The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are to feature in a major new documentary on German TV, with the show directed by a royal family expert. A sensational new documentary is set to delve into the lives of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, potentially revealing fresh secrets about them. A high-profile German TV production will put the spotlight back onto the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, it has been revealed.
Directed by Ulrike Grunewald, a journalist with decades of experience covering the Royal Family, the documentary is being produced for Germany’s ZDF network. Grunewald has travelled to California with a five-strong team, including esteemed producer Mo Davies from London, to gather insights in Montecito, where the Royal couple resides among other celebrities just north of Hollywood.
Among those interviewed is Richard Mineards, a former Fleet Street Royal reporter who now contributes to The Montecito Journal. He shared in his latest column: “Los Angeles-based producer, Melanie Hillmann grilled me for two hours on my Riven Rock neighbors, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, under director Ulrike Grunewald. The interview is airing in due course as part of a prime-time documentary on ZDF Royal.”
Grunewald, a prominent figure in German television and a presenter on the news program Heute-Journal (Today-Journal), has been involved with royal reporting since 1987. Her first major assignment was covering the visit of then-Prince Charles and Princess Diana to Germany for ZDF. An expert at uncovering hidden truths and delivering sensational revelations about her subjects, her most recent documentaries include Princess Diana’s Dangerous Legacy and The Queen and the Power of Images; Fergie!, The Duchess and the Secret of the Windsors, and How German is the Queen? the Scottish Daily Express reports.
Earning her doctorate from the University of Mainz in 2012, she pursued academic research into the history of the British Royal Family. Her groundbreaking research gained her access to untapped documents in the royal Archives located within Windsor Castle. A resulting book from her research exposes fresh insights on the controversial speculations regarding the legitimacy of Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the great-great-great-grandfather of King Charles, who served as Queen Victoria’s Consort. Other royal-themed books authored by her include William and Kate: The Unfolding Love Story and The Curse of the House of Windsor.
In 2020, she partnered with Sarah Ferguson to embark on an exploration into the life of Princess Louise of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg, Albert’s mother. She led a notorious life, being estranged from her two young sons, shipped off to a secluded German village and denied them throughout the rest of her life. Intrigued about what could have led to such isolation, Ferguson expressed her desire to unravel what Princess Louise had done that warranted her to be so “terribly wrong” as to be “discarded and written out of history”. Prince Harry has a German streak within him according to the royal expert.
Grunewald caught up with Prince Harry in Dusseldorf at the Invictus Games in September 2023, noting: “Now that Meghan is here, he is over the moon. They have been holding hands, cheering competitors on at various matches and games. They seem intimate and very close. Either that or they are very good actors. From where I’ve been watching, they seem very in love.” She continued: “It felt like the old Harry was back. He talked to all of us. We had some little toys that we gave for Archie and Lilibet. He said he was enjoying Germany and has a lot of German in him, he was obviously referring to his family heritage.”
Speculation is rife that this could hint at the theme of their upcoming documentary given Prince Harry’s German roots, with his family’s original name being Saxe-Coburg-Gotha before it was changed to Windsor during World War I. Meghan’s lineage is also intriguing, with her father Thomas Markle’s ancestors reportedly linked to Germany and Switzerland.
Back in 2017, Bunte magazine unearthed records suggesting a Johann Markel ventured from Offenburg in Baden-Wurttemberg to Pennsylvania in the late 18th century. Yet, there’s a twist in the tale as it’s been proposed that the Markle family might actually originate from Lampertsloch, a quaint commune in France near the German border.
