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howwelldoyouknowyourmoon · 5 years ago

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Nansook Hong’s video gets over one million views

LINK to Nansook Hong video 17 minutes

Her book is called: “In The Shadow Of The Moons: My Life In The Reverend Sun Myung Moon’s Family.” Little, Brown & Co. Boston, New York, Toronto & London, 1998

▲ The marriage of Hyo Jin Moon and the fifteen-year-old Nansook Hong, officiated by Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han on January 7, 1982.

Nansook was married at 15, pregnant at 16, and a mother at 17.

Messiah Sun Myung Moon was guilty of breaking US law on 2 counts: false visa for Nansook to enter the US and enabling underage sex. (The age of consent was 17 in New York state in 1982, and is the same now.)

Nansook Hong fled from her volatile and abusive husband and the Moon ‘East Garden’ compound in August 1995.

Divorce papers were filed in December 1996.

In December 1997, Nansook Hong was granted a divorce from Hyo-jin Moon, and was given custody of their five children. Hyo-jin was granted visiting rights on condition he passed drug tests. He failed the tests.

On September 13, 1998, in a segment on CBS-TV’s “60 Minutes,” Mike Wallace spoke to Nansook Hong about her 14-year marriage to Hyo-jin Moon, the eldest son of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon. One of Moon’s estranged daughters, Un-jin Moon, broke her long public silence about the dysfunctional “True Family.” Un-jin backed up Nansook Hong’s account and called her “very honest.” Donna Orme Collins also contributed.

On September 21, 1998 Sun Myung Moon spoke at East Garden, but many members felt he failed to address their concerns from “60 Minutes.” The issue of another illegitimate son, Sam Park born in 1966, was a major one. Many members left.

In October 1998 Nansook’s book, In The Shadow Of The Moons: My Life In The Reverend Sun Myung Moon’s Family, was published in the U.S. It was also published in French (1998), Japanese (1998) and German (2000 and 2002). Sections of her book have also been published in a 1999 Korean book by Lee Dae-bok, 이대복 (a former member).

Mike Wallace spoke to Nansook Hong on the American CBS ‘60 Minutes’ TV program about her 14 year marriage to Hyo-jin Moon, the eldest son of the Reverend Sun Myung Moon. His daughter, Un-jin Moon, and Donna Collins also contributed.

TRANSCRIPT:

Mike Wallace: If you’re a 15 year-old Korean girl and your spiritual leader, your messiah, selects you to marry his son, that is about as close as you can get to heaven on earth. But sadly Nansook Hong’s marriage into the Reverend Sun Myung Moon’s family turned out to be more like hell on earth. As you will hear from her, and from one of Sun Myung Moon’s daughters, Moon himself and some of his children had not always practiced what Moon preaches. His Unification Church stresses no sex outside marriage, no alcohol, no illegal drugs. But Nansook says that is not what she saw after she married the Reverend’s eldest son, Hyo-jin Moon, the young man they call the prince.

Nansook Hong: He was the prince, the prince. He was very abusive, both physically and emotionally. He is alcoholic. He is addicted to drugs.

[video of Hyo-jin Moon giving a sermon to church members.]

▲ Hyo Jin cursing the church members at Belvedere

Hyo-jin Moon: After all, isn’t it give and take.

Mike Wallace: And, she told us, he was high on cocaine or some other drug when he made this rambling, angry, off-color speech to a church group.

Hyo-jin Moon: I am standing here being judged by you motherf*****s. What the f**k do you judge me by? Huhh.

Mike Wallace: Nansook didn’t even know Hyo-Jin when she was chosen to marry him, and she certainly didn’t expect a drug addict. She had been brought up believing that the Rev Moon’s family was without sin.

Nansook Hong: They had a lot of Moon and his family pictures that as a child, as a teenager, we adored, we admired. We looked at those nice smiles and the happy family and we thought that was ideal family.

MW: The Reverend Moon calls his family, the True Family, the perfect family.

NSH: Moon is a perfect human being, he is the only perfect human being on the earth, and he can choose his wife, and his wife then becomes perfect as well, and so his children become perfect because they are from this perfect man and perfect woman.

▲ Mike Wallace

MW: And so when Moon marries more than a thousand couples at once, as he did in New York last June, he exhorts them to live the high moral life that he, supposedly, exemplifies. The church told us that Moon himself had matched each couple by studying their pictures and brief biographies. And the newly-weds say they want their families to be just as virtuous as his.

Groom: He sets an example as to how to be true parents. The world is in dire need of strong family values. He not only preaches that, but he lives it as well.

Bride: True family, and they bring up children of goodness.

MW: And without sin…

Bride: No sin at all, no sin

MW: Drugs?

Bride: No drugs

MW: Alcohol?

Bride: No alcohol

NSH: Moon’s theology is that he is perfect man who can create perfect family, I think it kind of falls apart if I look at his children.

MW: The Moons gave birth to thirteen children, and various individuals who have been close to them told us, that, in violation of church rules, they have seen some of Moon’s children drink alcohol, smoke, and use illegal drugs. And Nansook soon learned that her husband is the worst of them. She lived with him here at the Moon’s opulent estate north of New York City.

▲ East Garden, Sunnyside Lane, Irvington (18 acres) was bought in 1973 for $566,150

▲ This Conference Center, in the grounds of East Garden, was built by Moon at a cost of $24million.

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MW: Nansook says the Moons knew all about her husband’s drug problem but still they spoiled him; kept showering him with cash.

NSH: When he needed cash he went to his mum and his mum would give him from $1,000 up to $50,000 and some more.

MW: From a $1,000 to $50,000?

NSH: Yes, depends. Depends what he asked and what kind of mood the parents are in.

MW: Where did all this cash come from?

NSH: I believe it is mainly coming from Japan. When Japanese leaders come in, they bring cash in, and basically they give to Reverend and Mrs Moon.

MW: And how would his son use those church donations?

NSH: He basically used for his cocaine, his parties, his hostess, bar hopping, all the fun things that a person can do.

MW: Those fun things apparently included mistresses. Hyo-jin told her he was entitled to have affairs because his father had had them. And she says that Reverend Moon himself confirmed, to her, that he had had affairs and the Reverend told her that God wanted him to.

NSH: He told me, in person, that he… he called it providential affairs.

MW: Providential affairs?

NSH: Providential affairs

MW: What does that…?

NSH: It’s providential means that it is God’s mission. So he had to have these affairs, extra-marital affairs, because it was providential, it was God’s mission that he had to fulfill.

MW: Of course Reverend Moon does not tell his followers about that part of God’s mission. Instead he preaches that adultery is a major sin.

NSH: That is the worst sin that Unification Church members could commit, to commit adultery, then you will basically burn in hell forever. That is the one single most worse thing that you can do. But Hyo-jin did it many times and his parents know. But there is nothing they do.

▲ Hyo-jin Moon with two guns and a knife. His father is also holding one of the guns. Nansook said that Hyo-jin had a collection of about 60 guns, some of which he kept in their bedroom. She was fearful of them. Hyo-jin used money that Mrs Moon had given him, “earmarked for our children’s future, to buy a thirty-thousand-dollar gold-plated gun for his father and motorcycles for himself and his brothers.” … “He would open the gun case he kept in our bedroom and stroke one of his high-powered rifles. ‘Do you know what I could do to you with this?’ he would ask. He kept a machine gun, a gift from True Parents, under our bed.” ( ‘In the Shadow of the Moons’ pages 166 and 182)

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MW: But worse than the affairs, she says, the Reverend’s eldest son would beat her. One awful night, she told us, he pummeled her while she was pregnant with her fifth child.

NSH: He was doing his cocaine ritual, and against my better judgement, I went and said I will have to talk to you. I said, I just cannot live like this. And I took his cocaine, and I tried to flush it down the toilet and that is when he started to punch me and I did get black eyes and I got bloody nose. And umm, he… But the big fear was that he was gonna kill the baby I was…

MW: You were carrying…

NSH: I was seven months pregnant and I was pretty big. And he kept saying, “I am gonna kill the baby, I’m gonna kill the baby.” That was the worst fear that I had, that he might punch and then something would happen.

MW: Whenever she told Reverend and Mrs Moon about the beatings, Nansook says, they blamed her.

NSH: I was not ideal wife for Hyo-jin that is why he would behave in a certain way towards me, and I was not a good member of their family – so also it was my fate…

MW: Who told you that? Mrs Moon or …

NSH: Both, both of them, yes. And it was my fate that I have to endure these things.

20:50

Un-jin Moon: Sounds familiar

MW: Nansook is getting support from a surprising source, one of Reverend Moon’s daughters, Un-jin Moon. She told us her parents blamed her too, when she was abused by her husband. Did he beat you?

▲ Un-jin Moon

UJM: Yes

MW: And you would tell your folks

UJM: Yes

MW: And they would say…

UJM: I deserved it.

MW: Un-jin Moon is estranged from her parents, but she has never criticized them in public before. She and a close friend, Jeannie Honnerd (spelling?), said that by coming forward they hoped to dissuade people from joining cults. Off camera Un-jin told us that she does not believe that her father is the messiah. On camera she put it this way:

UJM: He is just my father. I think that in itself should say a whole lot.

MW: Un-jin is a Moon, but not a Moonie, not a believer in her father’s church.

