Prince Harry and Meghan Markle love a good Halloween bash just like the rest of us. The first costume party the couple attended was on Oct. 29, 2016, when Harry dressed up as Mad Max and his relationship hadn’t been revealed in the press yet.
They were enjoying a few cocktails at the laidback house party at Soho House in Toronto, according to the Daily Express. Then came a phone call from palace communications secretary Jason Knauf, which Harry described in his memoir Spare as proof the universe had a “wicked sense of humor.” A news outlet had learned of his relationship with Meghan and planned to break the story the next day.
Harry wrote that “everything was rendered moot” after the call. “Well, we said, staring anxiously at our phones, it was going to happen eventually. In fact, we’d had a heads-up that it was likely to happen that day. We’d been tipped, before heading off to the Halloween Apocalypse, that another apocalypse might be coming. More proof that the universe had a wicked sense of humor.”
Their costumes were shown in episode 1 of Netflix’s Harry & Meghan; Harry reportedly borrowed his Mad Max gear from Tom Hardy, but it’s unclear if Markle’s getup was intended to match it.
“The four of us snuck out in Halloween costumes to just have one fun night on the town before it was out in the world that we were a couple,” Markle explained on a Nov. 18, 2021 appearance on The Ellen Degeneres Show.
Nobody knew it was them, because it was a “post-apocalypse theme, so we had all this very bizarre costume on.”Despite the oncoming press, they “were able to just sort of have one final, fun night out.”
Halloweens after the birth of their children, Archie and Lilibet, have been more low-key and kid-centered. In the same Ellen interview, Markle said, “We wanted to do something for the kids, and then the kids were just not into it at all. Archie was a dinosaur for maybe five minutes.” DeGeneres, who was the couple’s neighbor at the time, added ” Lili was a skunk, it was so cute.”
The couple is unlikely to celebrate Halloween publicly in 2024, especially amidst rumors they’re on divergent paths for business and charitable reasons for now. In Fall 2024 they have been leading increasingly separate lives, with Harry appearing solo during his travels and Markle showing up to events by herself. In fact, they haven’t been spotted together in over a month, leading many to speculate how much gas their marriage has left in the tank.
They’ve decreased their public appearances slowly since 2021, perhaps due to the focal point of their relationship being their feud with the Royal Family, which shows no signs of defrosting. Maybe they can get creative with head-to-toe costumes once more though. Hire a babysitter and get back on the town. With two young kids at home, they could probably benefit from a little responsible partying, lest the stress of it all hurt their marriage for good.
Published: Oct 29, 2024 11:06 am