Nazi uniform ‘biggest mistake of my life’
Harry says wearing a Nazi uniform to a private party was “one of the biggest mistakes of my life” and that he felt “so ashamed afterwards”.
In 2005, Harry made headlines when he was pictured wearing a Nazi uniform with a swastika armband to a fancy dress party.
The pictures was published on the front page of The Sun newspaper under the headline: “Harry the Nazi”.
Clarence House later issued a statement which read: “Prince Harry has apologised for any offence or embarrassment he has caused. He realises it was a poor choice of costume.”
Googling the national anthem
Meghan opens up about her experience joining the Royal Family, the protocols and how she came to learn the British national anthem.
She says: “Joining this family, I knew that there was a protocol for how things were done. And do you remember that old movie The Princess Diaries, with Anne Hathaway?
“There’s no class, and some person who goes ‘sit like this, cross your legs like this, use your fork, don’t do this, curtsey then, wear this kind of hat’. It doesn’t happen”.
When asked how she learned the national anthem she says: “I googled it, and I’d sit, there, and I’d practice and I’d practice”.
Paris Hilton says her “heart has shattered into a million pieces,” after visiting the charred remains of her Malibu beach house which has been destroyed in wildfires sweeping LA.
Describing herself on Instagram as “in complete shock,” the hotel heiress said seeing her family memories “reduced to ashes” was “devastating”.
Meanwhile, Mel Gibson has said the loss of his family home and all his belongings in the fire was “emotional”. It burned down while he was recording the Joe Rogan Experience in Texas.
At least 10 people have been killed in the blazes, which have been burning for four days, forcing 179,000 to evacuate their homes. Tens of thousands of acres of land still burning.
The fires affected multiple celebrities, as the fires have ripped through exclusive suburbs in southern California, home to film stars and billionaires.
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1:29
Celebrities’ homes have burned down in the LA fires
Hilton, 43, said she watched her home burn to the ground on TV – and shared a video on social media from inside her gutted home.
She said she was grateful to be safe along with her husband Carter Reum and their two children, Phoenix and London, but was devastated to have lost her family home.
She wrote on Instagram: “I’m standing here in what used to be our home, and the heartbreak is truly indescribable.
“When I first saw the news, I was in complete shock – I couldn’t process it. But now, standing here and seeing it with my own eyes, it feels like my heart has shattered into a million pieces.”
She has lived in the multi-million-pound property for three years.
Hilton added: “This house wasn’t just a place to live – it was where we dreamed, laughed, and created the most beautiful memories as a family.
“It was where [son] Phoenix’s little hands made art that I’ll cherish forever, where love and life filled every corner. To see it reduced to ashes… it’s devastating beyond words.
“What breaks my heart even more is knowing that this isn’t just my story. So many people have lost everything. It’s not just walls and roofs – it’s the memories that made those houses homes. It’s the photos, the keepsakes, the irreplaceable pieces of our lives.”
She described herself as “incredibly lucky,” adding: “My loved ones, my babies, and my pets are safe. That’s the most important thing”.
She thanked the firefighters, first responders and volunteers who she said were “all risking their lives” to help, adding “Even in the ashes, there is still beauty in this world”.
‘When I got home, it wasn’t there’
Braveheart star Mel Gibson, who was away when the fires began, told NewsNation’s Elizabeth Vargas Reports that the home he had lived in for over a decade had burned while he was appearing on an episode of the Joe Rogan podcast.
The 69-year-old actor said it was “emotional” to know all his belongings have been lost, but he was doing his best to stay positive.
He said he felt “relieved from the burden of my stuff, because it’s all in cinders”.
Gibson, who lived in his Hollywood home with his partner Rosalind Ross and their seven-year-old son Lars, described finding out about the loss of his house.
“I was doing the Rogan podcast… And [I was] kind of ill at ease while we were talking, because I knew my neighbourhood was on fire, so I thought, I wonder if my place is still there.
“But when I got home, sure enough, it wasn’t there. I went home and I said to myself, well, at least I haven’t got any of those pesky plumbing problems anymore.”
He said the family’s pet chickens had survived the blaze, and while many “personal things from over the years” had been lost, the important things were still there.
“These are only things. And the good news is that those in my family and those I love are all well, and we’re all happy and healthy and out of harm’s way, that’s all I can care about, really.”
The ancestral home of Big Lebowski actor Jeff Bridges is also understood to have been destroyed.
The four-bedroom home, which had been in the Bridges family for generations, had been inherited by Bridges and his two siblings in 2018 according to the Los Angeles Times.
Tina Knowles, the mother of singer Beyonce, has also lost a house she owned in Malibu to the fires.
She shared a short video of dolphins playing in the sea on Instagram, writing: “This is what I was looking at on my birthday this past weekend from my tiny little bungalow on the water in Malibu! It was my favorite place, my sanctuary, my sacred Happy Place. Now it is gone!!”
She went on to thank the fire department and first responders and offered condolences to others affected by the fires.
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Take That star Mark Owen and his family were evacuated from their home, with his wife Emma Ferguson describing them waking to “helicopters, thick black smoke and winds howling”.
She said while she was grateful her family was safe, it was “exhausting” to be “constantly looking online to see if your house is gone.”
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1:04
Steve Guttenberg: ‘I’ve seen such tragedy’
Actor Steve Guttenberg, best known for his role in the Police Academy film franchise, has called the fires “absolutely the worst” he’s ever seen, and has been doing what he can to help distressed residents.