UJM: I believe in a God, but I don’t think that I want to belong to one particular denomination now.

MW: What do you think of Nansook? Honest?

UJM: I think she is very honest.

MW: Do you admire her, do you respect her, do you believe her?

UJM: Yes I do. I respect and admire her very much.

MW: Nansook got a degree in art history from Barnard College. Though she realized the perfect family was far from perfect, she tried to be philosophical about it. So what you are saying is that they are like…

NSH: … everybody else, like all of us who are dysfunctional. Every family has problems, so they are like everybody else. But I think a little more dysfunctional than an ordinary middle class family.

MW: Well they have more money to help them to be dysfunctional.

NSH: Yes

MW: The church won’t say how much money Moon has, or how many businesses he owns, but over the years he is reported to have amassed hundreds of million of dollars. Former Moon insider Donna Orme Collins was the first western child in Moon’s church. She was born into it because her parents set up the church in England.

▲ Donna Orme Collins

Donna Orme Collins: I grew up believing he was the messiah, but I can’t imagine it now.

MW: Moon took a personal interest in Donna, and as a favorite child from the West, she saw a lot of Moon’s family.

DC: I had more contact with his family that the average member which is probably what led me to leave because I saw a lot of the discrepancies between the teachings and his behavior in his family life.

MW: The final straw came for Donna and her family, she says, when they discovered another Moon family secret, that the Reverend has at least one illegitimate son. Moon’s daughter confirmed that:

Un-jin Moon: That I know, yes.

MW: You know the child?

UJM: Yes, his name is Sammy.

▲ Sammy Park with his mother, Soon-wha Choi, known as ‘Annie Choi’ in the US. There is a photograph of Sammy’s father on the wall behind them. It was at around this age that Sammy discovered the friendly auntie who came to visit was actually his mother.

___________________________________

MW: And Un-jin told us that the warm family pictures in the church magazine give a false impression; that the truth is that Moon spends very little time with his children; and that he and his children had never been close. Nansook says that there is even a language barrier between Moon and his five youngest children. Don’t his young children speak Korean?

NSH: Not really

MW: And the father does not speak much English.

NSH: The father doesn’t, no.

MW: So what you are saying is that the younger ones can’t talk to their dad.

NSH: They can’t really communicate.

Donna Collins: Actually that is what his daughter told me as well. But then I would say the communication he had, even with his older children, was not particularly intimate.

Do you worry at all that there might be some kind of revenge exacted upon you for your speaking out?

DC: Yes I was extremely frightened for a long time. I couldn’t speak out. But I think there is some safety in going public, and I certainly wanted to support Nansook, because I think it is wonderful that the truth comes out about him and his family.

MW: Over the years Nansook says that her husband became increasingly violent and she feared that he might hurt the children. So one night, three years ago, while, she says, her husband was locked in their bedroom after hours of cocaine, she hustled her five children into a minivan, hid them under blankets, and drove them out of the Moon’s luxurious estate, never to return.

▲ The entrance to the East Garden Estate showing the guardhouse.

MW: Now you live in a modest house in Lexington, Massachusetts, no swimming pools, no bowling alleys, no…

NSH: … no baby-sitters, no drivers, no cook.

MW: no cook

NSH: I am the cook. I had to learn.

MW: How have the children adjusted to this new lifestyle?

NSH: Oh, wonderfully. I am proud of them. We all had to learn a new way of life.

MW: A life that also contains fear of retaliation from the Moons.

NSH: They are not going to control my life. I basically have to live with the fear that I have that somebody might do something to me, but that is life.

▲ In the divorce court, Hyo-jin Moon looks at Nansook Hong.

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MW: After telling the divorce court what she has told us about her husband, Nansook got her divorce plus $600,000 in cash and $9,000 a month for child support. Now 32 years old she works at a center helping battered women. And she has just completed a book called “In the Shadow of the Moons.” Why are you telling this story?

NSH: Because I feel that I was duped.

MW: Duped?

NSH: Duped. I feel I was conned. I had a certain naive idealism that I wanted to work for God. I do think a lot of people have that. And a lot of organizations like Moon do take full advantage of those people, and I was one of them.

MW: Nansook still believes in God, but she has a new way of looking at Reverend Moon.

NSH: I did come to the conclusion that Reverend Moon just cannot be the messiah.

MW: What you are saying is that he is a phony.

NSH: A con man.

MW: The Reverend Sun Myung Moon is a con man.

NSH: That is the conclusion I came with, [after] living with the family for 15 years.

MW: The Reverend and Mrs Moon declined to talk to us, but they did send us a brief statement. They wrote, in part, “We commiserate with Nansook over the suffering arising from the tragic personal problems our son has faced. We as parents feel a deep sense of responsibility.”

END

___________________________________

Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han refused to help Hyo Jin pay court ordered money to Nansook and their grandchildren. Hyo Jin was jailed.

The Moon family tactic was to grind Nansook down financially so she would be forced return to her husband who had threatened to kill her. The “True Parents” failed because the judge understood their game. The “True Parents” had also failed to raise or guide their son to treat others with decency. The “True Parents” consistently blamed Nansook, whom they had married to Hyo Jin at age fifteen, for their own son’s failures and criminality.

Judge Edward Ginsberg didn’t buy Hyo Jin’s claim of poverty. He said he believes the Moon family is trying to squeeze Nansook Moon and her five young children. Judge Ginsberg agreed she must have money to pay her legal defense, and ordered Hyo Jin back to jail for another sixty days.

Nansook’s attorney, Weld Henshaw: “The church is, and the [Moon] family is going to devote all their energies, not to try to resolve the situation but to winning and grinding [Nansook and] their own grandchildren down. It is a pathetic, terrible situation.”

Suzanne Bates for WBZ News 4 in Boston: “Whether or not Hyo Jin can afford to pay, it is certain the Moon family could. Reverend Sun Myung Moon, who claims to be the messiah and the champion of family values, has millions of dollars in Trust Funds which have always supported his family, but he is not writing any checks to get his first son [Hyo Jin] out of jail.”

Full transcript of the WBZ-TV News reports

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Japanese language 洪蘭淑 video transcript

Korean language 홍난숙 video transcript

Spanish – Nansook Hong entrevistada

Polish – Wideo: Nansook Hong w rozmowie z Mike'em Wallace'em.

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A review of Nansook Hong’s revealing book

Nansook Hong interviewed by Rachael Kohn

Nansook Hong – [C-Span] Book Discussion – ‘In The Shadow of the Moons’ with FULL TRANSCRIPT

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Book in English:

Nansook Hong – In The Shadow Of The Moons

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Book in French:

« L’ombre de Moon » par Nansook Hong

J’ai arraché mes enfants à Moon – Nansook Hong

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Book in Spanish:

‘A la Sombra de los Moon’ por Nansook Hong

Nansook Hong entrevistada

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Nansook Hong book in German:

Nansook Hong – Ich schaue nicht zurück

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Nansook Hong book in Japanese:

わが父文鮮明の正体 – 洪蘭淑

文鮮明「聖家族」の仮面を剥ぐ – 洪蘭淑

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Polish:

Nansook Hong book Prologue

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Three other significant videos about Sun Myung Moon’s activities:

VIDEO: The authors of The Tragedy of the Six Marys interviewed

English: Tragedy of the Six Marys video transcript with additional photos

Demands on the Japanese members of Mr. Moon’s church

Sam Park ‘Hidden History’ VIDEO – recorded at ICSA in 2014

Sam Park ‘Moon’s hidden history’ 2014 Video TRANSCRIPT

#Nansook Hong #Hyo Jin Moon #violence in the FFWPU #Sun Myung Moon #Hak Ja Han #FFWPU

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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AFI Fest 2020 Features Some of the Year’s Best Films

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This year, like just about every other film festival that managed to put on some kind of show in 2020, the 34th annual AFI Fest went nearly all-virtual. The yearly American Film Institute event, which usually combines major studio and independent releases, bypassed its usual eight-day blitz at the famous TCL Chinese Theatre complex in Hollywood for an online simulacrum that did not perhaps offer up the same glittering premieres and major studio contenders as in past years, but still managed to offer up a number of superb offerings.

“Attending” a film festival from one’s desk or couch can be a tricky proposition, so it remains to be seen how successful AFI Fest was overall with paying audiences (screenings were ticketed for the public). But as with other such events we’ve experienced this year, like Fantasia, the technical aspects were flawless and the ease of use and screening windows made the event largely stress-free. And we saw some truly extraordinary films, some premiering for the first time, and others coming from other festivals we missed. Check them all out below.

Anthony Hopkins and Riz Ahmed Lead Parade of Talent at AFI Fest

The Father

The best film we saw at AFI Fest was The Father, director and screenwriter Florian Zeller’s adaptation of his own stage play. Anthony Hopkins stars as Anthony, an elderly English man who is suffering from the onset of dementia. Olivia Colman is his daughter Anne, who is planning a move to Paris to live with her partner and is desperately trying to find a new caregiver for her father after he scared off the last one.

But as the film goes on, the viewer begins to wonder what is actually happening? People drift in and out of the narrative under different names, Anthony’s spacious apartment seems to change around him, and time itself seems to bend. Then we realize: we are seeing almost all the events from his point-of-view, which means that none of what we see can truly be trusted–making what could have been a conventional drama about illness and memory into something brilliant.

