Vinay Menon: Meghan Markle says she felt like a ‘bimbo’ on ‘Deal or No Deal.’ Now she’s just dangerously annoying

Let’s pretend “Deal or No Deal” is a university and Meghan Markle is a prof.

In this alternate reality, she’s an astrophysicist who teaches Big Bang. But she is forced to wear a red minidress or silky gowns with plunging necklines. In her lectures, she can’t talk so much as emote and grin while opening a briefcase.

In this scenario, we could all understand why Professor Markle might feel like a “bimbo.” And we’d agree with a sentiment she shared this week on her “Archetypes” podcast: “There was a very cookie-cutter idea of precisely what we should look like. It was solely about beauty — and not necessarily about brains.”

Back to reality. “Deal or No Deal” is not a university any more than “The Price Is Right” is an inflationary newsletter published by the World Bank. “Deal or No Deal” is a game show franchise that has aired in dozens of countries since 2000.

And long before she was the Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle was one of 26 “Briefcase Girls” on the U.S. version. Now she has regrets. As she said this week of her “brief stint” on the show: “I would end up leaving with this pit in my stomach knowing that I was so much more than what was being objectified on the stage.”

Frankly, we are all so much more than what we do for a living. That is the nature of modern existence. We work primarily to pay our bills, which is precisely what “Deal or No Deal” allowed Markle to do in 2006 when she was an aspiring actress.

But on her podcast this week with Paris Hilton, the Duchess lamented how producers didn’t care about the international relations she studied in college or ask about her time as an intern at the U.S. Embassy in Argentina, where she was “valued specifically for my brain.”

By contrast: “I was being valued for something quite the opposite.”

Ah, yeah. It’s also why we don’t assess therapeutic masseuses on their expertise of ancient Mesopotamia. I have no doubt there are NFL cheerleaders who could join a huddle and suggest a great offensive play. But that is not their job. There’s a reason male Calvin Klein models do not tag an ad with a sombre analysis of the war in Ukraine and the geopolitical ramifications. Not their job.

Lad, just pout in your midways, flex your six-pack and zip your mouth.

Nobody held a bazooka to Markle’s head to demand she be one of 26 hotties in slinky matching outfits on “Deal or No Deal.” She auditioned for the gig and presumably uncorked champagne after getting it. That job was a stepping-stone, a TV set staircase to be navigated in stilettos. Suddenly, Markle had a steady income — better than most tenured professors — was in a union with health insurance and had TV exposure that would lead to a future role on “Suits.”

Without “Deal or No Deal,” you could argue Markle might now be a hostess at the Rainbow Bar & Grill and married to a landscaper who is screenwriting a rom-com to hopefully star Meg Ryan. But instead of giving a shout-out to Lady Luck, instead of expressing gratitude to the cosmic sequence of events that led her from game show to royalty, Markle is flailing in the quicksand of revisionism.

I get she now wants to be a voice of feminist empowerment. Good for her. But her stroll down the “Deal or No Deal” memory lane makes it sound like she was a surgeon forced to show up in an operating theatre in lingerie. Markle didn’t get that game show job due to her deep knowledge of bilateral treaties between Argentina and Egypt. She was hired as a Briefcase Girl entirely for her looks and there is no residual protein in eye candy. The literal job description is beauty. The rules of engagement are skin deep. If you don’t like it, don’t take the job.

I despise fruits and vegetables and that’s why I’d never open a vegan restaurant. Vanna White has been turning letters on “Wheel of Fortune” for 40 years and never once has she been tempted to offer an impromptu soliloquy on Nietzsche.

Psst. That’s not her job.

Meghan Markle should not be living in her Briefcase Girl past. That gig helped propel her to where she is now. She should be much more concerned about the present and future, and more alarmed she is getting dangerously annoying.

I hate saying that. I have defended the Duchess many times. I think her heart is in the right place. But her brain — what she allegedly wants valued most by the world — is in a sketchy part of town where woke orthodoxy is carjacking critical thinking.

It’s telling that other past members of the Briefcase Girls sorority, including Claudia Jordan, set the record straight this week and said they never felt like “bimbos.”

As Jordan put it: “We got so many opportunities because of that show.”

Indeed. Just ask Chrissy Teigen or Leyla Milani.

But Markle can’t shake the feeling that her time on the show was “all looks and little substance,” even though that is exactly what it was sold as when she signed on the dotted line. If I got a job at Sobeys, I would not object to stocking shelves.

Meghan Markle has no reason to be ashamed of her time on “Deal or No Deal.”

But she is. And that is shameful.

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