James Blunt has said “vitriolic” press coverage of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex is “leaning on bullying”.
The singer, who attended the couple’s wedding in 2018, said he has spoken to the couple about the critical attention they have received.
In the ITV documentary Harry & Meghan: An African Journey, Meghan described her past year as a member of the Royal Family as “hard” and said she was not prepared for the intensity of the tabloid interest.
'I really tried to adopt this British sensibility of a stiff upper lip'
The Duchess of Sussex admits she's tried a coping mechanism to manage the pressures that come with marrying Prince Harry #HarryAndMeghan https://t.co/GWs5KfuovM pic.twitter.com/XctGTpk94l
— ITV News (@itvnews) October 20, 2019
Blunt told Good Morning Britain: “I do know them, I might have spoken briefly about it.
“What I think I can see is that they seem to be on the cover of the newspapers a lot and it seems to be vitriolic quite a lot of the time.”
He added: “Him I know from the army, he’s a very nice man, a really phenomenal soldier, who does a lot of work for other people, for charities, for veterans, for Sentebale charity, for children in Africa, and I think under great scrutiny they seem to try a lot for other people.
“So the vitriol seems a bit like leaning on bullying to me.”
Blunt, whose new album Once Upon A Mind is out later this week, also discussed how he deals with criticism online.
The You’re Beautiful singer has developed a large Twitter following because of his pithy responses to trolls.
He joked: “If I’m honest I don’t write them myself, Prince Philip does it for me.”
He added: “We are really unpleasant to each other online, the real world seems to be so positive.
Because I can’t find any. https://t.co/ax82ZAVAvo
— James Blunt (@JamesBlunt) November 18, 2018
“I do these concerts to thousands of people and then people say ‘How are you dealing with all the negativity?’ and you go ‘What negativity?’
“It’s just dedicated to Twitter and online and I think we should laugh at ourselves for even focusing on that.
“We should be focusing on the real world, which is much more positive.”