That realization, coupled with absolutely heartbreaking work from Hopkins and Colman, makes The Father a devastating look at a slow-motion nightmare from which there is no escape. Anthony (the character) is at once recognizable as a certain kind of man (and as such is both charming and mean-spirited), and the legendary actor (we swear we saw a flash of Hannibal Lecter in there at one point), makes his long, slow descent into an unmoored new reality even more profound. A nearly perfect film. (5 Stars)

Sound of Metal

Just as The Father brings us inside the world of someone in the grip of dementia, Sound of Metal gives us an up close look at what it feels like to suddenly go deaf. Riz Ahmed is excellent as Ruben, a recovering drug addict who drums in a heavy metal duo alongside his girlfriend, singer/guitarist Lou (Olivia Cooke). The two tour the indie rock circuit in a beat-up but cozy RV that also serves as their home. However, their gypsy lifestyle is upended when Ruben abruptly loses his hearing.

Director Darius Marder (who co-wrote the script with Abraham Marder) does not give into sentimentality, even as Ruben moves through grief, loss, denial, anger and self-pity, all the while clinging to the possibility that he may find a surgical way to restore his hearing. His journey also takes him to a home for deaf people in recovery (headed up by the marvelous Paul Raci, whose own life story involving deafness is remarkable), and eventually opens his heart and mind–at least a little–to the understanding that he can still live a fulfilling life. The excellent sound design is the final touch on a captivating and highly original story. (4 Stars)

Nine Days

Winston Duke (Black Panther), Zazie Beetz (Deadpool 2), and Benedict Wong (Doctor Strange) star in this striking directorial debut from Edson Oda, who also wrote the script. Duke, one of our favorite up-and-coming actors, plays Will, an enigmatic being who once lived on Earth as a human and now decides which souls get their chance to proceed to do the same. When a slot becomes available due to an unexpected death, Will and his colleague Kyo (Wong) welcome five new applicants to their way station, one of whom (Beetz) challenges Will’s method of selecting a new soul.

Based on the concept alone, Nine Days would make an interesting double feature with Pixar’s upcoming Soul. The film touches on a number of sophisticated ideas about what defines humanity and what it means to live, doing so in a compelling and deeply moving way. Duke, Wong and Beetz are all excellent, as are Tony Hale (Veep), Bill Skarsgard (It), and Erika Vasquez as fellow applicants. This is a surreal fantasy that strikes at some truths about how we live. (4 Stars)

New Order (Nuevo Orden)

The sixth film from Mexican writer-director Michel Franco is less than 90 minutes long but will leave you battered and devastated. As a wealthy “white” family celebrates the marriage of their daughter with other upper class guests at their posh estate, trouble is brewing in the streets of Mexico City. The “brown” workers, including people toiling away at the wedding itself, erupt into a furious revolution in which almost no one is spared. But the forces behind the seemingly spontaneous uprising may not be what they seem.

Franco spares no one in this harrowing and absolutely relevant descent into societal breakdown, as the screen fills with the screams of the tortured, the murder of women and children, and the flames of burning bodies. He may cut away at the last minute in key instances, but you are fully aware of what’s happening nonetheless. The film’s hard-nosed approach extends to the motivations behind the chaos, which are more opaque and not as straightforward as one might expect. New Order will leave you shaken and disturbed–as it should. This may not be science fiction. (4 Stars)

Belushi

The first major documentary on the life and career of late comedian and Saturday Night Live alumnus John Belushi touches as expected on all the personal history, creative development, and psychological complexity of a man who many consider one of the great comic geniuses of his time. With many of the interviews with key people done as audio only (for an oral history project), director R.J. Cutler fills in the visual blanks with animation, excerpts from private letters, and various film and video clips, creating a shaggy, kaleidoscopic vision of a too-brief and just as frenetic life.

Since Belushi’s career is well-documented (although it’s weird to realize he only starred in seven films), and the circumstances of his death sadly all too predictable, what stands out most about the film is the central relationship with his wife Judy, who provided an anchor even when Belushi self-destructively pushed her away. Belushi the movie doesn’t offer many surprises beyond that, but does make us wonder what he might have done had he stuck around. (3.5 Stars)

I’m Your Woman

Rachel Brosnahan (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel) stars in this new melodrama from Fast Color helmer Julia Hart, who weaves themes of motherhood, loyalty, love, and family into a 1970s crime thriller with a decidedly feminist bent. Brosnahan plays Jean, whose sheltered life as the wife of professional thief Eddie (Bill Heck) is upended by his gifting her with a baby (not hers) and then disappearing shortly thereafter. Jean learns that Eddie has betrayed his boss and that she and the baby must go on the run, with help coming from a surprising source.

I’m Your Woman kicks off in bracing fashion, laying out the contours of Jean’s dreamlike, aimless life, then ripping it all out from under her in a gritty, fast-paced first half. But the movie nearly grinds to a halt in its second hour, with a lot of exposition and some confusing narrative strands slowly letting the air out of the proceedings. Brosnahan is great in as a woman who must finally fill in the blanks of her own life, with excellent work as well from Marsha Stephanie Blake and Arinzè Kene as unexpected allies, but the movie doesn’t achieve the triumphant moment it’s striving for. (3 Stars)

Apples

This Greek dystopian fable could serve in some ways as a more metaphorical companion piece to The Father. A product of Greece’s recent wave of “weird” filmmaking (led by Yorgos Lanthimos of Dogtooth and The Favourite fame), this debut from director and co-writer Christos Nikou is set in an Athens where a strange virus is causing people to experience abrupt and almost total memory loss. There’s no cure and no one recovers, and while some amnesiacs are claimed by their families, others become part of a program to give the afflicted a chance at starting a new life.

Movies

Toronto International Film Festival 2020 Movie Round-Up

By David Crow

Movies

New Horror and Sci-Fi Movies Break Out at Fantasia Fest

By Don Kaye

Two of those in the latter category are Aris (Aris Servetalis) and Anna (Sofia Georgovassili), who try to recall the past while attempting to build a new future. He’s as melancholy as she is cheerful, and their different approaches are indicative of the ways all of us might face having our entire existence rebooted. Apples takes turns being absurd, sweet, and poignant, and while it’s a bit too self-consciously strange, it’s a touching twist on classics like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. (3.5 Stars)

Uncle Frank

Six Feet Under and True Blood creator Alan Ball has written and directed this intimate look at a New York University professor (Paul Bettany of WandaVision) who finally comes out to his semi-estranged South Carolina family when he returns home for the funeral of his father. Frank is aided in his efforts by his niece Beth (Sophia Lillis of It), who has always admired her worldly uncle, but didn’t even know his secret herself until attending NYU as well.

Bettany is fantastic, and supported by strong work from Lillis and Peter Macdissi as his longtime partner Walid. But there’s something that feels pre-programmed about the way the plot proceeds, and the film’s last half-hour goes off the rails in overwrought fashion. The engaging cast, led by Bettany’s dignity and humanity, steer it back however. (3.5 Stars)

One Night in Miami…

You can read a much more comprehensive review of Watchmen star Regina King’s directorial debut here, where movies section editor David Crow liked the movie a bit more than us. But after a slow start, there’s no denying that One Night in Miami… (adapted by Soul co-writer Kemp Powers from his play) builds to a powerful and inspiring finish.

Powers’ scenario envisions what happened on the night that Cassius Clay (El Goree), Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.), and football star Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge) all assembled in a motel room after Clay defeated Sonny Liston for the heavyweight championship. King can’t quite escape the movie’s origins as a play, but she projects confidence behind the camera and gets distinctive performances out of her four stars. Goree and Hodge are the strongest, but Ben-Adir’s doomed civil rights leader and Odom Jr.’s introverted singer are the heart of this timely story. (3.5 Stars)

The Intruder

A voiceover actress named Ines (Erica Rivas) has her vacation cut short by a tragic occurrence and comes home to find that the incident may have lasting supernatural repercussions in this low-energy chiller from Argentinian director Natalia Meta. The brooding atmosphere and sound studio setting seem almost like a deliberate nod to Peter Strickland’s eerie Berberian Sound Studio (2012), but Meta’s script can’t navigate the blurring lines between fantasy and reality as successfully.

The result is a movie that badly wants to be socially relevant enhanced horror but ends up being a sleepy letdown. Meta and the great Cecilia Roth as her mother both do their best, but there’s not enough substance to the story or Meta’s premise, and the scare tactics are predictable. (2 Stars)

Wander Darkly

We are mystified at the praise that this film has received since premiering at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, as we found it to be a confusing, pretentious mess. Sienna Miller and Diego Luna star as a young couple, with a house, a baby, not a lot of money, a growing distrust of each other, and all the pressure that brings to bear. Then their lives are changed in a horrific car accident from which Miller wakes up and begins a surreal journey through the couple’s past, with Luna as her guide.

