It’s been a difficult year for Meghan Markle and Prince Harry.
The mixed reaction to Harry’s controversial memoir in January gave way to a series of minor PR setbacks that began to have a major impact on the Sussexes’ career prospects.
In June, Meghan’s Spotify podcast was canceled, and recent attempts to restore the couple’s good name appear to have mostly fallen flat.
Harry and Meghan’s attendance at the Invictus Games generated some positive press coverage, but the Sussexes’ Netflix doc about the annual competition failed to generate much buzz.
It’s a worrisome situation for the duke and duchess, who no longer have access to the tremendous wealth they might have enjoyed as working royals.
But insiders say that despite the rockiness of the past year, Meghan and Harry are not panicking.
In fact, one prominent royal biographer says that the Meghan is happily on the verge of a major “relaunch” with plans for a “new money-making venture.”
“It was no accident that over the summer, we saw rather more of Meghan than for all of the past year,” author and journalist Emily Andrews told The Mirror this week.
Andrews says the rebranding effort is already underway, as evidenced by two recent developments:
For one thing, Meghan signed with the famed WME talent agency over the summer.
On top of that, she’s been more visible than ever in recent months, likely at the urging of her new handlers.
“She has decided she wants to live her life much more openly and the ’relaunch’ by her new Hollywood power broker agency William Morris Endeavor has started with a series of August photographs and reports to maximize plans for a new moneymaking venture,” said Andrews.
The author went on to claim that Meghan’s unexpected “sudden willingness” to be photographed indicates that she knows her “commercial value.”
Despite rumors to the contrary, it doesn’t look as though Meghan plans to return to acting.
Instead, it seems that WME is assisting the duchess with the rollout of a new stage in her career.
But the exact nature of that stage remains uncertain.
Last week, Harry and Meghan’s Archewell Foundation hosted its first live event with a mental health summit in New York City.
Such humanitarian work will no doubt remain a big part of Meghan’s life — and her brand — going forward.
But that sort of work generally doesn’t bring in much money, and Harry and Meghan have likely grown accustomed to a certain lifestyle.
So Andrews is almost certainly correct when she says that Harry and Meghan are planning to launch some sort of new business venture in the very near future — but we probably won’t know what sort of path they’re pursuing until they make some sort of announcement.
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