The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are said to have ‘called the shots’ and given instructions to palace press officers about what information should be made public.

Meghan, 39, and Harry, 36, had a string of clashes with palace staff before their departure to the US, according to the Daily Telegraph.

‘There was a constant dialogue from the couple along the lines of “Why can’t we do this? You can’t stop us from doing what we want to do,”’ a source told the newspaper.

In their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey, the Sussexes insisted they ‘did not have a plan’ prior to stepping down as senior royals.

Harry told the chat show veteran: ‘The Netflix and the Spotify (deals)… that was never part of the plan.

‘We didn’t have a plan. That was suggested by somebody else by the point of where my family literally cut me off financially, and I had to afford… afford security for us.’

But now it has been claimed the couple were in talks with a billion-dollar backed YouTube rival a year before they quit the Royal Family.

The couple insisted they did not have a plan before stepping down as senior royals

The Duke and Duchess are said to have meetings about potential projects with US streaming service Quibi – described as a ‘mobile-based Netflix’ – before their son, Archie, was born in May 2019.

Discussions are believed to have continued until after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex dropped their Megxit bombshell in January last year, according to the Telegraph.

The talks with the now defunct start-up firm are said to have sparked fears the couple could be accused of ‘cashing in’ on their status.

Harry is said to have rushed back from the so-called Sandringham summit with the Queen to meet Quibi executives in London.

The couple are said to have been talks with YouTube rival Quibi before son Archie was born in May 2019

The talks were ‘orchestrated by Meghan’s people in America’, a source told the Telegraph, adding: ‘It was a bit of a secret squirrel.’

A number of sources including Quibi founder Jeffrey Katzenberg and chief executive, Meg Whitman, are said to have confirmed the discussions took place.

The Sussexes were seen as critical to getting the project off the ground ahead of its launch in April 2020.

But six months later, in September, it was on the verge of collapse – with Katzenberg blaming its failure on the coronavirus pandemic.

Around the same time, Harry and Meghan revealed their $112million deal with Netflix.

They later announced a deal to make podcasts for Spotify – although a trailer for their offering was branded a ‘woke word salad’.