Is Miller dead? Is she dreaming? The movie keeps the truth hidden but director/writer Tara Miele’s experimental non-linear narrative doesn’t pay off. The hopping through time and space is incoherent, even within its own rules (which are not clear either), and as a result the movie doesn’t build to anything emotionally true. The horror movie subplot and big “twist” at the end are also weak. Miller and Luna are both spellbinding, and have real chemistry, but they can’t save the film. (2 Stars)

The Boy Behind the Door

Two 12-year-old boys (Lonnie Chavis and Ezra Dewey) are kidnapped by a pair of what appear to be human sex traffickers in the tense opening moments of first-time directors David Charbonier and Justin Powell’s dark, dark thriller. Kevin (Dewey) is chained up inside the pair’s sinister house, which sits adjacent to an oil field; Bobby (Chavis) manages to escape from the trunk of their car, but valiantly enters the house to save his friend, knowing that at least one of their kidnappers is still inside.

After that gripping start, The Boy Behind the Door plunges further into inanity. The two boys are marvelous, but their characters are barely developed and the villains even less so. Stupid actions and implausible plot developments drain any believability out of what could have been a riveting tale, turning it into a subpar slasher movie that doesn’t even seem to know when it’s set: the boys don’t have mobile devices, yet Bobby treats an old rotary phone that he discovers like a find from an archaeological dig. Good cinematography and atmosphere can’t save this one from slamming shut on itself. (2 Stars)

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justanoutlawfic · 7 years ago

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Scrabble: Chapt. 2

Summary: Mary Margaret and David are two best friends who desperately want a baby. One night, over a game of Scrabble, she suggests they have one together.

Chapter Summary: David reflects on his childhood and failed marriage as he also thinks about Mary Margaret’s question. He ends up turning to Gold for some advice.

Also on AO3/FF

David blinked a few times, staring at Mary Margaret. For some reason, he was brought back to the first day that they met.

It had been his second day at the new school and he was at his locker, trying to figure out how to open it. When he was just about to give up, he turned and suddenly his face collided with an elbow. His nose bled as a result and it was throbbing. Mary Margaret’s eyes were wide with worry and she led him to the nurse’s office, though he didn’t even know her name yet. She stayed with him as the nurse cleaned it up and gave him an ice pack. She kept apologizing profusely, saying it was an accident. He couldn’t help but laugh and assured her he wasn’t upset. She kept asking what she could do to make up for it and finally he relented, saying they could go get some ice cream. They were best friends ever since.

There was no doubting that Mary Margaret was beautiful. In high school, she had long, thick dark curls but after college she cut her hair down to a cute pixie cut. Her makeup was always subtle, accenting her best features. She didn’t really have a set style. He had seen her in it all, from sweats to a prom dress. She was intelligent, funny. Any child that she had would be unstoppable.

But why did she want one with him?

“A baby,” he repeated. “You want to have a baby with me?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Why?”

Mary Margaret frowned. “Why?”

“I mean, come on, it’s not like we’re…together.”

She sighed, pushing the game away from them. “I went to look into adoption recently. It’s going to be hard as a single parent and I realized, I don’t want to have a child as a single parent. I know Regina has done it, but I just…I don’t want to do that. And I don’t want to wait.”

“But why me?”

Mary Margaret smiled a bit at him. “You’re the one person I know who wants a baby as much as I do. I see the way you are with children, you listen to them, you’re kind. You’re smart, healthy, not to mention good looking. We agree about a lot of things…”

“We’re not in love.”

David wasn’t trying to be a jerk, he really wasn’t. The truth was, he wanted to say yes to Mary Margaret. He wanted a baby and he could see himself having one with her. He knew she’d make a fabulous co-parent and he did love her. Like he said, they just weren’t in love. To his surprise though, she didn’t falter.

“I know, but look at it this way. So many people have kids together, that shouldn’t. They hate each other, even if they’re married.” A small smile went across her face. “Even though we’re not in love, we love each other. We’re best friends. I’d say we have a lot going for us more than a lot of people having children.”

He didn’t know what to say to that. In a way, he knew she was right. Adjusting himself in his seat, he chewed on his lip. Having a baby with Mary Margaret, finally getting to be a dad…could he do it?

“Look, I know this is a big thing to spring on you,” she continued. “You don’t need to say yes or no right now. And we could do this in any way that you want. We could try adopting together or using IVF. I’m up for suggestions. I want to be a mom and I know you want to be a dad. I think we could make it work. Just…just promise me you’ll think about it?”

David nodded and slowly smiled. “Yeah, I’ll think about it.”

He was true to his word and he did think about it. It was all he possibly could think about. He thought about it the whole way back to his apartment, as he threw his keys up on the hook and threw himself down onto his bed.

David had moved into the apartment two days after he walked in on Kathryn and Jim. She had told him not to go, said that he could stay in the guest bedroom or that he could even have the house. He didn’t want to, though. They had bought the house together. It was the first thing he owned all on his own and it felt damn good. Even his truck had been a gift from George and he would’ve trashed it, except for the fact that he needed it.

He had a good childhood, that much was sure. Ruth and Robert Nolan weren’t the richest, in fact, they owned a farm. Even so, they cherished their twin boys and taught them valuable lessons. David and James were very close, got into mischief together and overall had lots of fun. Even if they didn’t have the latest gizmo or gadget, they were still happy.

Then their father was murdered when they were 5-years-old. He had been heading back after selling some of their wares and had pulled over when he saw a seemingly homeless man struggling for help on the side of the road. It was all an act, however, and the man killed his father, stealing the money he had gotten from the sale. Ruth was devastated and the boys didn’t understand how she continued to get out of bed every morning.

A couple of years later is when she met George. From the start, David didn’t like him. There was just something…off. Yet, he was a widower, one who couldn’t have children of his own, so Ruth’s heart went out to him. They had a “whirlwind romance” and soon he was helping expand the farm, turning it into something big and grand. He made renovations to the old little house, impressing James and Ruth, not so much David. He didn’t understand how they were moving on.

Even so, he supported his mother. He wanted her to be happy. So when he was 8-years-old, he served as a ring bearer in the wedding. Shortly after George moved in, though, it was clear that things were different. He was strict and had high expectations for the boys. Even James, who had once adored George, now hated him. Ruth was trapped in an abusive marriage to a man she didn’t love, but George manipulated her into letting him adopt the boys. The one condition was that they got to keep their father’s name. Ruth was their one savior in all of it, she protected the boys and didn’t want them to feel the pain she did.

However, when they were 10, she died of a heart attack. George was technically their legal guardian and ruled the farm with an iron fist. James began to rebel and David kept to himself. It started the beginning of a big strain in their relationship. Without Ruth to play peacekeeper between the two, their fighting was getting worse and worse.

When they were 16, George’s company decided to move him to Maine. So, they packed and moved up North. David adjusted quite well to the new town, while James struggled. His new crowd of friends wasn’t the best, neither was his girlfriend, Jack. Upon graduation, David made a choice, he wanted nothing to do with George anymore. James, though hating their step-father, was attracted to the fancy things he offered and stayed under his clutches. The two boys went to separate colleges and barely spoke after that. It was one of David’s biggest regrets, especially when he got the call that his brother had died in a gang fight alongside Jack.

Mary Margaret had been the one to comfort him through it. He was engaged to Kathryn at the time, but she didn’t know quite what to say. She just kept bringing up that they were estranged. Mary Margaret understood though, she had known how complicated the relationship between the brothers were. She held David’s hand through the funeral, helped him ignore George. Kathryn didn’t even come to the wake and was late to the funeral. She had excuses and in the end, he married her anyway. Looking back, he knew he should’ve called off the engagement. They weren’t in love.

Yet, at the time he had just lost one of the last people that meant a thing to him. He couldn’t lose Kathryn. He latched onto her and placed every dream, every hope.

That was what had hurt the most when the affair was uncovered. Not the fact that he was losing Kathryn, but the fact that he was losing his dreams. He always imagined they’d start a family some day, that he could be a father. All of that went up in smoke when he walked into the master bedroom and found Jim’s naked butt staring back at him.

Mary Margaret was giving him a second chance, one to be a father. He knew that if he and Kathryn had children together, their co-parenting situation would be a mess. They could barely do anything but glare at each other when they passed each other on the streets or at similar functions. It wouldn’t be the same with her.

But could he really have a child with someone that he wasn’t with?

Letting out a deep breath, David shut his eyes. It had been a long day and he had a lot to do in the morning. Thoughts of his past and family would have to wait for the sunrise.

“So, I’m thinking two officers will cover it,” Kenneth Gold explained to his friend over coffee the following morning. “I hate doing these events as is, but Belle is instant that art nights are profitable, so oh well.” He noticed that David was staring off into space. “Are you listening to me?”

David snapped out of it and looked over at Gold. “Um, you were saying something about art?”

Gold let out an irritated sigh. “The art exhibit I’m holding, for the collection of old paintings that were submitted, you offered to have some of your officers act as security.”

“Right, right.” He rubbed his temples. “Sorry, I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“Game night overstimulate you?” Gold asked with a smirk. “I know you’re a farmer’s son, but you have to be sharp to keep up with Mary Margaret.”

David couldn’t help but laugh. His friendship with Gold, was quite the unlikely one. He had never really known the pawn shop owner/landlord when he first moved to town. As he was also an attorney, there were times that we would swing by George’s to go over some contracts, but David tried not to be home at all, much less during one of George’s business deals. However, he had developed a good friendship with Belle during high school. When she began dating Gold a few years after graduating college, many were skeptical, David included. The man was 15 years older than her, with a son of his own, surely he had to be sketchy. It didn’t help that he had a reputation as a harsh landlord.

