ALISON BOSHOFF on the not-so regal A-list celebrity set who’ll welcome Harry and Meghan

Starting at their wedding in May 2018 – which featured a startling number of celebrity pals of the bride – it was abundantly clear that the Sussexes were forging a starry new social circle, away from stuffier royal circles and Harry’s old school and Army pals.

The friends with whom they will be spending more time and, quite possibly, striking high-profile media deals, are the image of what Harry and Meghan want to become.

They are super-successful career-minded sophisticates, based internationally, who have both giant incomes and impressive portfolios of charity work.

Oprah Winfrey – who it appears had barely met Meghan in 2018 (although she had done yoga on her lawn with Meghan’s mum Doria) – has already snagged Harry to contribute to an Apple TV documentary about mental health.

Maybe she will be a conduit for further lucrative media work for the couple as they strive to gain that ‘financial independence’ of the statement. 

Certainly, she remains the ‘Queen’ in America, where she has a $340million fortune and her own TV network and is generally rated as the most influential woman in media.

Meghan Markle with her close friend and stylist, Jessica Mulroney. She is based in Toronto and it is here that the Royal couple are expected to buy a temporary base

Meghan Markle with her agent Gina Nelthorpe-Cowne. Meghan and Harry have made it their business to befriend only those with impeccable political and social credentials

Meghan Markle with her agent Gina Nelthorpe-Cowne. Meghan and Harry have made it their business to befriend only those with impeccable political and social credentials

Meghan is also very close to Oprah’s best friend and confidante Gayle King, a TV news anchor with CBS. Gayle spent time with the couple at Frogmore as they awaited the birth of Archie. 

She was among the invited few who came to that baby shower in New York – an event which, curiously, Meghan’s mother did not attend. 

She will be well placed to smooth their path into any media outlet you could name and there will be no shortage of others to advise them.

So who are the starry bunch who will be sustaining them on this journey out of the Royal Family and into the sparkling if shallow waters of Hollywood, Toronto and all points West?

Meghan and Harry have made it their business to befriend only those with impeccable political and social credentials. No dodgy oligarchs for them.

Barack and Michelle Obama are friends. The former president and his wife hold them in dear esteem and Michelle met up with Meghan while she was in the UK to promote her autobiography, Becoming, last year.

Mrs Obama was reportedly ‘instrumental’ in the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s romance – although it’s not clear quite what part she played.

The Obamas and the Prince were first brought together by the Invictus Games, created by Harry for injured, sick or disabled military personnel and veterans.

At the second Games in Florida in 2016, Michelle took part in numerous events and said of Harry: ‘He truly is Prince Charming’. In return, the Prince lent support to her ‘Full Effect’ education programme for under-privileged teenagers.

George and Amal Clooney arriving at St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle for Meghan and Harry's wedding

George and Amal Clooney arriving at St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle for Meghan and Harry’s wedding

Serena Williams and her husband Alexis Ohanian arriving for the wedding ceremony of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle In May 2018

Serena Williams and her husband Alexis Ohanian arriving for the wedding ceremony of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle In May 2018

George and Amal Clooney attended the royal wedding in May 2018. It seems that it is barrister Amal, who grew up in Buckinghamshire, who fostered the friendship after being introduced to Meghan by mutual friends at the exclusive London private members club, Soho House. 

She has since opened her contacts book to Meghan, recommending everyone from hair stylists to interior designers and key staff members. 

In August 2018, the pair spent a long weekend with actor George and Amal at the Clooneys holiday home on Lake Como, Italy.

Perhaps more surprising is the inclusion of David and Victoria Beckham, actor, comedian and chat show host James Corden and his wife Julia, and fashion designer Misha Nonoo and her billionaire oil heir husband Mike Hess. 

This new social landscape took shape in 2018 when Prince Harry and Meghan based themselves in a rented house in Oxfordshire.

Meghan’s close friends, the tennis star Serena Williams, and the Indian actress Priyanka Chopra, were entertained at Soho Farmhouse by the couple.

They also saw Jessica Mulroney, Meghan’s best friend for years and sometime stylist. She is based in Toronto and it is here that the Royal couple are expected to buy a temporary base.

Pre-Harry, Meghan spent many weekends in Toronto enjoying family time with her and her husband Ben, a TV anchor, and son of the former Canadian PM. 

Their children John, Brian, and Ivy were among the page boys and flower girls at the Royal wedding and regard Meghan as an honorary aunt.

Meghan Markle with American actress and musician Janina Gavankar in an image posted on Instagram

Meghan Markle with American actress and musician Janina Gavankar in an image posted on Instagram 

Meghan’s best friend, Markus Anderson, who works for the Soho House group, remains a key member of the Duchess’s ‘support team’ and regularly socialises with the Royal couple.

It was Anderson who invited her to join Soho House in Toronto four years ago when she was a little known TV actress based there and he facilitated all of Harry and Meghan’s early dates at Soho Houses in London and in Oxfordshire. 

He also arranged her low-key hen weekend celebrations – at Soho Farmhouse of course –and persuaded the pair to attend the boozy launch of the new Soho House in Amsterdam.

Markus is also very good friends with New York-based fashion designer Misha Nonoo, who is said to have introduced the couple to each other. She and Harry went to Misha’s wedding.

The royal couple are also close to James Corden and his wife Julia. James made a speech at the royal wedding dressed as King Henry VIII, at the reception. 

Julia now has a new job running the interior design company Charles & Co with Vicky Charles, who used to oversee all Soho House interior design. She is said to have lent her touch to the Sussexes’ house at Frogmore.

Advice on bicontinental living and its complexities can be offered by the Beckhams, who spend time in LA where they used to live, and Miami where David has a football team, as well as having a barn conversion just around the corner from Soho Farmhouse.

Meghan Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry during a Creative Industries and Business Reception in Johannesburg, South-Africa last October

Meghan Duchess of Sussex and Prince Harry during a Creative Industries and Business Reception in Johannesburg, South-Africa last October 

Harry is particularly close to the former footballer whom he has known for years through charitable causes, while fashion designer Victoria has become a huge fan of Meghan’s. The entire Beckham clan went to Australia to support Harry at the Invictus Games – for which David is an ambassador – in Sydney.

Other friends include Stella McCartney, another Soho Farmhouse regular, often with her young family in tow.

Meghan has passed through her professional life forging and, if necessary, dropping various friends.

The broadcaster Piers Morgan was once a contact and recipient of her charm when she was a relative nobody on Suits. 

After she met Harry, he was dropped. Socialite Lizzy Cundy was introduced to her at a charity event pre-Harry: Lizzy says that they were friends but that she too was sent into social Siberia once starrier prospects hove into view.

And the story has been repeated. Others who have proved not quite Meghan’s cup of chai soy latte are Harry’s old crowd of drinking buddies like Guy Pelly, Tom and Lara Inskip and Astrid Harbord. 

Friends in this set were grumbling last summer that they ‘never saw Harry any more’. 

He’s even thought to have given up shooting under the influence of Meghan, which put him firmly out of those circles in any case. They will surely see even less of him now. 

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