A new BBC show "Meghan Markle's Royal Sparkle" is part of a spoof BBC Two programme, Tonight With Vladimir Putin. Photo / BBC
A new BBC show "Meghan Markle's Royal Sparkle" is part of a spoof BBC Two programme, Tonight With Vladimir Putin. Photo / BBC
The BBC is to broadcast a comedy which portrays the Duchess of Sussex as a "trailer trash" American who threatens to knife the Duchess of Cambridge in a jealous rage.
The BBC Two programme, Tonight With Vladimir Putin, is a spoof chat show that uses performance capture technology to turn comedians into 3D digital characters.
Both episodes, to be shown tomorrow night in the UK, include a feature entitled "Meghan Markle's Royal Sparkle". The Duchess of Sussex character takes planted questions from the studio audience.
She is asked: "What makes you angry?" and replies with an anecdote about the Duchess of Cambridge asking to borrow her hairbrush.
"I say no because that's gross and then I leave my room and come back and I can tell she's used my hairbrush anyway because it's covered in skanky hair that's going grey and I say, 'Stay the f--- out of my trailer or I'll cut you, Kate,'" she yells,
The show also makes fun of the Duchess's relationship with her father, Thomas Markle. "I'd just like to know: how's your dad?" an audience member asks. "Great question. Next," the Duchess replies.
The actress who plays Markle said: "Anybody who has seen anything of Meghan Markle in public will know that she seems incredibly agreeable and friendly, always smiling. So I was interested in finding humour in the ridiculous... What if somebody who seems super lovely in public actually has a really mean streak? Photo / Getty Images
When she is asked by a woman what it is like being married to the Duke, she responds: "I'm just wondering why you're so interested there, missy? I mean, what's that about? Do you have a problem with me and Harry? Are you trying to lay claim to my man?" She then challenges the questioner to a fight, saying: "We can go right now, b*tch, you and me."
The character says she is taking part in the show "to get to know you, the United British of Kingdom people" and to boost her social media profile.
The Duchess is voiced by Gbemisola Ikunelo, an actress, writer and comedian who also appears in the BBC Three sketch show Famalam.
Ikunelo said she had conceived the character as the opposite of how the Duchess really behaves. "Anybody who has seen anything of Meghan Markle in public will know that she seems incredibly agreeable and friendly, always smiling. So I was interested in finding humour in the ridiculous… What if somebody who seems super lovely in public actually has a really mean streak? What would that look like? So I introduced an over-the-top, shouty, hill-billy drawl," she explained.
"The show was made in front of a live audience, so it required real-time reactions from the character – I reacted to events as they happened from in the studio and my movements and voice was transferred to the animated Meghan character in the exact same way as it is done with Vladimir's character (who gets pretty angry himself!).
"If a character I chose to play happens to be angry in a moment, I'm okay with it. Because black people and people of colour are entitled to the whole spectrum of emotions being human demands. So I'm done censoring legit choices and feelings because someone might misinterpret me as an angry black woman. That trope belongs to the media, not to black women."
A BBC spokesperson said: "Viewers will clearly recognise this performance as a spoof and highly satirical, within the context of a programme which lampoons a wide range of public figures and the public's perception of them."
The "semi-scripted" show, which was commissioned as two pilot episodes, features Putin interviewing guests including Alastair Campbell and June Sarpong. Putin is played by the comedian Natt Tapley.
