{"id":205528,"date":"2025-10-11T13:34:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T13:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/205528\/"},"modified":"2025-10-11T13:34:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T13:34:10","slug":"how-victoria-beckham-has-done-what-meghan-markle-never-could","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/205528\/","title":{"rendered":"How Victoria Beckham has done what Meghan Markle never could"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a moment in Victoria Beckham, Netflix\u2019s new three-part documentary, where David<\/a> and Victoria are having a heart-to-heart in a cabin overlooking their manmade lake at their \u00a312m Cotswolds mansion. <\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t you feel confident enough that you can sit back and relax?\u201d he asks, rather tenderly. \u201cWhat is stopping you from saying, \u2018Okay, I\u2019ve achieved it\u2019? Who are you trying to prove this to?\u201d As her voice cracks with emotion, VB responds, \u201dMaybe a lot of it is to you.\u201d He shrugs and says, \u201cYou could make a cheese sandwich and we\u2019d be proud of you.\u201d She replies, both with tears and laughter: \u201cLet\u2019s be honest, I couldn\u2019t actually make a cheese sandwich very well.\u201d<\/p>\n

This, you see, is Brand Beckham<\/a> 2.0 \u2013 the power couple\u2019s Kardashified<\/a> reinvention. Borrowing the Kardashians\u2019 \u201cat home with\u201d format, we\u2019re presented with a tight family unit, living between its various mega mansions around the world \u2013 London, Miami, Oxfordshire and Dubai. Victoria Beckham is the companion series to Netflix\u2019s 2023 Beckham documentary (for which they\u2019ve reportedly made \u00a320m in total) and it\u2019s understood that the Beckhams were given full editorial control. <\/p>\n

\"Victoria<\/p>\n

open image in gallery<\/p>\n

Victoria Beckham dishes out endless public displays of affection upon her husband, David (Netflix)<\/p>\n

With VB dishing out endless PDSs (public displays of affection) upon David, there are of course, moments that feel performative, designed to distract from any, ahem, current disharmony with their eldest. But there are also plenty of signs that suggest this celebrity dynasty<\/a> could actually be human too \u2013 there\u2019s Harper ticking off VB for messing up their TikTok dance routine, David shaking his head and walking away from another one of Victoria\u2019s stories, and VB talking about \u201cburying her boobs in Baden-Baden\u201d. <\/p>\n

It won\u2019t have escaped your attention that Meghan Markle <\/a>has also flung open her very grand doors to Netflix again, with her second series of With Love, Meghan, released in August. Because, as both VB and MM know only too well, if you want to reach new audiences, you\u2019ve got to show \u201creal life\u201d behind the scenes. At home, notes the celebrity PR Mark Borkowski, \u201cis where they feel comfortable. Look at the success of Hello! and OK! \u2013 that\u2019s how they managed to get those talks over the line. So it\u2019s, \u2018Take a look at my glossy kitchen!\u2019\u201d Just as with Hello! And OK!, celebrities can insist on content approval, but here, adds Borkowski, they can enjoy \u201cbigger audiences\u201d. <\/p>\n

\"Victoria<\/p>\n

open image in gallery<\/p>\n

Victoria Beckham\u2019s early Posh Spice days with fellow Spice Girls, Emma Bunton and Melanie Chisholm (Netflix)<\/p>\n

The similarities between Victoria and Meghan<\/a> don\u2019t end with the Netflix series. Both women are confessed \u201ccontrol freaks\u201d, and they are branching out into merch, which they need to shift. Meghan with her As Ever wine and entertaining products (flower sprinkles<\/a>, anyone?), VB with her fashion and beauty lines, both women know that (in theory at least), by role-modelling their fabulous lifestyles \u2013 the immaculate veg patches, the professional kitchens, the status socialising \u2013 we may be persuaded that we really want to be like them and therefore will happily buy into them. <\/p>\n

Both have also been in Paris this month for fashion week \u2013 but where VB now commands the hard-earned respect from everyone from Anna Wintour downwards, Markle only saw her epic fails go viral, including what\u2019s been dubbed her Zoolander<\/a> walk as she strutted into a fashion show, being accused of laughing at a stumbling model, and an awkward kiss mis-aim with Balenciaga\u2019s Pierpaolo Piccioli. The tone-deaf limo reel, filmed close to where Diana died, further cemented the feeling of Meghan Markle\u2019s overwhelming self-absorption.<\/p>\n

