Oprah Winfrey reveals what 'surprised' her the most about Meghan Markle interview

Oprah Winfrey has revealed what 'surprised' her the most about the Meghan Markle and Prince Harry interview. 

• Oprah Winfrey has revealed the thing she found most surprising about the Meghan Markle interview.
• The talk show host spoke to Nancy O'Dell on talkshop live this week about the bombshell interview and revealed some behind-the-scenes details of the programme.
• This royal news comes as the royal family has reportedly been warned to 'suspend talks' with Meghan and Harry.

Oprah Winfrey, who hosted the famous interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, has admitted that she was 'surprised' that Meghan Markle 'went all the way there' with some of the allegations of racism made against the royal family.

In March, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex were interviewed by Oprah about their experiences living in California, why they left the UK and Meghan's personal experiences with the royal family.

The no holds barred interview included some shocking revelations, particularly from Meghan, who claimed that a senior royal had concerns about how dark Archie's skin would be.

When the Duchess revealed this on the programme, Oprah's jaw visibly dropped and she said, "What?".

Speaking to Nancy O'Dell about this moment earlier this week on talkshop live, the American talk show host said, "I'm like, 'What? You're going there? You're going all the way there."

The claim was backed up by Prince Harry during the interview, who said that the conversation occurred between himself and another member of his family and it 'shocked' him. However, he immediately refused to identify who the conversation had been with. Following the explosive interview, Oprah confirmed that it was not the Queen or Prince Philip who had made the comment.

Oprah, who was on Nancy O'Dell's show to talk about her upcoming book 'What Happened to You? Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing', also revealed that she hadn't met with the couple prior to the interview - but they had texted.

"Whenever I'm doing interviews with anybody for anything that is significant, I have a conversation with them before."

She said, "I didn’t see Harry and Meghan before but I did text them and say intention is very important to me, tell me what your intention is, so that we can be aligned in our goal. And our shared intention was the truth. They wanted to be able to tell their story and tell it in such a way that allowed them to be as truthful as possible."

"The reason why it was such a powerful interview — first of all, I know how to ask questions, and you [Nancy] know how to ask questions, we all know how to do our jobs, but what makes it powerful is when you have someone else who is willing to be as open, as vulnerable, as truthful, as they [Meghan and Harry] were."

Oprah continued, "So, I don’t give myself credit for that, I give myself credit for asking the questions, but the reason the interview was what it was, was because they answered the way they did."

In a rare occurrence, none of the revelations made in the interview were leaked to the public prior to the programme airing in the US. This, Oprah also says during the conversation, was extremely important so that any clips taken out of their context "could not be exploited".

She said, "It was really important to me that what we put out there in the world was put out at the time everyone could see it and that things didn’t leak, and things weren’t misconstrued before the actual interview happened.

"I remember when we finished doing the interview and that interview was 3 hours and 20 minutes I think, and I stood up and said to the crew, 'We all know what was said here, and how important it is to have the trust of the people who just shared that, and so I’m hoping you all will not go out into the world and share what has happened here.' And nobody did."

"And so, as we were releasing clips to CBS, we were releasing them in such a way that whatever was being put out there could not be exploited. So a lot of time and effort and energy went into it on my part."

The interview, which initially aired on March 7, pulled in a huge 17.1 million viewers on CBS and immediately hit the headlines all around the world.