With just days to go until the Duke and Duchess of Sussex launch their Netflix series, newspapers are turning a documentary about how the media treated the couple into a story about how the couple treats the media.
The release on Monday of a second trailer promoting the show has already led to suggestions of misleading editing, with several photos and clips taken out of context in the promotional video for the six-part show titled Harry and Meghan.
“There’s a leak, but there’s also a planting of stories… It’s a dirty game,” Prince Harry says in the trailer, as light bulbs tear through a variety of files and stock footage.
The Sun, one of the publications featured in the trailer, ran the story on its front page under the headline “Sussex, lies and video tape”. While some of the manipulations are small (a photo of Harry surrounded by paparazzi was cropped from an old picture with his ex Chelsy Davy, rather than Meghan), some are more unusual. Two images showing a series of cameras are taken from very different stories. One is from outside a Sussex magistrates court where cameras were waiting to capture glamor model Katie Price, another is a picture of Donald Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen leaving his New York apartment.
Another photograph showing dozens of photographers with long-lens cameras jostling for position was actually taken outside a Harry Potter film premiere in 2011. It’s one of the best “paparazzi” results in a popular image website.
Robert Jobson, the royal editor of the Evening Standard, criticized another dramatic photo of a photographer’s lens looking at the couple with their newborn son Archie. Jobson insisted that it was taken with his approval by an accredited press photographer at Archbishop Tutu’s residence in Cape Town. He tweeted: “Only three people were in the accredited position. H&M [Harry and Meghan] agreed to the position. I was there.”
This photo used by @Netflix and Harry and Meghan to suggest press intrusion is a complete hoax. It was taken from an accredited pool at Archbishop Tutu’s residence in Cape Town. Only 3 people were in the accredited site. H & M accepted the position. I was there pic.twitter.com/nvjznlloLF
— Robert Jobson (@theroyaleditor) December 5, 2022
Chris Ship, ITV’s royal editor, supported Jobson: “Archie’s filming at Archbishop Tutu’s residence was very controlled. And the ITN Productions camera filming the Africa documentary from Sussex were there with their permission. It wasn’t a media scrum. They spoke to [ITV news anchor] Tom Bradby in.”
The question, in part, is whether this still seemed like press intrusion to the couple, even if it was done with the approval of their aides at the time. Netflix declined to comment on suggestions that the images were misleading.
As the show is made for Netflix, rather than a British TV channel, it is not subject to the UK Broadcasting Standards Code. According to British rules, which are overseen by Ofcom, factual programs “must not materially mislead the audience” or risk breaching them.
It is unclear whether the use of stock footage from scrum cameras to illustrate press intrusion would count as a material breach of these rules. But British TV executives live in fear of a repeat of the BBC’s blunder in 2007, when a misleading trailer appeared to show Queen Elizabeth II leaving a photo shoot with Annie Liebowitz and an incident that led to the resignation of the then controller of BBC One, Peter Fincham.
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It may not help the coverage of the Sussexes that they are suing most British newspaper owners for a variety of reasons, as they have long since abandoned any pretense that they want to abide by the traditional rules of royal media engagement. Harry is bringing phone hacking cases against both News UK (which owns the Sun and Times) and Reach (which owns the Mirror, the Express and the Daily Star). He is also one of the prominent people who are making serious allegations against Associated Newspapers, the publisher of the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and MailOnline.
Meghan has already won a separate legal case against the Mail on Sunday after it published a private letter she sent to her father. Only the parent companies of the Guardian, the Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times are not publicly known to be involved in legal battles with the pair.
On Tuesday, Harry took a break in a defamation battle against the Mail on Sunday. He says a story they published about the funding of his security team is libelous, but the Mail editor is contesting the claim because the article expressed an “honest opinion” and did not cause serious reputational damage.
In a sign of the huge sums Harry is willing to spend on such legal cases, the court heard the royal has already paid £340,000 in legal fees for this one case and has budgeted up to £1.2m if the case goes to trial The two sides will continue negotiations to reach a deal until January 20 next year, by which time Harry and Meghan’s six episodes, which set out their views on the British media, would have been watched by millions.