Netflix drops Meghan Markle’s animated series amid cutbacks – report

theguardian.com:

Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, has fallen victim to cutbacks at Netflix, according to a US report that said the struggling streaming giant has dropped plans for her animated series Pearl.

Announced to fanfare last summer, with Meghan as its creator and executive producer, the “family series” was to have focused on the adventures of a 12-year-old girl inspired by historically influential female figures.

It was to have been the first animated production under Meghan and her husband Prince Harry’s Archewell brand, which was created in 2020 as a vehicle for their new careers in the US, following their separation from the British royal family.

Netflix, once dominant among streaming platforms but now wrestling with slumping subscriber numbers and a collapse in share value, dropped the project amid a wave of cutbacks, according to Deadline.

Referring to the decision unflatteringly as “a royal flush”, the entertainment industry website said the project Meghan was co-executive producing with David Furnish, who is married to Elton John, was axed in the development stage.

“Word in town is that even before recent events, Netflix had been telling producers to take some development projects elsewhere,” the report said.

“Clearly, Netflix’s inordinately high content spend is being reevaluated. It is just unreasonable to expect its execs to manage that many projects, and have enough of them turn out to be memorable.”

Netflix did not immediately comment.

There was also no immediate reaction from Archewell, leaving it unclear if the company would continue production on Pearl or attempt to move it elsewhere.

Other Archewell projects with Netflix, including the documentary series Heart of Invictus, about Harry’s Olympics-style Invictus Games