Prince Harry says he left royal life because UK press was 'destroying' his mental health
London (CNN Business)Prince Harry has said he stepped back from the royal family last year because the British press was "destroying" his mental health.
In
a rare one-on-one interview in which he discussed the pressures of
royal life and his move away from London, Harry told "The Late Late
Show" host James Corden
that he decided he needed to "get (his) family out of here" and that he
preferred the depiction of royal life seen on Netflix show "The Crown" to the one published in newspapers.
"We
all know what the British press can be like, and it was destroying my
mental health," he said during the segment. "I was like, this is toxic.
So I did what any husband and what any father would do."
The prince and his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, quit as working members of the royal family in January 2020, a step that caused a crisis within the establishment.
They
have since moved to Los Angeles and have begun carving out new lives,
increasing their public visibility and engagement with more sympathetic
media figures.
The release of Harry's interview with Corden comes days before he and Meghan sit down for a prime-time interview with Oprah Winfrey.
During
the segment with Corden, in which the pair travel round Los Angeles in
an open-top bus, Harry revealed he has watched "The Crown" -- the
popular drama that probes a number of reported fractures within the
royal family. "I'm way more comfortable with 'The Crown' than I am
seeing the stories written about my family or my wife or myself," he
said.
"They
don't pretend to be news, it's fictional," Harry added of the show,
about which his fellow royals have generally been tight-lipped. "But
it's loosely based on the truth. Of course it's not strictly accurate,
but ... it gives you a rough idea about what that lifestyle, what the
pressures of putting duty and service above family and everything else,
what can come from that."
Prince Harry and James Corden outside the house from "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air."
Harry
and Meghan have been mired in a long-running war of words and lawsuits
with a large portion of the tabloid media, fighting multiple legal cases
against publications and photo agencies that had printed details of
their private lives.
Earlier this month, Meghan won a privacy claim against the publishers of the Mail on Sunday
after they published a letter she sent her father, and launched a
stinging rebuke to "dehumanizing" media organizations after the verdict,
saying the "damage they have done and continue to do runs deep."
Harry: We've Zoomed the Queen a few times
Harry
told Corden his life with Meghan in LA will be "a slightly different
version, but a continuation, of what we were doing back in the UK
anyway."
"My
life is always going to be about public service, and Meghan signed up
to that, and the two of us enjoy doing that," he said, echoing comments
the pair made after the Queen announced last week that they would not return as working members of the royal family.
Their
statement at the time, which insisted that "service is universal," was
read by many as a rejection of the Queen's framing of their departure.
"It
was never walking away. It was stepping back rather than stepping down.
It was a really difficult environment," Harry said, adding he'll never
"walk away," regardless of "whatever decisions are made on that side."
But
he told Corden they have video-called the Queen and Prince Philip since
their move. "We've Zoomed them a few times, they've seen Archie running
around," he said.
He
joked that Philip, instead of clicking the button to leave a meeting,
just shuts the laptop when the conversation is over. The 99-year-old
prince is currently in the hospital in London suffering from an infection, though Harry's interview was likely filmed before his admission and does not comment on it.
Harry
also discussed his relationship with Meghan and their son Archie,
revealing the child's first word was "crocodile" and that the Queen sent
him a waffle maker for Christmas, at Meghan's request.
Turning
to the couple's early romance, he said: "Dating with me, or with any
member of the royal family I guess, is kind of flipped upside down. All
the dates become dinners or watching the TV or chatting at home. And
eventually when you become a couple, then you venture out to dinners, to
the cinema and everything else."
During
the segment, the pair visit the house used in the '90s Will Smith
series "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," with Harry revealing -- during a
bout of somewhat awkward rapping -- that he knows the lyrics to the
show's famous theme song, before slipping inside for a bathroom break.
Corden
then video-calls Meghan on Harry's phone to jokingly suggest the pair
move in. "I think we've done enough moving," she said, dropping her
nickname for her husband -- "Haz."
Interest
in the couple's new lives is likely to intensify after they sit down
for a lengthy interview with Winfrey, which is expected to touch on the
nature of their departure from royal life.
The couple recently announced they are expecting a second child.
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