Forget the haters – Meghan Markle’s new Netflix show is a brilliantly informative series showing how to get your home ready for a guest.
A sentence said by no one, ever, anywhere.
In the interests of keeping up, I watched the Duchess of Sussex’s new offering With Love, Meghan.
The reviews were dire. How bad can it be?
Like many, I don’t think she’s a lovely person but she deserves a chance – it couldn’t be that bad.
Friends, it was worse.
As it happens, I had prepared my house for a friend staying the weekend before and it was a vastly different experience to Meghan’s.
‘It’s not so twee and harmless’
The premise of the show is that she invites us into her world to see the real her.
The reality is Netflix rents a multi-million pound home to film in, producers stage everything in a beautifully stocked and lit kitchen – and she leaves for her actual home the moment she’s wrapped.
Preparations for her friend included making little gift bags.
This involved harvesting honey from her bees by watching a professional bee-keeper do it.
She arranged a tiny vase of sweet, locally grown flowers and made a “she’s-beautiful-on-the-inside” cake. I know.
Now, this might seem all very twee and harmless but it’s not. Because Meghan’s schtick is that she’s just like us. Relatable, humble.
So how come, when I went into a flying fizz to have our friend stay, it went like this.
Guest bed bedding washed (twice, because a slight muddy cat paw print wouldn’t come out).
Washing hung on the line. Rained.
Into the tumble dryer. Wondered if I’d get repetitive arm injury from ironing duvets.
On hands and knees to clean every inch of floor. A phone call to say my tax was due tomorrow.
Possible mild panic attack. Onto the toilets and bathrooms – “Wait ‘till the boys get home – how hard can it be to wee in the actual toilet?”
Open the door to greet our postie and make him laugh by telling him I’ve been cleaning like f***.
Realise I’m still in my pyjamas. Hidden sweetie and ice lolly wrappers found in multiple hiding places.
What would we make our pal for dinner? Boys home. Forgot to shout at them about wee – too late. Happened again. Screamed like a banshee about pigsties.
You tell me. Which is the more accurate account of making your home ready for a guest?
What does it say about a person that they want to convey a perfect life to millions?
Do you think it’s done to make us feel better about ourselves?
Dundee reality
The closest Meghan came to physical activity was whisking eggs – in a pristine white shirt and trousers.
Working in the industry, I know it can sometimes take a whole day to produce ten minutes of TV like this.
All the ingredients would have been bought for her and laid out beautifully too.
The mums I gravitate to are the ones who say they’re at the end of their tether – that everyone’s driving them mad.
When our guest – who was brought up in Dundee and has lived in London for years –arrived, we did got tray of half-time pies cut in half for lunch while watching the football and washed down with a drink of his choice (Tennent’s).
This time we bought from Yorkes but as we all know, our city excels in butchers, from West End to Scott Brothers and Grossett’s and let’s not forget Clark’s Bakery.
Back to our attempt at an afternoon snack. There were Macaroni pies, Scotch, steak and gravy, curry sauce.
I thought our pal was going to cry.
He said: “Oh my God, I miss Dundee pies so much.” He took pictures. He wanted to bring his daughter up just to taste a macaroni pie.
‘Potentially dangerous’
Back to Meghan. She didn’t offer a guest a seat, ever.
It felt awkward and staged and I have no sympathy because the whole vanity project makes real people’s lives feel like a grotesque version of the perfection she portrays.
I’m calling it out. No one lives or thinks like this. It is false and potentially dangerous for mental health.
Claim the crown as a Martha Stewart-esque lifestyle queen and the prize is huge.
Granted, we don’t want to watch a woman who needs her roots done in pyjamas, perspiring on her hands and knees.
Glossy and aspirational has its place. But we can smell a fake and this Netflix malarky stinks.
I bet her guest could have murdered a can of Tennent’s and a steak and gravy peh.
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