Then one day, before he became sheriff, David got a call at the station regarding a custodial kidnapping. It seemed that Gold’s ex-wife, Milah, didn’t have custody of their son and had picked him up from pre-school. David was able to track her down and reunite father and son. The look in Gold’s eyes, was one he hadn’t seen in years, not since his own mother’s passing. It was one of pure love and devotion of a child. He could not stop thanking David for finding his boy.

In the end, the two met up for drinks and realized they had a lot in common. Both had been raised on farms, like George, Gold’s father had been abusive. Yet, both had been able to make something of themselves. David was able to show his friends that he was worthy of Belle and even served as best man in their wedding, being godfather to little Gideon.

“Well you would know a lot about that, after all, can’t you only read picture books?” David fired back. “How does that go over with your librarian wife.”

“Glad to see even when distracted you have your wits about you.” Gold sipped his coffee. “What’s going on?”

He sighed. “Can you keep a secret?”

“I’m hardly the town gossip.”

“Right. It’s just…Mary Margaret asked me if I would have a baby with her.”

Gold raised an eyebrow. “You mean…she propositioned you?”

“Not like that.” David rolled his eyes. “She doesn’t care how we do it, adoption, IVF. She just wants to have a child…with me.”

“With you?”

“That’s what she said.”

“And what did you say?”

“That I had to think about it. I mean…I love Mary Margaret. She’s my best friend. I know how badly she wants to be a mother, I want to be a father just as badly….”

“Then what’s the issue?”

David gave him a look. “Seriously? You’re asking what the issue about me having a baby with someone I’m not even involved with is?”

Gold shrugged. “At least you two love each other on some level, that’s more than most co-parents have going for them.”

David frowned. He knew Gold’s co-parenting situation with Milah was messy. She hadn’t seen Baelfire since the kidnapping. The courts hadn’t given her any jail time, but she seemingly gave up on having a relationship with her son. He had Belle, which was good, but it was still a touchy subject.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “Maybe this isn’t the best conversation for us to have.”

“Oh please, I am not that sensitive on the subject, I was being serious. Look, Milah was a terrible person. She wasn’t a good mother or much of a wife, but look at Mary Margaret. She loves children, she’s annoyingly kind,” Gold rolled his eyes at that. “She’d be a good mother. I don’t think it’d be all that ridiculous for you two to have a child together.”

“But what if…what if something goes wrong?” David asked, thinking of the worst. “We’ve been best friends for 12 years, there’s no doubting that. But, what if we get into an argument? What if we start hating each other or something? Then we’ve dragged a child into this horrible situation.”

“Or, what if you two are extremely happy and the child is lucky to have two parents that love them,” Gold pointed out. “What if this is even the best for the two of you, you could even fall in love.”

“That definitely won’t happen.”

“Right.” He rolled his eyes once more. “I’m just saying…don’t rule it out. If I’m being honest, I never saw you and Kathryn having kids. However, you and Mary Margaret…I can see it.” He shuffled some papers and cleared his throat, a sign he was ready to move on with the conversation. “Now, about the security guards…”

Mary Margaret pulled up in front of her childhood home, taking it all in. There were times it still seemed strange that she grew up there. It hadn’t really felt like a home after her mother died. Her father had the place redecorated not long after, changing the bright, colorful furniture, to darker and colder touches. He claimed people were meant to renovate every so often and that it would’ve happened anyway. She wasn’t so sure about that.

Leopold had tried as a single father, no one could argue that. He allowed Mary Margaret to mourn as much as she needed to after her mother’s passing. He respected her wishes about not celebrating her birthday anymore, as Eva had died on that day. He bought her presents and made sure she never went without.

But he wasn’t there, not really.

He had to travel often for work, but even when he was home, there was a wall between them. Mary Margaret tried desperately to break it down, but it was no use. They were more like roommates at times, rather than father and daughter. He didn’t understand that she needed more love and warmth.

Leopold didn’t quite understand why she chose to move out of the mansion and into her tiny loft after college. He didn’t understand that as small as it was, she could decorate it how she wished. It was bright, warm and inviting. She even had some pieces that her mother had selected all those years ago, that had been tucked into storage after her passing. It felt more like home than the mansion did after she was 7-years-old.

Despite the distance, Mary Margaret did still speak with her father. They had a short phone call every other Sunday and occasionally he’d invite her over for dinner. This visit wasn’t planned, however. She knew her father wouldn’t be home, during their last chat that very week he had told her he’d be in Spain. Even so, she wanted to walk through the mansion.

Using her key to go inside, Mary Margaret saw the one thing that made the mansion feel like a sliver of what it once was. The only picture of Eva that Leopold allowed to be left out after her passing. It was one of her holding Mary Margaret when she was a baby, smiling down at her with all the love in the world, as if she were the only person in the room. Mary Margaret hadn’t felt loved like that in a long time, she missed it. She craved it.

She wanted to give that love to a child.

Heading on up to her childhood bedroom, she found the one place of light that seemed to come from the entire place. Leopold didn’t step foot in it after Eva’s passing, but would allow Mary Margaret to redecorate as she saw fit. Settling down onto the fluffy white comforter, she picked up the teddy bear she had left behind, picking some fuzz out of it’s fur. Her mother had made the bear for her before her passing and Mary Margaret always pictured passing it down to a child of her own.

She wondered if she was acting crazy. She wasn’t even 30 yet and she was so worried about having a baby. What if asking David ruined her friendship with him forever? She couldn’t imagine her life without him in it and didn’t want to. She hoped he knew that deep down, she wouldn’t judge him for his choice. If he said no, that would be it. She would wait for Mr. Right.

Tucking the bear into her purse, she inhaled her pillow case. It had once smelled like Eva, a mixture of her perfume and fabric softener. However, after awhile, it just started smelling like Mary Margaret. She had yet been able to recreate the smell.

Forcing herself up, Mary Margaret walked back out of the house and got into her car. She drove back to the loft and was surprised to find David standing outside of it. She walked over to him, pushing her hands into her sweatshirt pocket.

“Hey, what’s going on?” She asked. It had been nearly a week since she brought up having a baby and while they had texted at most, she had yet to see him face to face.

David shrugged. “I was waiting for you to come back. School let out awhile ago.”

“I stopped by my dad’s to get something.” She sighed. “David, I need you to know, no matter what choice you make, I won’t be mad at you. Maybe I was silly for bringing it up…”

“You weren’t,” David interrupted. “Look, you were right. There are people that have kids together that can barely stand each other. We may not be in love, but we do love each other and I think we have a lot more going for us than them.”

A small smile played on her lips. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying…I want to have a baby with you, Mary Margaret. I don’t exactly know how yet…but I know I want to be the father of your baby."

The small smile was replaced with a full on grin. Dropping her purse to the sidewalk, Mary Margaret attacked him with a hug. He would’ve fallen over had he not been able to steady them both out, laughing as he did. Hopefully their baby would have better coordination than they did.

#snowing #snowing au #charming family #charming family au #sheep bros

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harryandmeghan0-blog · 6 years ago

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Meghan Markle boasted about serving ‘200’ marijuana joints at her wedding to Trevor Engelson before meeting Pr - The Sun

New Post has been published on https://harryandmeghan.xyz/meghan-markle-boasted-about-serving-200-marijuana-joints-at-her-wedding-to-trevor-engelson-before-meeting-pr-the-sun/

Meghan Markle boasted about serving ‘200’ marijuana joints at her wedding to Trevor Engelson before meeting Pr - The Sun

MEGHAN Markle boasted to pals about how she’d serve illegal marijuana at her first wedding.

Leaked emails reveal plans to put the dope in party bags at her nuptials to Trevor Engelson.

Mega

Meghan Markle, with her first husband Trevor Engelson, who bought enough weed to roll 200 joints at their wedding

The Mega Agency

Meghan Markle parties with mates at celebrity wedding to Trevor Engelson

Urged to buy a certain type of bag by a pal, the Duchess replied: “Already ordered ’em. And teeny ones for the pot that say ‘shh’.”

The American actress even personally ordered small muslin bags for the illegal drug to be placed inside glitzy gift bags to guests.

The future Duchess then signed off to the friend with a jokey smiley face.

Meghan’s estranged father Thomas revealed last month that guests at the wedding in Jamaica were given a bag of marijuana.

Refer to Caption

Meghan Markle and blonde mum Doria Ragland in Jamaica for the 2011 wedding

Meghan Markle, with her first husband, even personally ordered small muslin bags for the illegal drug to be placed inside glitzy gift bags to guests

Prince Harry married Meghan Markle earlier this year and the pair had a carriage ride through Windsor

Who is Meghan Markle’s ex-husband Trevor Engelson? Film producer who divorced Prince Harry’s bride in 2013

But the emails show for the first time how Prince Harry’s wife was directly involved in the planning of the druggy stunt.

Sources claimed she even had a hand in rolling the joints and inserting the filter tip.

Splash News

An insider called Meghan Markle’s first wedding in Jamaica in 2011 a ‘boozy beach wedding with a magical backdrop’ and ‘an epic weekend under the sun and stars’

Splash News

Pregnant Meghan Markle joins Prince Harry in Sandringham for Christmas Day service

Splash News

Meghan Markle curtsies for the Queen as she joins Royals for Christmas Day

Getty – Contributor

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Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton brush off ‘rift’ rumours as they arrive side-by-side for Christmas Day service

At the time of the wedding in 2012 any possession of cannabis was illegal in Jamaica.

