Meghan Markle and Prince Harry visited Botswana, Africa, during their 2017 relationship. There, they happened to have dinner with directors Mark Linfield and Vanessa Barlowitz, who were working on the Disney Nature documentary Elephant. Fast forward three years later, and Megan is narrating in that very same film. I love this little detail!

Per People (opens in new tab):

"She was absolutely intrigued by the elephant, especially the female empowerment aspect," Berlowitz says. She was particularly taken by the female empowerment aspect," says Berlowitz. It is consensual leadership. It is also very inclusive and very contemporary. She was absolutely fascinated by it."

The directors quickly came up with the idea of having Megan narrate the speech, and tested her voice from speeches online against the footage they had already collected. Linfield said, "She had done a speech for the UN Women and it went very well." The directors did not say whether Meghan was immediately informed of these plans, but when Meghan and Harry came to the London screening of "The Lion King" (open in new tab), Meghan commented on her voiceover work. She actually recorded the narration in 2019.

As the Express (opens in new tab) pointed out, this means that Meghan could have been working on non-royal projects as early as 2017, even though the film's release is in 2020 (shortly after Meghan and Harry resigned as senior royals). Of course, Kate Middleton has done voiceover work (opens in new tab) and appeared on TV shows (opens in new tab) to promote "Every Mind Matters" and her "Back to Nature" garden, so this type of work is forbidden It should be pointed out that this type of work is not forbidden.

Nevertheless, I think the point is that Meghan's focus was on whatever charitable work she was interested in, and not necessarily on the "normal" things that senior royals focus their patronage on. Of course, we don't know if the seeds of resignation have been planted all along since that time, but we can appreciate that Harry and Meghan have done a lot of charitable work as senior royals from that time to the present.

From what I have read about Princess Meghan, she has long been dedicated to philanthropy, so I am not surprised or scandalized by the fact that she was thinking broadly all the way back to 2017. Of course, it is interesting in light of Meghan's and Harry's resignations, but it also shows consistency and concern on her part for a cause that she considers particularly important.

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