Prince Philip’s Sharp Warning About Harry and Meghan, According to a New Royal Biography

Prince William also raised early concerns about the relationship, Prince Harry has said

When Prince Harry announced his engagement to Meghan Markle, his grandfather, Prince Philip, reportedly responded with a characteristically blunt remark.

Harry and Meghan revealed their engagement in November 2017, just over a year after news of their relationship first surfaced. According to Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York, historian Andrew Lownie’s recent biography of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, Philip was wary about Meghan entering royal life. The Daily Mail, citing the book, reports that Philip cautioned his grandson with a pointed line: “One steps out with actresses, one doesn’t marry them.”

The comment was first attributed to Philip by The Sunday Times in 2019, which described it as the kind of dry, cutting joke for which the Duke of Edinburgh was widely known.

Philip, who died in 2021 at 99, wasn’t the only senior royal said to have reservations about the match. In 2019, a source close to the family said that Prince William urged Harry to slow down, suggesting the relationship was moving too fast — advice that reportedly left Harry upset.

Harry later wrote in his 2023 memoir, Spare, that tensions with William deepened after the wedding. He recounted a 2019 argument in which William allegedly described Meghan as “difficult,” “rude” and “abrasive,” and said the dispute escalated into a physical confrontation. Harry has said he felt his brother was echoing press narratives about Meghan.

Still, Harry has also stressed that William never tried to stop the marriage. In an interview tied to Spare, he said William didn’t attempt to dissuade him, but did voice worries early on.

“No, he never tried to dissuade me from marrying Meghan,” Harry said. “But he aired some concerns very early on and said, ‘This is gonna be really hard for you.’ I still don’t truly understand which part of what he was talking about.”

Harry added that William may have been anticipating the intensity of the British media’s reaction to Meghan.

The couple met in early 2016 and married in May 2018. They stepped back from official royal duties in 2020 and now live in Montecito, California, with their two children, Prince Archie, 6, and Princess Lilibet, 4.