Actor Idris Elba defended his friends Meghan Markle and Prince Harry after their interview with Oprah Winfrey in March by noting that no one should be stopped from speaking out. Elba, who stars in the new Netflix movie Concrete Cowboy, attended Markle and Harry’s 2018 wedding with his wife, Sabrina Dhowre. He also served as their wedding reception DJ, as Elba also performs as DJ Big Driis when he is not acting.
During an interview with Entertainment Tonight this week, Elba, 48, was asked about Markle’s comment that she needed to “speak my truth.” Elba agreed that everyone should be able to speak about their experiences. “I will say that everyone has to have their opportunity to speak up about what they feel, you know,” Elba said, via the Daily Mail. “You cannot take someone’s voice away, that’s all we have to communicate.”
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Winfrey’s interview with Markle and Harry, which aired on CBS on March 7, included several shocking bombshells about their life in the U.K. before they stepped down from senior royal family duties. In one segment, Markle revealed that there were “concerns and conversations” among the royal family about “how dark” Harry and Markle’s son Archie’s skin color would be. Harry corroborated the story, but they both refused to say who exactly raised this concern.
“I’m not comfortable with sharing that,” Harry told Winfrey. “But it was right at the beginning. What will the kids look like? That was the beginning when she wasn’t going to get security when my family suggested that she might continue acting.” On the day after the interview aired, Winfrey told CBS This Morning that Harry did confirm his grandparents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, did not ask about Archie’s skin color.
In another portion of the interview, Markle said she felt like the royal family was trying to silence her. “Everyone in my life was given a very clear directive to always say ‘no comment,’ I did anything they told me to do because it was always through the lens of ‘we’ll protect you,’” the Duchess of Sussex explained. She believed the royal family was protecting her, even after noticing negative coverage from U.K. tabloids. However, once they were married, she “came to understand that not only was I not protected, they were willing to lie to protect other members of the family.” Despite this, Markle said the Queen was always “wonderful to me.”
Elba’s latest movie is Concrete Cowboy, which was released on Netflix Friday. In the film, he plays a father in Philadelphia who reconnects with his estranged son, played by Stranger Things‘ Caleb McLaughlin. Elba also stars in the upcoming DC Comics movie The Suicide Squad, which opens on Aug. 6. He stars as Robert DuBois/Bloodsport.