Other stars to have lost their homes in the fires include Billy Crystal, Miles Teller, Diane Waren, Ricki Lake, Cary Elwes, Milo Ventimiglia, Anna Faris, Adam Brody and Leighton Meester, Spencer Pratt and Heidi Montag.
On Friday, the Recording Academy, which runs the Grammy Awards, and charity MusiCares have pledged $1m (£813,000) to support music artists impacted by the fires.
Actress Jamie Lee Curtis has pledged the same amount to fire relief efforts from her family foundation.
Alec Baldwin has filed a lawsuit against prosecutors who pursued a criminal charge against him after the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of Rust.
The Hollywood actor, who was the lead actor and co-producer of the Western film, was pointing a gun at Ms Hutchins when it fired in October 2021.
The cinematographer was killed and director Joel Souza was wounded.
Baldwin, 66, was accused of involuntary manslaughter but his trial was upended in July when a judge threw the case out based on the misconduct of police and prosecutors over the withholding of ammunition evidence from the defence.
He has now filed a lawsuit for malicious prosecution and civil rights violations against those involved in pursuing the charge.
The lawsuit alleges that prosecutors intentionally concealed evidence that would absolve Baldwin from blame and “sought at every turn to scapegoat” him to “maliciously bring about or advance” the actor’s trial and conviction.
It claims the defendants, which include special prosecutor Kari Morrissey and Santa Fe district attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies, were “blinded by their desire to convict Baldwin for all the wrong reasons”.
In a statement, Ms Morrissey said: “In October 2023 the prosecution team became aware that Mr Baldwin intended to file a retaliatory civil lawsuit.
“We look forward to our day in court.”
Representatives for Ms Carmack-Altwies have been contacted for comment.
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2:48
From July 2024: Special prosecutor Kari Morrissey accused of calling Baldwin a ‘c*********’
Baldwin’s lawsuit has been filed less than a month after Ms Morrissey withdrew an appeal over the court’s decision to dismiss the involuntary manslaughter charge against the actor.
After the lawsuit was filed, Baldwin’s lawyers Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro said in a joint statement: “Criminal prosecutions are supposed to be about the search for truth and justice, not to pursue personal or political gain or harass the innocent.
“Kari Morrissey and the other defendants violated that basic principle, over and over, and trampled on Alec Baldwin’s rights.
“We bring this action to hold the defendants accountable for their misconduct and to prevent them from doing this to anyone else.”
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1:58
From November 2024: Tributes paid to Halyna Hutchins at Rust premiere
Baldwin had always denied the charge of involuntary manslaughter, maintaining he did not pull the gun’s trigger and that others on the set in New Mexico were responsible for safety checks on the weapon.
If he had been convicted, he could have faced up to 18 months in prison.
According to the prosecution, the actor had behaved recklessly during a scene rehearsal on the set near Santa Fe, playing “make believe with a real gun” and violating “the cardinal rules of firearm safety”.
Baldwin’s defence team argued this was not true – saying he was “an actor, acting” and “committed no crime”.
Following repeated suggestions from defence lawyer Alex Spiro that evidence had been concealed, in an unusual move, Ms Morrissey called herself to the witness stand during the trial, despite the judge telling her she was not required to do so.
Mr Spiro told the court that she had referred to the actor as a “c*********” and an “arrogant p****” to witnesses. Ms Morrissey said she did not recall this.
Hollywood celebrities are among thousands of people to have been evacuated from their homes as fires rip through areas of Los Angeles.
Sky News’ US correspondent Martha Kelner reported that Tom Hanks, Ben Affleck and Reese Witherspoon were all evacuated on Tuesday as wildfires continued to spread in the Pacific Palisades suburb of LA.
The area, which is home to billionaires as well as Hollywood A-listers, is located between Santa Monica and Malibu.
Other celebrities who have fled their homes include the award-winning actor James Woods, who said last night he had been safely evacuated from his home in Pacific Palisades.
But he added in a post on X: “I do not know at this moment if our home is still standing.”
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Actor Mark Hamill, best known for playing Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars films, also posted on social media last night saying he evacuated his home in Malibu and his family were “fleeing for our lives”.
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This Is Us actress Mandy Moore was also forced to leave her home due to the fires.
She said in two Instagram stories she had fled the Eaton fire, which is raging near Altadena, with her children, cats and dog. They have found temporary refuge with friends.
The actress said: “Trying to shield the kids from the immense sadness and worry I feel.
“Praying for everyone in our beautiful city. So gutted for the destruction and loss. Don’t know if our place made it.”
According to Velvet Ropes, which maps celebrity properties, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Matt Damon, Steven Spielberg, Hilary Swank and Sally Field all have homes close to where fires are raging.
Dr Dre, Adam Brody and Leighton Meester, Tyra Banks, Martin Short, Anna Faris, Milo Ventimiglia, Linda Cardellini, Mary McDonnell, Adam Sandler, Miles Teller, and Jennifer Love Hewitt are also said to have houses in affected areas.
In neighbouring Malibu, which was also affected by fires in December, stars including Beyonce and Jay-Z, Kim Kardashian, Lady Gaga and Billie Eilish are said to be among the celebrity residents.
The Palisades blaze has already burnt through more than 11,000 acres of land while the Eaton one has caused the death of two people, Los Angeles County fire chief Anthony Marrone said on Wednesday.
The two other fires are known as Woodley and Hurst, after the main areas affected.
All four blazes are still growing, Mr Marrone said.