In 2015 laws were relaxed to make possession of small amounts a “petty offence” unlikely to lead to a criminal conviction.

An insider called Meghan’s first wedding in Jamaica in 2011 a “boozy beach wedding with a magical backdrop” and “an epic weekend under the sun and stars”. But as well as alcohol, there was plenty of weed, too.

Guests said Meghan and first husband Trevor bought marijuana through a member of staff at their hotel.

Getty – Contributor

Meghan Markle wows in figure-hugging, black dress on the red carpet with her first husband

Image Bank – Getty

At the time of the wedding in 2012 any possession of cannabis was illegal in Jamaica

Meghan Markle spoke with pals about ‘special bags for the wedding containing illegal drugs’, leaked emails claim

But a guest added that although she was “very excited” about surprising guests with marijuana, it was more of a gimmick and she did not smoke too much herself.

The guest said: “It didn’t seem like it was really her thing.

“Trevor and his friends definitely had more experience with it. I think she is more of a champagne and rose kind of girl. It almost looked like she didn’t know how to smoke.

“It is not something that was very much ‘her’, but it was part of the theme and the couple were very excited to have this surprise gift for the guests.

“It was a destination wedding in Jamaica, so they thought it would be appropriate and cool to supply this. She thought it would make it memorable.

“She was excited about making that a thing, showing a cheeky side people wouldn’t have imagined she had, especially at her wedding.”

Prince Harry and Meghan nicknamed ‘Monica and Chandler’ by royal staff

Splash News

Meghan Markle spoke to members of the public in Sandringham and it’s thought her baby is due in Spring

PA:Press Association

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s wedding was world’s away from her first one

AFP and licensors

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle share a romantic smooch on their wedding day

Queen warned Prince Harry over Meghan Markle’s ‘difficult’ behaviour and attitude after row over bride’s tiara for royal wedding

The wedding plan included procuring enough marijuana to hand-roll over 200 joints, delivered to guests in gift bags left in their hotel rooms for their arrival.

Although there was just one tote bag per room – designed for the occasion – each contained a baggie with 3-5 ready-to-smoke joints.

Older guests received gift bags without the drugs inside.

The guest said: “Trevor used his charm and very easily found a member of staff at the hotel willing to supply the party.”

Meghan Markle’s nephew is a cannabis farmer who ‘wanted to launch a special strain called Markle’s Sparkle to mark the Royal Wedding’

“It wasn’t great quality, I heard he didn’t pay much more than $100 for a couple of bags, but it didn’t really matter. There was enough to roll all the joints in the goodie bags and have plenty of left-overs to pass around as and when needed over the weekend.

“I’m told it took hours to roll them up. People were surprised, but no-one seemed to be against it, it went down really well.

“I don’t think Meghan thought for a second about it as a legal issue, even though they were holding a large quantity of it. It was part of their plan.

“Some people were lighting up all weekend, particularly Trevor’s friends. Meghan herself not so much, she was fairly constrained. She preferred to drink but I don’t think she wanted to be a party-pooper so she would take a puff from time to time to be a part of it.”

Splash News

Duchesses walk through Sandringham and share jokes before chatting to well-wishers

Splash News

Meghan Markle chats to the crowds about baby excitement

Moment Meghan Markle felt her baby KICKING on stage at the British Fashion Awards

One guest who had not looked through her gift bag almost flew home to the US with a joint in her luggage.

The wedding was a four-day weekend with around 100 guests at the Jamaica Inn, in Ocho Rios, followed by a honeymoon at celebrities’ favourite Rockhouse Hotel, in Negril.

“Meghan always wanted to get married with her toes in the sand,” said the insider. She went to Jamaica with her mom a handful of times when she was younger, the two of them loved the beaches there, so there was a childhood connection.

“She had stayed previously at the Inn with Trevor in a romantic trip and they said they both felt a connection to the place too. You had 100 friends jumping on a plane and gathering on an island, it was an epic weekend under the sun and stars. There was drinking games, dancing, marijuana… it was a boozy beach wedding with a magical backdrop.”

PA:Press Association

Meghan Markle’s first wedding was a four-day weekend with around 100 guests at the Jamaica Inn, in Ocho Rios, followed by a honeymoon at celebrities’ favourite Rockhouse Hotel, in Negril

Getty – Contributor

Prince Harry grins at Meghan Markle in their star-studded Royal Wedding

AP:Associated Press

‘It was worlds away from her wedding to Harry,’ said the source

Kensington Palace has confirmed Meghan Markle is pregnant and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex are expecting a baby in Spring 2019

Guests included both Meghan’s parents Doria and Thomas, her only family members, as well as Suits stars Patrick Adams and Rick Hoffman.

Aside from them, and her bridesmaids, those attending were almost all from Trevor’s side – including various family members and friends he had introduced her to – so in that sense it was similar to her Royal Wedding. That is where the similarities ended though.

Meghan and Trevor arrived on the tropical island around four days before the festivities to have everything in place for the occasion.

The wedding was funded mostly by Thomas Markle and Trevor’s parents, but Meghan and Trevor picked up some of the costs themselves.

PA:Press Association

Royal expert Ingrid Seward, Editor of Majesty magazine, said it was extremely unusual for a duchess to be caught discussing drugs

“It was worlds away from her wedding to Harry,” said the source.

“There was a lot of drinking all weekend. There were cocktails like Pina Colada and Long Island Iced Tea, and of course lots of rum and a lot of Red Stripe beer (local beer, featured in the couple’s wedding invitation).

“You could tell there was other sorts of things going on. Some people got really rowdy, including Trevor’s friends and some of Meghan’s Suits co-stars. There was debauchery, drinking games on the sand, people passing out and others being loud.

“They set up some competitions on the sand, like tug of war, wheel-barrel racing and drinking games like beer pong. It was out in the sun, so people got pretty drunk. Most guests were couples but there was some hooking up between the single people, but nothing too crazy and public. And the night of the wedding the party went until very late.”

Reuters

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry wave to the crowds in Windsor in May

Getty – Contributor

Royal Fab Four Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, Prince William and Kate Middleton pictured earlier this year

John Legend talks to Dan Wootton about the Royal wedding of Meghan Markle to Prince Harry

The cannabis wedding gift was revealed by Meghan’s dad Thomas Markle earlier this month.

He said: “It’s illegal, but it’s no big deal in Jamaica. It’s almost customary down there. I don’t smoke weed and to the best of my knowledge nor does Meghan. I don’t know what I did with mine. I think I gave it away.”

Prince Harry was ordered to visit a drugs rehabilitation clinic by his father Prince Charles after the teenager confessed to smoking cannabis and heavy drinking.

The short sharp shock treatment came after Harry, who was 16 at the time, admitted experimenting with the class B drug with older teenagers at Highgrove, at private parties in Gloucestershire and in an outbuilding at a local pub. He also told how he had been taking part in underage drinking at the same pub during after-hours sessions.

Getty – Contributor

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle beam at the altar

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Royal expert Ingrid Seward, Editor of Majesty magazine, said it was extremely unusual for a duchess to be caught discussing drugs.

She said: “Members of the Royal Family would never normally talk about such things. The Royals have been touched by drugs before, but it has always been brushed under the carpet.

“The Queen may be a bit disappointed by this, but she is a very pragmatic woman, and will be well aware that Meghan has had a life before joining the Royal Family. This will no doubt cause some tut-tutting among certain elements, but we mustn’t forget that Meghan lived quite a full life before meeting Harry.

“Back then she was a normal LA girl, living an LA lifestyle where everyone probably smoked cannabis. This is a fascinating insight into Meghan’s previous life, and I’m sure there will be more.”

Meghan Markle ‘left Kate Middleton in tears’ over her strict demands for Princess Charlotte’s bridesmaid outfit

Source: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/8071308/meghan-markle-marijuana-illegal-drugs-first-wedding/

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harryandmeghan0-blog · 6 years ago

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Letter showing true tragedy of Meghan Markle's rift with her father - Daily Mail

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Letter showing true tragedy of Meghan Markle's rift with her father - Daily Mail

The full content of a sensational letter written by the Duchess of Sussex to her estranged father shortly after her wedding can be revealed for the first time today.

Its existence emerged last week after five close friends of the Duchess gave anonymous interviews to an American celebrity magazine.

They said the Duchess was so upset by her father Thomas Markle’s public attacks on her and Prince Harry that she penned the anguished letter begging him to patch up their differences privately.

But last night Mr Markle said the letter, extracts of which are published today by The Mail on Sunday, is far from conciliatory and has left him feeling ‘devastated’.

Thomas Markle has revealed the full content of a five-page letter written to him by his daughter the Duchess of Sussex

The bombshell five-page letter, sent in August last year, lays bare the true depths of the Duchess’s estrangement from her father.

In elegant script, she accuses him of breaking her heart ‘into a million pieces’ by giving interviews to the press, fabricating stories and attacking her new husband.

The Duchess also admonishes her father, in anguished tones, for siding with her half-sister Samantha – who has attacked her in the press – while she ‘silently suffered at the hand of her vicious lies’.

