Amid the all the celebratory posts about the engagement of Prince Harry and “Suits” actress Meghan Markle clogging my Facebook news feed yesterday, one stood out. It was my cousin Laura Fiorelli, who is in her twenties and lives in Brooklyn. Her response? “Who gives a s - - t?”
Reading it, I laughed out loud. Instead of the usual knee jerk swooning over the royal family, the earthy voice of reason.
The people swooning over this news are the same ones who spent their summer watching TV specials commemorating Princess Diana: class-envying Americans of a certain age.
But there’s a generational shift taking place — and America’s obsession with the British royalty is fading. Some young Americans even regard the British monarchy as a meaningless artifact.
A recent survey by “60 Minutes” revealed that two-thirds of Americans didn’t give a rat’s ass about the 2012 royal wedding between William and Kate. So, there!
Unless you are a Brit and obeisance to Queen Elizabeth II is part of your DNA, there’s simply no reason to care anymore. (And even some Brits don’t care — just look at John Oliver.)
Americans may try to justify their “fascination” with this royal wedding because Markle is now an “American princess.” But as princesses go, she’s pretty middling. The media is working overtime now trying to elevate her to the level of celebrity enjoyed by real stars like Jennifer Lawrence, but it simply won’t stick.
It’s not like she’s abandoning the “Hunger Games” franchise to become the Duchess of Scones (or maybe it’s Crumpets).
Markle’s credits include guest appearances on such mediocre television fare as “CSI: Miami,” “Without a Trace” and “Castle.” When Grace Kelly left Hollywood to become Princess Grace of Monaco, she already had an Oscar (“The Country Girl”) and some classic films to her credit, like Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” and “To Catch a Thief.”
Let’s just say YouTube will be hard-pressed to have a Meghan Markle career retrospective on the day of the wedding. She’ll receive far more attention for her skill at attending royal ceremonies, polo matches and other monarchy-related events than she ever did as an actress.
She and her red-headed prince are not the stuff legends are made of and everyone needs to calm down.