Hark! Is that a loud, dissonant crashing sound we hear coming from a certain mansion in Montecito? Could it be that sustainably-sourced, eco-friendly crockery, yours for a very reasonable $250 a soup plate plus a donation to an indigenous cause of their choosing, is being hurled Chez Sussex? Imagine the aggrieved exchanges between Meghan and Harry as another deal falls apart amidst harsh criticism from industry insiders:

“WHAT? They actually expected us to WORK for the money? Don’t they know who we are?”

The Duchess thought she had put all that kind of tedious hard graft behind her. After marrying the fifth in line to the throne and establishing a base in the States, she and her husband would trade on their royal fabulousness. All those Hollywood types who had remained oddly immune to Meghan Markle’s charms when she was just a wannabe actress/Deal or No Deal suitcase girl would now genuflect before her title. She would savour that.

Pious podcast platitudes about female empowerment – well, one female’s empowerment anyway – would be a sizzling hot property. Glittering guests would line up to take a largely non-speaking role in madam’s Archetypes show. Hundreds of millions of dollars would be strewn in their princely path simply because hereditary power (which they affect to disdain because, uh, you know, “fairness and equity”) gave them the magical ability to spin self-pitying chaff into gold.

It was a genius idea. Harry and Meghan would be the first non-working Content Producers in history. The “content” they sold to Spotify and Netflix would be themselves. By prostituting their royal credentials to the highest bidder, they would be raking it in for years to come.

Except the Duke and Duchess failed to take one crucial thing into account. Hollywood is a ruthless place. Even if you have abundant talent (which H&M don’t), even if you slog your guts out to please (which they certainly don’t), you can be dropped in an instant, your contract cancelled, the lustre chipping off your stardom like week-old nail polish.

In the UK, Meghan and Harry’s royal status might still have commanded respectful treatment (despite what they say about the tabloids). Not in LA. “F---ing grifters,” is what Bill Simmons, a Spotify executive, called the couple after the streaming giant pulled out of its $20 million (£15.7 million) deal with them after just one series. Simmons, who is head of podcast innovation and monetisation, did rather blow a hole in the “mutually agreed to part ways” story. On his own podcast, the splendidly frank Simmons said, “I have got to get drunk one night and tell the story of the Zoom I had with Harry to try and help him with a podcast idea. It’s one of my best stories … F--- them. The grifters.”

Grifters is an American term which roughly translates as scroungers out to make a fast buck. As I learned when I was on my marathon US book tour (23 cities in 25 days), the one thing Americans dislike more than a grifter is a “whiner”. Even those with good cause for complaint are wary of appearing “whiny”. It looks ungrateful and Americans are very hot on gratitude. (Note, even the biggest names always take care to say how grateful they are for the oppordunidee.) Somehow, the Sussexes have pulled off the disastrous double-whammy of being whiny grifters.

Here’s the marvellous Bill Simmons again: “You live in 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.”

After such stinging, spot-on criticism, it is starting to look like open season on the deluded pair. One of the entertainment industry’s most powerful figures, Jeremy Zimmer, chief executive of United Talent Agency, piled into the growing censure this week, saying he was not surprised by Spotify’s decision. “Turns out Meghan Markle was not a great audio talent, or necessarily any kind of talent,” he told the news website Semafor in Cannes. “Just because you’re famous doesn’t make you great at something.”

Ouch! Such nicks and cuts to the couple’s reputation create blood in the water and, before long, the sharks start circling. More damning stories emerge. According to the Wall Street Journal, Taylor Swift got an aide to reject an invitation to appear on Archetypes, calligraphed in Meghan’s own fair hand. Who knows, maybe Taylor, who made her first recording aged 15 and is now worth the best part of $1 billion, didn’t feel it was appropriate for her to bitch with marry-into-a-fortune Meghan about “the labels that hold women back”.

An author, also invited to be a guest on Meghan’s podcast, said that when she arrived she was interviewed by a producer. She didn’t speak to Meghan; never even met her. Allegedly, the recording was then “edited” with the Duchess’s voice spliced in to pretend she had carried out the interview herself. How rude, how utterly lacking in class. Apparently, this experience was not unusual. Meghan would only have “conversations” with the most famous guests.

Well, what do you expect from a woman who, during a royal tour of Australia, is said to have moaned, “I can’t believe I’m not getting paid for this.” (All the poor thing got was a £32 million wedding and an ancient title to flex like a Platinum Reserve card.)

Add to that the rumoured “brainstorming” session with Harry in which the Duke suggested he should interview big names like Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump to talk about their childhood traumas and the effect it had on their mental health. Thereby improving “world peace”. Of course, this presumes that Prince Harry has a brain to storm in the first place.

“Hey, Vlad, will you withdraw troops from Ukraine now you realise your anger stems from your mother stopping you going to a birthday party when you were seven?”

“Nyet, idiot boy!”

So, what next? At a time when the Prince of Wales is launching a serious scheme to abolish homelessness, his younger brother is a laughing stock. Harry & Meghan was Netflix’s biggest documentary debut ever, but mining their personal grievance-lode offers ever-diminishing returns. Harry’s autobiography, Spare, was successful because someone else wrote it. Meghan’s animated children’s film has been cancelled, sparing us its tooth-rotting worthiness (“the adventures of a 12-year-old girl who finds inspiration in a variety of influential women throughout history … Mum, can we watch Mission: Impossible?).

The Sussexes’ deal with Netflix runs until 2025, but the Wall Street Journal talks ominously about a “graveyard of video projects that were never made”. Corporations which have handed over vast sums are “underwhelmed” by their lack of productivity. The couple are said to have “struggled to make content beyond their own experiences”, the paper claims.

Well, yes, obviously. Trapped in a velvet-padded echo chamber, Meghan and Harry have a hard time grasping that anything exists beyond their own privileged experiences. Denied the deference that was once theirs to command, they now stand cruelly exposed as workshy and entitled in both senses. Allegations of racism and tantrummy flouncing out won’t rescue the situation in the US. The sharks scent blood. The royal credit card is maxxed out. Ginge and Whinge are in trouble.