Sibling drama. Meghan Markle’s older half-brother, Thomas Markle Jr., has joined the cast of Australia’s Big Brother VIP and appeared to slam his regal sister in the first trailer.
The Channel 7 series dropped its first teaser on Sunday, August 8, promising “explosive” drama from the cast.
In the teaser, per the Daily Mail, the 55-year-old Oregon resident is the first celebrity player introduced. “I’m Meghan Markle’s brother. I’m the biggest brother of them all,” Thomas said in the video.
Thomas further alleged that he told Meghan’s husband Prince Harry, “I think she’s going to ruin your life. She’s very shallow.”
In a 2018 letter to Prince Harry, exclusively published by InTouch, Thomas called his sister a “jaded, shallow, conceited woman that will make a joke of you and the royal family heritage.”
The show’s voiceover announcer promised they “have searched the country and around the world for the most fascinating stars, and I found them.”
Thomas is set to join a star-studded lineup of competitors, including Omarosa Manigault Newman and Caitlyn Jenner to live in the Big Brother “hotel.”
The Suits alum, 40, does not have much of a relationship with her half-brother, who moved out of the family home when Meghan was a toddler, but he’s previously been outspoken about their feud and the royal family’s part in it.
“Since Hollywood and being on that show [Suits] — being a celebrity has changed her,” the window fitter told Daily Mail in August 2018. “Maybe she feels like she is above everybody, maybe even more now. But if she wasn’t with Prince Harry right now — even if she was still on Suits right now — she would have stopped what she was doing to go and visit [her father] and make sure he’s OK.”
He added at the time, “I think [the family’s ongoing feud] got ignored and swept under the carpet for so long. It’s a shame where it’s ended up, especially between her and my father. She’s capable of doing anything, she’s just got to want to do it. If she was to make amends, by all means, she can do that. But she’s got to want to do it.”
Thomas further added that Kensington Palace should have supported their father, Thomas Markle Sr., ahead of the 2018 royal wedding. Thomas Jr. also did not attend the Windsor Castle nuptials.
“They’ve dealt with this kind of stuff for a long time and why they did it this way, that’s the big question,” the reality star claimed. “They could have looked after my dad and he would have been happy. I don’t think he deserves that kind of treatment from her. I think she owes him emotionally, as his daughter, to support him the way he supported her. To see all this go on in the media, from their relationship being so close and so tight-knit all her life to come to this, like, she doesn’t want to deal with him. For what reasons, I don’t know.”