Her writing is elegant and distinctive. Over five pages, the Duchess of Sussex pours out her heart to her father in a letter written last August – three months after their bitter rift began. Time and again, she chastises him for the hurt and pain he has caused her and insists she and Prince Harry did all they could to help Thomas Markle, even when he pulled out of the Royal Wedding days before their May 19 nuptials

Meghan’s sad opening message to ‘Daddy’ as she sits down to pour out her heart to her estranged father over five handwritten pages

The Duchess claims Mr Markle causes her pain by being manipulated in the media but he insists ‘I love her with all my heart’

She goes on to complain that Mr Markle has made no attempt to contact her – and chastises him for falsely telling journalists he is the one who has been shunned – a criticism her father vehemently refutes.

She also accuses her father of snubbing her and Prince Harry’s offers to help when he pulled out of attending their wedding following two heart attacks and accuses him of being ungrateful for money she has given him.

The former award-winning Hollywood lighting director, who now lives in Mexico, said that he never intended to make the handwritten missive public ‘out of respect for Meghan’ – but says he has been forced to do so now because its contents have been falsely portrayed.

Mr Markle insists: ‘I sent Meg and Harry a text telling them I wasn’t coming. It was too dangerous after my heart attacks’

Mr Markle says he only asked for help to move house and that any ‘modest’ financial gifts from Meghan were ‘greatly appreciated’

Her father says: ‘I didn’t stop answering my phone. I was in hospital with a heart attack! Meg and Harry knew what was going on’

Mr Markle comments: ‘I have no idea what this means. This is pure Harry. Americans don’t use the “rabbit hole” expression’

Meghan complains Thomas sided with her half-sister Samantha in criticising her, but he insists: ‘I never wanted Meg to suffer.’

Contrary to claims made by the Duchess’s friends, he said the letter made no attempt to heal their bitter rift. ‘I thought it would be an olive branch. Instead, it was a dagger to the heart,’ Mr Markle, 74, said last night.

He dismissed suggestions he has made no attempt to patch things up since her wedding. He showed this newspaper texts which he says prove he reached out multiple times to his daughter and the son-in-law he has never met.

The US magazine People claimed to ‘put the record straight’ over the Duchess’s relationship with her father and criticism of her style as a Royal.

It was based on interviews with five friends – at least one of whom is thought to be one of the Duchess’s co-stars in Suits, the legal drama in which she starred for six years.

Thomas Markle says: ‘I’ve never attacked Harry. I asked him to man up’

He insists the Duchess is mistaken: ‘I have only ever spoken out in response to fake narratives and lies’

The Duchess refers to the MoS paparazzi photos story, right, but he insists he continued to reach out

The Duchess came under fire over her apparent decision to allow her confidantes to defend her in the extraordinary interview, without, it is understood, involving Kensington Palace.

The palace has refused to comment on whether the magazine’s anonymous sources had co-operated at the direct request of the Duchess or with her tacit approval.

Former Buckingham Palace press secretary Dickie Arbiter, who worked for both Prince Charles and the late Diana, Princess of Wales, feared the decision would only exacerbate issues.

He said: ‘Assuming – and as these sources are anonymous we don’t know for sure – that this was done with her agreement, it has opened a Pandora’s box. The issue with her father is an open wound and I’m not entirely sure it is the best idea to aggravate that.’

In her letter to her father, the Duchess begged him to stop attacking ‘patient, kind and understanding’ Prince Harry

Last night, Mr Markle said it was unfair for his daughter’s friends to use the media to ‘spin a line’ while he was being criticised for ‘giving a handful’ of interviews to the press. In the article last Wednesday, the Duchess’s friends said that she was devastated by his response to the letter, in which he suggested father and daughter pose for press pictures.

One friend said: ‘She feels like “that’s the opposite of what I’m saying. I’m telling you that I don’t want to communicate through the media, and you’re asking me to… Did you hear anything I said?” ’

Mr Markle said he had suggested the photo op as a way of showing the world they could be friends again, describing the Duchess’s reading of it as ‘tragic misunderstanding’ he wishes he could put straight. The rift between the Duchess and her father began after The Mail on Sunday revealed, just days before her wedding in May last year, that he had colluded with the paparazzi to stage a series of lucrative photo opportunities.

Such was his humiliation that he offered to pull out of attending the Royal Wedding and was later prevented from going after suffering two heart attacks.

Since then, he has given a series of damaging interviews in which he has spoken of his dismay at being cast adrift by his daughter and the Royal Family.

Thomas’s Anguished Reply

The Duchess insisted she phoned him, but he had no missed calls

Mr Markle says he never attacked Harry, but feels he should have met him before the wedding

Mr Markle insists his bid to reduce press intrusion was ‘completely misinterpreted’

Mr Markle says he never heard from his ex-wife after his plea to help him heal the rift

How Meghan’s media fightback led her father to reveal letter he wanted to keep secret

The Duchess’s father told no one about her letter and planned to ‘keep it totally private out of respect for her’ – until her friends launched their ‘attack’ on him last week.

Following Meghan’s ‘Duchess Difficult’ reputation and stories of her allegedly petulant behaviour like firing off 5am emails to staff and demanding air freshener be sprayed around musty St George’s Chapel, Windsor, Meghan is said to have authorised five of her closest friends to speak to US People magazine to correct the falsehoods.

The article painted Meghan in a glowing light, while insisting the negative stories about her were lies. But Mr Markle says Meghan’s decision to reveal the private letter in the pages of the magazine left him with no choice but to go public: ‘The letter was presented in a way that vilified me and wasn’t true,’ he said last night. ‘It was presented as her reaching out and writing a loving letter in the hope of healing the rift, but the letter isn’t like that at all. Meghan can’t have it both ways. She can’t use the press to get her message across but hang me out to dry. I have the right to defend myself.’

Experts have claimed the Duchess is walking a dangerous path by allegedly bypassing the palace press office.

Meghan Markle urged her father to stop ‘painful’ attacks on ‘patient, kind and understanding’ Prince Harry in five-page letter – but anguished dad says ‘I like him. I’ll always love you’

For months, the letter has stayed concealed in his battered black leather briefcase inside a simple FedEx envelope. Five pages, written in his daughter’s distinctive, elegant script – he shared it with no one because, he says: ‘It was just too painful.’

‘When I opened the letter I was hoping it was the olive branch I’d longed for,’ he said last night. ‘I was expecting something that would be a pathway to reconciliation. Instead, it was deeply hurtful. I was so devastated I couldn’t show it to anyone and never would have had it not been for the events of last week.’

Indeed, the existence of the letter – in which his daughter chastises her father time and again – was revealed by anonymous friends of the Duchess in a magazine article published in the US on Wednesday. It was portrayed as a loving missive from a heartbroken daughter anxious to heal the rift with her father.

Except it wasn’t.

In her letter to her father, the Duchess begged him to stop attacking ‘patient, kind and understanding’ Prince Harry

‘There was no loving message in there, nothing asking about my health, nothing from her saying, “Let’s get together and heal our differences,” Mr Markle, 74, said last night.

According to a ‘longtime friend’ of Meghan’s quoted in People: ‘After the wedding she wrote him a letter. She’s like, “Dad, I’m so heartbroken. I love you, I have one father. Please stop victimising me through the media so we can repair our relationship.” ’

Yet, Mr Markle insists, the letter again proves she and Harry have ‘misunderstood’ him – leading time and again to her believing one thing whereas, he insists, his reality is far different.

In one angry passage, the Duchess blasts her father for not telling her he would not walk her down the aisle. Prince Charles famously stood in at the last minute.

She writes: ’You’ve told the press that you called me to say you weren’t coming to the wedding – that didn’t happen because you never called.’

Mr Markle says this is ‘totally false’ and he has the text messages proving it.

He pulls out his phone and scrolls through dozens of text messages between himself, his daughter and Prince Harry.

In the turbulent week before his daughter’s May 19 wedding, Mr Markle was exposed by this newspaper as colluding with a paparazzi photographer. He later ended up in hospital after suffering two heart attacks and underwent an angioplasty procedure to unblock two arteries to his heart.

It is during this time that the relationship between him and the couple fell apart.

In her letter, the Duchess accuses him of ignoring her increasingly desperate attempts to reach him.

She writes: “From my phone alone, I called you over 20 times and you ignored my calls… leaving me in the days before our wedding worried, confused, shocked and absolutely blindsided.’

Mr Markle shakes his head: ‘I don’t know anything about 20 phone calls. There were no missed messages.’ He shows me a text message dated May 16 which, he insists, proves ‘conclusively’ that he told the couple he could not fly to the UK as planned.

The text reads: ‘Surgery went OK… The doctor will not allow me to fly so of course I’m sorry but I can’t come. Love you and wish you the best of everything.’

Mr Markle said: ‘The doctors absolutely refused to let me fly to the wedding after my procedure. As soon as I knew this, I texted Meg and Harry to let them know I couldn’t be there.’ Mr Markle insists he called his daughter after the rift began ‘but she never picked up.’

Thomas Markle has revealed the full content of a five-page letter written to him by his daughter the Duchess of Sussex

People magazine quotes a friend saying: ‘He knows how to get in touch with her. Her telephone number hasn’t changed. He’s never called; he’s never texted.’

