Lackluster Lifestyles

How the Meghan Markle Netflix Show is So Awful

My lifestyle brand if I had one might best be encapsulated by this nice painting by Van Gogh:

File: Farmhouse in Provence, 1888, Vincent van Gogh, NGA.jpg - Wikimedia Commons

It’s Lent and half of my children are on Spring Break, and so, because life is pain, those of us who didn’t have to run off to class or work decided to watch With Love, Meghan, the lifestyle effort of Meghan Markle Sussex (heaven help us) on Netflix. Apparently, there are 8 whole episodes. We only made it through 3 yesterday before we couldn’t take it anymore. Seeing the immense and overwhelming social media response, we will probably try to watch the rest of it today, even though, as someone or other pointed out, it’s not even good enough television to hate-watch. In the words of one of my astute young daughters, “This feels like a hostage situation.” This sentiment I saw hither and yon as more than one TikTokker suggested it be used to torture suspected terrorists. This, it seems to me, escalates the matter unduly, and yet, watching it, there is something so off, so cringe, that perhaps it bears some reflection.

Basically, for the show, Meghan rents a house in Montecito with a large and luxurious garden from which she picks flowers and herbs with the proprietorial air of having grown them herself. In the kitchen she chats away about being a mom and what kinds of things she loves and what sort of person she is. I asked Grok why she didn’t use her own house and here is the answer that was vouchsafed unto me:

Meghan Markle chose not to film her Netflix show, With Love, Meghan, in her own Montecito home primarily to protect her family’s privacy and maintain a safe haven. She explained in an interview with People that her $14.65 million mansion, where she lives with Prince Harry and their children, Archie (5) and Lilibet (3), is a close-knit family space. She highlighted cherished routines—like napping Lili, having lunch together, and cooking for the family in their kitchen—which she didn’t want disrupted by a film crew of over 80 people. Instead, she opted for a nearby rental property, an $8 million farmhouse owned by philanthropists Tom and Sherrie Cipolla, just two miles away in Montecito, California. This decision aligns with a pattern: for their 2022 docuseries Harry & Meghan, they also filmed in a borrowed $30 million estate rather than their own home. Meghan told People she picked a rental with a similar style to reflect her aesthetic, but the choice avoids exposing her actual living space. Some speculate security concerns played a role—standard for high-profile figures—while others, per posts on X and media like the New York Post, suggest it’s about crafting a curated, “relatable” image, avoiding the perceived extravagance of her mansion. Critics have called it “tone-deaf” or “staged,” but Meghan’s stated reason centers on preserving her family’s sanctuary. Most interior scenes were shot at the rental, though a few exterior shots (e.g., berry-picking, chicken coop) feature her real property.

Ah yes, “tone-deaf.” That is definitely a term I would use to describe what’s going on here.

So in the first episode, she has a person who once did her make-up, but who is now, apparently, a very close friend, come over so that she could show him how she makes a one-pot pasta dish and candles out of the wax from bees that may or may not belong to her—I couldn’t quite make it out. In the opening scene, she is extracting honey from a hive somewhere, in company with someone who knows what he is doing. Then she is in the house, getting ready for the arrival of her friend, Daniel.

First—and the internet absolutely died over the preciousness of this—she took some peanut butter pretzels out of their original packaging and put them into a plain bag with her own label. The thing that was so weird, though, is how she said she *knows* her friend loves peanut butter pretzels, but also, she carefully marks the ingredients in her own hand ‘in case he has a peanut allergy.’ These sorts of strange little inconsistencies pepper Meghan’s explanations, making many people feel that she lacks ‘authenticity.’ Does she, they wonder, have any real friends?

After the pretzel incident, Meghan explains that she likes for her guests to enjoy cozy baths when they stay with her, and so she shows how to make an aromatic bath mixture. She slews around salt and essential oils and hoves it into a large container after which she shoves herbs and flowers haphazardly into some “tea bags” that can go in the bath but won’t stop up the drains. She mashes those in the top of the jar and then moves on to arranging flowers. And that, truly, is where I died inside.