\"Meghan<\/p>\n

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Meghan Markle has seen her \u2018epic fails go viral\u2019 (Netflix)<\/p>\n

There are other key differences, not least in their deployment of that key publicity strategy, vulnerability. After receiving criticism for glossing over David\u2019s alleged affair with Rebecca Loos in Beckham, it feels like the Beckhams have upped the vulnerability quotient for this series. We see Victoria Beckham admit to having an eating disorder for the very first time, as well as opening up about her label being tens of millions of pounds in the red, being bullied and uncool at school, and enduring decades of media vitriol. (It is, of course, a highly curated version of vulnerability \u2013 still no word on the alleged rift with her eldest son, for example.) \u201cPeople like it when celebrities can say, \u2018I f***ed up\u2019, or, \u2018That was really difficult for us,\u2019\u201d explains celebrity agent Elaine Foran. \u201cShowing your vulnerability makes you relatable; it makes people like you more.\u201d Ker-ching. <\/p>\n

Being \u201cat home\u201d with Meghan, however, meant her inviting \u201cnew friends\u201d (ie, well-known people that may have been more acquaintances, and were certainly not guests at her wedding) over to her Montecito mansion. She then attempts to impress with dull, trad-wifey crafts (water marbling, book binding, flower pressing), which just felt laboured and inauthentic. <\/p>\n

\"Victoria<\/p>\n

open image in gallery<\/p>\n

Victoria and David Beckham started dating in 1997 (Netflix)<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was excruciating,\u201d says Foran. \u201cI couldn\u2019t imagine her doing any of those things. It felt very forced and awkward.\u201d So while the Beckhams have arguably endeared viewers to them, With Love, Meghan only seems to have bolstered her haters and spawned a spate of negative publicity. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say that Meghan and Harry <\/a>haven\u2019t overshared in the past (that Oprah interview, and of course, Harry with that memoir, Spare). But it has landed differently. \u201cThey\u2019ve been vulnerable in a really moany way,\u201d says Foran. \u201cIf you\u2019re that privileged, you cannot moan.\u201d Borkowski puts it down to \u201cnot having the right people around them, not listening to advice, and not having any public relations EQ.\u201d Or maybe just not listening to them.<\/p>\n

\"In<\/p>\n

open image in gallery<\/p>\n

In the documentary, we see Victoria Beckham admit to having an eating disorder for the very first time (Netflix)<\/p>\n

In fact, even the media bosses are unimpressed, with one Spotify exec, Bill Simmons, labelling Harry and Meghan as \u201cgrifters<\/a>\u201c in 2022 after their $20m podcast deal abruptly ended. \u201cYou live in f***ing Montecito and you just sell documentaries and podcasts and nobody cares what you have to say about anything unless you talk about the royal family and you just complain about them,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Harry is nowhere to be seen in With Love, Meghan. If he had have been allowed, maybe he would have been able to add the warmth and side-eye humour<\/a>, it so desperately needed. Over at Beckham Towers, David, as well as always championing VB and her work, has important work to do around keeping Victoria grounded, keeping her in check with some typical Brit-self-depricating zingers (who could forget his much-memed line in Beckham: \u201cWhat did your dad drive you to school in?\u201d). <\/p>\n

Whereas Harry and Meghan\u2019s children\u2019s faces are rarely shown \u2013 often shown from behind, or obscured or just referenced in anecdotes, the family element for VB has been marketing gold, says Foran: \u201cIt brings in different viewers because the Beckhams have fans within different age groups.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"\u2018Meghan<\/p>\n

open image in gallery<\/p>\n

\u2018Meghan became the wicked queen in the \u201cSnow White\u201d narrative\u2019 (Netflix)<\/p>\n

So should Meghan have hauled Harry back in the picture? It\u2019s too late for that, says Borkowski: \u201cMeghan became the wicked queen in the Snow White narrative. Harry was this person that everybody loved, this knockabout, nice\u2013but-dim character that was sucked into this west coast lifestyle of parties and sunshine and fruit salads.\u201d <\/p>\n

So, for now, it is Victoria who has managed to do what Meghan hasn\u2019t. Become our TV queen and win over hearts and minds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a moment in Victoria Beckham, Netflix\u2019s new three-part documentary, where David and Victoria are having a heart-to-heart…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":205529,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[64,63,447,134],"class_list":{"0":"post-205528","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-entertainment"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}