In an extraordinary moment, Mr Markle dials his daughter’s number as we sit in a hotel room in Los Angeles. He activates the speakerphone. An automated voice responds: ‘The service you have attempted to use is restricted or unavailable.’

He says: ‘The number worked until a couple of weeks ago. I sent them numerous text messages and I tried calling. That recording is the message I get now on the number she says hasn’t changed.’

Reading the letter again is clearly deeply painful for a man who says he longs for nothing more than to be reunited with his pregnant daughter. He pauses: ‘This is not the girl I know. It’s not the way she talks. For her friends – and by default Meg – to portray this as a loving letter is ridiculous.

‘Love isn’t mentioned once in the entire thing. Meg wrote me tons of letters and cards over the years. She always signed off with “Love” or “Love you”.

‘This letter is cold. When she signs off it’s “Meg”. You read the way it ends and it felt like a final farewell to me. It doesn’t even start out with “Dear”. It’s just “Daddy”.’ He continues: ‘Meg accuses me in the letter of cashing in but I’ve only accepted a few payments. I worked it out and if I’d taken all the offers I’ve had, I could have made $600,000. I haven’t done that.’

He insists he did try to heal the rift in ‘multiple’ text messages, calls and in a heartfelt four-page letter he sent to Meghan after receiving hers.

Until last week’s article in People which disparagingly mentions his reply, he never knew she had received it. ‘They just stopped talking to me. I never heard from them after the wedding in May so by June I reached out.’

On June 10, he texted his daughter: ‘My surgery was successful. I will be on blood thinners and the diet for the rest of my life but I will live. Just thought you might want to know.’

On June 19, he again texted, saying he had spoken to Piers Morgan on Good Morning Britain and given his first interview (in which he revealed private conversations with Harry about Brexit and President Trump) ‘because you guys don’t respond back to me’.

His phone is filled with texts to the couple. On October 24, he writes: ‘I don’t know if this is still your phone number or not? I don’t know if you received my letter. I am only giving two interviews to the press not hundreds and I haven’t made millions of dollars.’

Thomas Markle spoke out after five friends of his daughter gave an anonymous interview

Yet again, on November 8, he reaches out: ‘Please respond back to me. You shunned me long enough unless you plan this for a lifetime? I don’t like speaking to the press but when the announcement for the baby came out, seven cars and reporters were outside my house every day for seven days. I gave a statement and all the cars went away. Anyway, I’m very happy for you and Harry and I wish you all my love.’

The Duchess’s letter accuses him of asking for money: ‘You’ve said I never helped you financially and you’ve never asked me for help which is also untrue…’

Mr Markle responds that the Duchess – worth a reported $4 million before she married – never supported him financially: ‘Meghan’s given me cash gifts occasionally but I never begged or asked for them. She would send money at Christmas, birthdays. It was a couple of grand here or there.’

There is one expression in the letter that her father is convinced comes from Harry. It is when she refers to him being down a rabbit hole. She writes: ‘Please stop taking the bait from the press. I realise you are so far down this rabbit hole that you feel (or may feel) there’s no way out, but if you take a moment to pause I think you’ll see that being able to live with a clear conscience is more valuable than any payment.’ He says: ‘Americans don’t know what the hell “down the rabbit hole” means? It’s apparently to do with Alice In Wonderland. You Brits use it. That feels like pure Harry.’

Mr Markle is baffled at his daughter’s claim that he was given support from her LA-based ‘team’ and from the Palace.

She writes: ‘We all rallied around to support and protect you from Day 1 and this you know. So to hear about the attacks you’ve made at Harry in press who was nothing but patient, kind and understanding with you is perhaps the most painful of all.’

He responds: ‘I was left to hang out to dry both before and after the wedding. Not one person came to see me. My ex-wife Doria received an engagement announcement via two people from the British consulate in Los Angeles who went to her door. No one came to my door. I felt hurt. I’m only 120 miles from LA.

‘I haven’t attacked Harry. I told him to man up. I still believe he should have flown to LA to see me, first to ask for my daughter’s hand and later to sort out the problems between us. He has all the resources in the world at his disposal.’

The Duchess’s letter talks of her hurt when her father denied cooperating with the paparazzi pictures only for this newspaper to publish CCTV footage of him colluding with a photographer: ‘I believed you, trusted you and told you I loved you. The next morning the CCTV footage came out.’

He says: ‘I’ve apologised for that a hundred times. I made a mistake, I shouldn’t have done it but how many times do I need to say “I’m sorry?” I did the pictures because I was tired of being portrayed as a slob. They were calling my home a shack.’

Thomas insisted that he didn’t attack Harry but added that the Prince should have met him before the wedding

Mr Markle wrote a heartfelt reply to the Duchess’s letter in September. ‘I took a long time to write back because I wanted to address all her accusations.’

He wrote: ‘The last time we talked was about three days before the wedding because I was in a hospital bed and just had my procedure.’

The Duchess complained her father did nothing when her older half-sister Samantha – from Mr Markle’s first marriage – attacked her, calling her ‘a social climber with a soft spot for gingers’.

‘You watched me silently suffer at the hand of her (Samantha’s) vicious lies. I crumbled inside.’

In his letter, Mr Markle refers to his elder daughter by her pet name, ‘Babe’, saying: “I did try to control Babe. I have as much control over Babe… as I do over you!’

In People magazine, the Duchess’s friend dismissed her father’s letter, saying he used it to ask for a ‘photo op’. In fact, Mr Markle wrote: ‘I wish we could get together and take a photo for the whole world to see. If you and Harry don’t like it? Fake it for one photo and maybe some of the press will shut up!’

He says: ‘That request was totally misinterpreted. When Doria was photographed with Meghan and Harry for the first time it took the heat off Doria. It showed she was part of the family. I don’t want a picture for any other reason than if we show harmony then the press will back off.’

In desperation, he even reached out to Meghan’s mother Doria, who he divorced amicably when their daughter was three. He hand-delivered a one-page letter to Doria’s LA home last October. That letter, too, was met with stony silence.

Mr Markle says the estrangement from his daughter is affecting his health, causing ‘massive stress’.

‘I want nothing more than to sort this mess out. I would ask her and Harry to contact me. All it would take is one phone call and most of this craziness would stop.’

* Mr Markle neither asked for nor received payment for this article.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6686817/Letter-showing-true-tragedy-Meghan-Markles-rift-father.html

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Meghan Markle boasted about serving ‘200’ marijuana joints at her wedding to Trevor Engelson before she met Pr - The Sun

New Post has been published on https://harryandmeghan.xyz/meghan-markle-boasted-about-serving-200-marijuana-joints-at-her-wedding-to-trevor-engelson-before-she-met-pr-the-sun/

Meghan Markle boasted about serving ‘200’ marijuana joints at her wedding to Trevor Engelson before she met Pr - The Sun

MEGHAN Markle boasted to friends how she’d serve illegal marijuana at her first wedding.

Leaked emails reveal plans to put the dope in party bags at her nuptials to Trevor Engelson.

Mega

Meghan Markle, with her first husband Trevor Engelson, who bought enough weed to roll 200 joints at their wedding

The Mega Agency

Bride Meghan Markle parties with mates at celebrity wedding to Trevor Engelson

Urged to buy a certain type of bag by a pal, the Duchess replied: “Already ordered ’em. And teeny ones for the pot that say ‘shh’.”

The American actress even personally ordered small muslin bags for the illegal drug to be placed inside glitzy gift bags to guests.

The future Duchess then signed off to the friend with a jokey smiley face.

Meghan’s estranged father Thomas revealed last month that guests at the wedding in Jamaica were given a bag of marijuana.

Refer to Caption

Bikini-clad Meghan Markle and blonde mum Doria Ragland in Jamaica for the 2011 wedding

American actress Meghan Markle, with her first husband, even personally ordered small muslin bags for the illegal drug to be placed inside glitzy gift bags to guests

Prince Harry married Meghan Markle earlier this year and the pair had a carriage ride through Windsor

Who is Meghan Markle’s ex-husband Trevor Engelson? Film producer who divorced Prince Harry’s bride in 2013

But the emails show for the first time how Prince Harry’s wife was directly involved in the planning of the druggy stunt.

Sources claimed she even had a hand in rolling the joints and inserting the filter tip.

Splash News

An insider called Meghan’s first wedding in Jamaica in 2011 a ‘boozy beach wedding with a magical backdrop’ and ‘an epic weekend under the sun and stars’

Splash News

Pregnant Meghan Markle joins Prince Harry in Sandringham for Christmas Day service

Splash News

Meghan Markle curtsies for the Queen as she joins Royals for Christmas Day

Getty – Contributor

Meghan and Kate show off unity and friendship in Sandringham amid rumours of a feud

Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton brush off ‘rift’ rumours as they arrive side-by-side for Christmas Day service

At the time of the wedding in 2012 any possession of cannabis was illegal in Jamaica.

In 2015 laws were relaxed to make possession of small amounts a “petty offence” unlikely to lead to a criminal conviction.

Guests said Meghan and first husband Trevor bought marijuana through a member of staff at their hotel.

Getty – Contributor

Meghan Markle wows in figure-hugging, black dress on the red carpet with her first husband

Image Bank – Getty

At the time of the wedding in 2012 any possession of cannabis was illegal in Jamaica