Stephen Colbert, Trevor Noah, and Jimmy Kimmel contextualize the queen's royal 'Megxit' summit

(Image credit: screenshots/YouTube/The Late Show, The Daily Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live)

published 14 January 2020

"The world is still on edge over escalating tensions between rival foreign powers that could at any moment erupt into a full-blown war, and everyone is asking the same harrowing questions: Can Harry and Meghan really leave the royal family?" Stephen Colbert deadpanned on Monday's Late Show. Last week, Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan announced they plan to "step back" from being senior royalty to become financially independent, "but like many millennials who move out, they will stay on the queen's Verizon family plan."

"The palace was shocked — shocked! — and so today the queen held a royal family summit to work out a future for Prince Harry and Meghan," Colbert said. And the queen's statement after the summit, that she and the other royals "are entirely supportive of Harry and Meghan's desire to create a new life as a young family" with a "more independent life," is "way nicer than the statements that came out of royal summits in the old days," he said, paraphrasing Henry VIII: "I'm starting a new religion so I can get divorced and kill my next wife."

Yes, Britain's royal family is "like the Kardashians with an occasional beheading," Trevor Noah said at The Daily Show, but Harry and Meghan announcing "they're no longer going to be on the family phone plan anymore" is "an unprecedented crisis." Meghan called into the meeting from Canada, he said, "and I'll be honest, I don't blame Meghan for not going. Because nothing good happens when white people invite you to the countryside."

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On paper, the couple has a charmed life — us commoners "kiss frogs to try and become royalty," Noah said, but "for Harry and Meghan in particular, the reality of being a royal couple has been far from a fairy tale." That's largely due to Britain's tabloid press, he explained. "Now everyone is wondering what they will do to support themselves without any of that royal cash. Well, good news: Meghan's already got herself a job," thanks to some high-level "hustling" by Harry.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.