Meghan Markle's best pal slams 'malicious' Christmas card photoshop rumours

A close friend of Meghan Markle has come to her defence amid ‘malicious’ rumours that a recently released Christmas photo featuring Prince Harry, their son Archie and herself was heavily edited.

US actor Janina Gavankar, 39, took to Instagram on Wednesday to refute allegations made by various publications that the Duchess’ face had been Photoshopped in the sweet family snap.

The former True Blood star, who has counted Meghan, 38, as one of her best pals for over a decade, was the one who captured the trio’s candid moment on camera while on holiday in Canada.

“So proud to have taken the Christmas photo for one of my best friends and her family,” Janina captioned a gif of the photo that shows twinkling lights above the doting parents as they gaze at their seven-month-old bub.

“Here’s the original that was sent out (cropped to fit IG [Instagram]). ...and to The Mail, I see your campaign against my friend continues. Nice photoshop of my non-photoshopped image,” she continued, suggesting that MailOnline was behind the editing in the first instance.

“Now may we all get back to the spirit of Christmas and not the spirit of maliciousness,” concluded Janina, who is currently starring in Apple TV+’s hit The Morning Show and attended Meghan and Harry’s 2018 wedding.

MailOnline’s Photoshop accusations

The MailOnline, which is the website of UK newspaper Daily Mail, claimed Meghan’s “face has been Photoshopped” in the royal e-card in a story published on Christmas Eve.

The article argued that the former Suits actor’s face appears ‘significantly more in focus’ than her husband’s despite both being ‘roughly the same distance’ from their son.

The MailOnline recruited a photographer to back up their theory, quoting them as saying Meghan’s face had “either been superimposed or enhanced considerably”.

The publication did, however, state that it was not suggesting that the Duke and Duchess edited the image themselves.

And, as it turns out, that statement turned out to be correct as a Twitter user later claimed responsibility for doctoring the image themselves before apparently shutting down their account.

The royal fan @sussexdiary tweeted on Tuesday saying they’d edited the pic in question using the app Remini and explaining “a lot of fan accounts use it to fix blurry pics”.

It was announced in October that the Harry and Meghan were launching legal action against the MailOnline’s sister paper Mail On Sunday after the newspaper published a letter from her to her father, Thomas Markle.

The Sussex’s private Christmas

Aside from releasing their low-key Christmas e-card and a posting a festive message on their Instagram account, the Sussexes have been spending a very private holiday season.

It’s thought that Meghan, Harry and Archie are on a six-week break from royal duties in Canada, where the Duchess once lived and worked as an actor.

Their overseas getaway meant they skipped the longstanding tradition of the royal Christmas Day church service which saw their niece and nephew Princess Charlotte and Prince George make their debut.

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