Royal admirers can now re-live the magic of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s romance on Disney+. The streamer just added two Lifetime original movies – both historical fiction dramas about the Sussexes’ courtship. However, fans should be warned that the movies are not universally beloved and are not necessarily accurate.
Disney+ just added Harry & Meghan: A Royal Romance (2018) and Harry & Meghan: Becoming Royal (2019). Both movies are fictionalized dramatizations of Prince Harry and Markle’s real-life story released around the time of their real-life wedding in 2018. Both are directed by Menhaj Huda and written by Scarlett Lacey, though she shares writing credit with Terrence Coli on A Royal Romance. The movies meant to be sequential, although some of the cast members change between them, disrupting the sense of continuity. A Royal Romance has a slightly higher average rating among critics than its sequel, but in general both movies are considered critical flops.
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A Royal Romance stars Murray Fraser as Prince Harry and Parisa Fitz-Henley as Markle. The movie begins in their respective childhoods, characterizing each of these figures as misunderstood and more sensitive than their peers. It then jumps ahead to their lives as adults, kicking off the action with their first blind date. The movie depicts their early courtship followed quickly by their struggles with the media attention they receive. It also focuses on their families, depicting the other royals as disapproving.
Becoming Royal stars Charles Field as Prince Harry and Tiffany Smith as Markle. It is about the Sussex royal wedding and their first year of marriage. Of course, the movie was released in the spring of 2019 so it doesn’t touch on the couple’s dramatic exit from royal life and move back to the U.S. Still, it is an interesting snapshot of their public personas at that time.
Disney has been adding a lot of Lifetime content to its streaming platform in the U.S. recently. Disney owns a large stake in A&E Networks which in turn owns Lifetime, which means the licensing agreements between them are likely favorable. This may also be a sign of Disney’s evolving strategy for Disney+ which is steering away from its strict family-friendly policies to include more diverse content. Whatever the reason, A Royal Romance and Becoming Royal are both streaming there now.
