Duchess Meghan's Private Pain

As a court battle looms, family drama is still front and centre for the sussexes

Two years after Meghan Markle’s wedding to Prince Harry was beset with dysfunctional family drama, the couple’s text messages to her father, Thomas Markle, have been released as part of a legal case against the Mail on Sunday. The couple are seeking damages after the paper published extracts of a “private and confidential” letter Meghan wrote to her dad after he failed to show up to her big day.

The Duchess of Sussex’s legal team lodged papers, obtained by news outlet TMZ, which show that Meghan and Harry repeatedly reached out to Thomas, 75, after the former movie lighting director was sprung staging paparazzi photos for cash days before he was set to walk Meghan down the aisle on May 19, 2018.

“I’ve called and texted but haven’t heard back from you so hoping you’re okay,” Meghan messaged, as revealed in the new court documents. On May 6, just days before their nuptials, Meghan and Harry learnt that Thomas had posed for fake photos. Meghan, the legal papers say, tried to arrange “logistics and supplies for her father discretely and with privacy, with care taken not to feed the press … She is trying to protect her father from heightened press intrusion and scrutiny and [advising] that he should keep a low profile until the wedding.”