There were unconfirmed reports that boos erupted in Dodgers Stadium when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were shown on the Jumbotron Tuesday night, sitting in the front row near home plate to watch the Los Angeles Dodgers lose to the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 4 of the World Series.
For their high-profile moment at a national sporting event, the California-based Duke and Duchess of Sussex certainly went out of their way to look the part of avid MLB fans, as they enjoyed prominent seats in front of sports icons Magic Johnson and Sandy Koufax.
Harry and Meghan also donned Dodgers caps to show their support for the home team — a gesture that would seem to make sense, given that Meghan was born and raised in Los Angeles. However, there’s also the fact that the former TV actor also went out of her way to be seen in Blue Jays regalia, “on numerous occasions,” during the seven years she lived in Toronto filming “Suits,” according to Toronto Star reporter Mark Colley.
Even more strange when it comes to loyalty: Harry’s father, Charles III, is the king of the United Kingdom as well as 14 other Commonwealth countries, including Canada. As Colley noted, Harry is technically in line for the throne of Canada, but nonetheless ditched his Commonwealth allegiances for the Dodgers. During the watch party at Toronto’s Rogers Centre, boos definitely erupted among the crowd of 30,000 people when the couple appeared on the Jumbotron, Colley said.
“How dare he cheer for LA. The Blue Jays are part of the commonwealth. What a sellout,” someone said on the MLB’s X post, announcing “royalty in the front row for the World Series.” Someone else sniped: “This is the United States. We don’t have ‘Royals’ here. Wasn’t there just a rally about this? No one cares about these people.”
The Daily Beast’s royal correspondent Tom Sykes reported not hearing any boos in Dodgers Stadium when Harry and Meghan appeared on the big screen. But the reception among this L.A. crowd to the couple’s appearance was “tepid” at best,” he said. “It certainly wasn’t the adoring cheers the royal couple might have expected a few short years ago.” Their prominent placement, in front of legends Johnson and Koufax, also was the source of a grumbling on social media, with critics “already suspicious of their Hollywood VIP status,” Sykes added.
“Meghan and Harry sat in the front row of the crowd, in a highly sought-after seat directly behind the pitch clock while basketball icon and part-owner of the team Magic Johnson was relegated to the second row,” someone also said on X.
Meanwhile, Harry looked pretty “glum” during the entire game, grimacing from the moment they entered the stadium and a fan raised a phone, Sykes said. Since the Sussexes fled the confines of British royal duty for a freer, more entrepreneurial life in the United States in 2020, Harry and people close to him have made it clear that he doesn’t like being in large crowds, with “camera flashes and public scrutiny triggering trauma associated with the worst moments of his life,” Sykes said.
And yet there Harry was in a large crowd with Meghan, who appeared to be happily soaking up all the attention. Sykes said she looked “bright, animated, thrilled to be shown on the Jumbotron. This kind of high-gloss, high-exposure environment is her happy place. The actress in her still loves to perform.”
To Sykes, the contrast between “glum” Harry and his “beaming” wife points to “an uncomfortable tension” the marriage, in which Meghan “wants to be the main character and the big star on the big stage.” Harry, meanwhile, wants less exposure, though he continues to go along with walking red carpets and appearing at major public events. Either Harry is making compromises for his wife or the couple are still trying to find some middle ground, Sykes said.
Whatever is going on, Sykes said Harry and Meghan’s appearance at the World Series “wasn’t the triumphant L.A. moment their team might have hoped for,” if for no other reason than that the Dodgers lost 6-2, and the series is now tied.
