Even Meghan Markle Isn’t Immune to Netflix’s Budget Cuts
Netflix is in the throes of its mission to recover from its first net subscriber loss in a decade, which means it’s been making cutback after cutback after stocks plummeted in late April. (Market value dropped $54 billion in a single day, and things haven’t been looking great since.) Unsurprisingly, there have been layoffs and show cancellations, with one of the latter standing out in particular. On Monday, Deadline revealed that the streaming giant has declined to give its royal (well, technically formerly royal) business partners special treatment. Pearl, an animated series about the adventures of a 12-year-old girl that was created and executive produced by Meghan Markle, will reportedly never see the light of day.
The show was set to be the second to stem from Netflix’s megawatt deal with Archewell, Markle and Prince Harry’s production company. So far, it appears that another of their Netflix projects, a docuseries about the Invictus Games, has been spared, and their multiyear deal will still lead to more projects down the line. Fortunately, Pearl was still in the development stage. The same can’t be said for another of the three animated children’s series that Netflix has canceled in recent weeks; another titled Dino Daycare was apparently “deep into production.”
On the bright side, Markle now has more time to devote to all the other content she’s been producing, both at Netflix and at Spotify. The 40-year-old Duchess of Sussex recently announced her first podcast at the latter, which is set to examine the history of stereotypes leveled against women—and, naturally, titled Archetypes.