Netflix “cancels” Meghan Markle: Pearl, the series of the Duchess, will not be made

Meghan Markle had announced its first animated series on Netflix, entitled Pearlin July 2021. The project – a “family series focusing on the adventures of a 12-year-old girl inspired by a variety of influential women in history” – the duchess would be executive producer along with David Furnish, the husband of Elton John. “Like many girls her age, our heroine Pearl will embark on a journey of self-discovery while trying to overcome the daily challenges of life “Markle had explained proudly in a note. Almost a year after the announcement, however, it became known that nothing will be done about that project – which was to be carried out by Archewell Productions.

The strong decline in subscribers has in fact forced Netflix to cut costs. And to pay the price, among others, there is the Markle. Her show is just one of many abandoned projects from the streaming giant. Among the canceled titles there are also two other projects for children: Dino Daycare And Boons and Curses. Netflix last month saw a dramatic drop in subscribers for the first time in a decade, and estimates that more two million people they will leave the service. Result: the streaming giant lost $ 54 billion on the stock exchange, more than a third of its value. And it’s running for cover.

Harry and Meghan had signed with Netflix a contract worth approximately 150 million euros – with which they undertook a produce a certain amount of TV series and documentaries – in September 2020. Almost a year and a half has passed since then e nothing has been seen yet. In recent months it had been said that the Sussexes were not keeping to their commitments. And the streaming TV giant – which was waiting impatiently for the couple to take care of the promised content while honoring the millionaire contract – began to show signs of nervousness. “Netflix is ​​putting the Sussexes under pressure. He wants them to produce content but he also wants the guarantee that those contents will have a large audience, ”a source revealed Express UK. Apparently Pearl doesn’t seem to offer those guarantees. And Netflix has decided to abandon the project. After all also the Sussex podcast for Spotify (with which they signed another millionaire deal) it was a hole in the water. The pilot episode, in which we had also heard the voice of little Archie, had created great expectations. It was December 2020. Since then nothing has been heard of the Sussex podcast.

Saying goodbye to the royal familythe Sussex have renounced to a prerogative of approximately 680 thousand euros net per year. To live they have to work, also because their expenses are monstrous. Alone their villa in Montecito, California, it costs 14, 7 million dollars: 5 already paid, the rest in the form of a mortgage. In addition, just to give another example, when they said goodbye to the royal family they had to pay back the $ 2.5 million they spent to renovate Frogmore Cottage, the London residence in which they lived for just a few weeks. The agreements with Netflix and Spotify seemed an excellent foundation on which to build their (rosy) economic future. Of course, the Sussexes also have other very lucrative projects at stake. Only for his (explosive) memoirthe one in which will tell the story of his entire life in the royal family, Harry would have received from the American publishing house Penguin Random House the impressive advance of $ 17 million. More, Netflix has confirmed that it will continue to work on a number of projects with Archewell Productionsamong which Heart of Invictusa documentary series on the hard preparation of veteran war athletes for the Invictus Games 2022. The eyes of the British press, however, are now all on Pearlthe animated series of the Duchess of Sussex that we will never see.

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