Unnoticed signs in Gwyneth Paltrow’s revealing criticism of Meghan Markle – insiders share with ALISON BOSHOFF the significant hint from a dinner party conversation

In the future, students studying social media and its influence on the world of celebrities will likely analyze the iconic 31-second clip of Gwyneth Paltrow making breakfast. This video marked a significant moment when the facade of formality crumbled between the Academy Award-winning Hollywood star and the Duchess of Sussex.

Appearing without makeup and dressed in pajama shorts that accentuated her long legs, Paltrow, the founder of the multi-million-pound enterprise Goop since 2008, exuded a sense of comfort and grace while preparing what she humorously refers to as a ‘#boyfriendbreakfast’.

Shared on her Instagram account on a Saturday, the caption accompanying the video read: ‘My playful twist on a traditional breakfast: gluten-free buttermilk biscuits, slightly imperfect over-easy eggs, and crispy bacon.’

Gwynnie has been preparing the occasional ‘boyfriend breakfast’ for months now, but there were some details in this one which immediately sparked debate.

Was this breakfast all it seemed or was it actually a subtle, but pointed, mocking of Meghan who has, of course, just launched her TV show and is about to unveil her own lifestyle brand? The salvo was well-timed, too, for the friction between Goop and its ‘Dupe’ may well be coming to a head with Meghan’s new venture into the business of selling ‘curated’ clothes and jewellery – just like Gwyneth does.

Yesterday, the Duchess of Sussex steered her lifestyle business even more firmly into Goop territory with an online shop of handpicked pieces from brands including Saint Laurent, Reformation and J Crew.

Gwyneth has her own ‘G Label’ but also sells handpicked pieces from other brands on her Goop website in an identical way.

So, what is the truth behind the froideur between Meghan, 43, and Gwyneth, 52?

In truth, a chilly distance between the Queen of the Californian coast and the upstart Duchess has been evident ever since the Sussexes moved to Montecito and Meghan started to make friends with many of the wealthy and influential women who had been mainstays of Gwyneth’s circle for years.

Before the Sussexes arrived, Montecito was a sleepy cashmere-clad enclave, a well-kept secret for the Hollywood elite.

Co-CEO of Netflix Ted Sarandos had a weekend place here, and Paramount boss Brian Robbins bought his family hideaway in Montecito during the Covid pandemic.

Oprah Winfrey has her huge house and parcel of land in Montecito and is notable for not spending much time outside the gates.

Ellen DeGeneres is another long-time resident, or at least she was until she took fright over the election of President Trump and moved to the Cotswolds.

Gwyneth has had a home in Montecito since 2016 and moved in full-time fairly recently, having sold up in LA now that her children have flown the nest.

Indeed she has just completed the total renovation of her jaw-dropping eco-mansion, which is bigger and situated in a better road than that belonging to newcomers Meghan and Harry, who moved there in 2020.

In business terms, it’s a David and Goliath story, too. Meghan’s fledgling business, run with the support of Netflix, is going to sell biscuit mixes and jams, at least initially. Its road to launch has been bumpy, with trademark issues and delays.

Gwyneth’s Goop, meanwhile, is a juggernaut in the health and wellness space, with a food offshoot, Goop Kitchen, plus skincare and fashion lines.

Phenomenally successful, it began as a newsletter in 2008 then launched as a commercial company in 2011 (when Meghan had yet to land her role in Suits, and three years before she launched her own minor blog in the lifestyle arena The Tig).

Among the friends of Gwyneth since romanced by Meghan is Whitney Wolfe Herd, founder of the dating app Bumble, who loaned Meghan a private jet in 2023. She and Gwyneth had known one another for years.

Then there’s the fashion designer Tracy Robbins, who invited Harry and Meghan to Kingston, Jamaica, last year for the premiere of the Bob Marley biopic One Love, which was made by her husband’s company, Paramount. She’s one of the guests on With Love, Meghan – but, again, she’s known Gwyneth longer.

Meghan has also fostered a friendship with make-up mogul Victoria Jackson, a long time pal of Gwyneth but now a member of the Duchess’s mahjong crew (she holds game nights with her girlfriends, we are told in With Love, Meghan).

Ted Sarandos and his wife Nicole Avant, were Gwynnie’s friends first too. And as for Ellen DeGeneres, probably Meghan’s most loyal local friend (before she moved to the UK) – she got to know Gwyneth when she was pregnant with Apple in 2003.

Last spring, I’m told there was a very telling episode when Gwyneth hosted a dinner at her house for the cashmere brand Loro Piana. It was a ‘celebratory evening dedicated to the art of living well’.

Oprah was there, and her best pal TV presenter Gayle King. So too were Sarandos and Avant, Whitney Wolfe Herd and Tracy Robbins. Every single one of those guests became a friend of Meghan – Robbins featured in series one of With Love, Meghan, after all, while Oprah came to her wedding. Yet Meghan wasn’t invited to have rhubarb white negronis with Gwyneth and friends that night. 

And now Gwyneth has apparently been ruffled just enough to make her irritation clear.

For there are numerous clues in her breakfast video – with its deliberate shrugged-off-in-a-minute feel – which point to an outbreak of hostilities.

What about that Mona Lisa smile as Gwyneth holds up a coffee mug, jokingly emblazoned with a faux heraldic ‘G’ and ‘B’ (for her and her husband Brad Falchuk)? It surely pokes fun at Meghan’s calligraphic handwriting, of which she is so proud.

It also lands a gentle blow on the pretension of the ‘M’ beneath a crown – yes, a crown – which heads the personal notepaper used by the Duchess of Sussex, who is no longer a working member of the Royal Family.

Gwyneth’s decanting of shop bought biscuits on to a baking tray feels like a tiny swipe at Meghan, too. With Love, Meghan contains a surprisingly large amount of pre-bought goodies, such as peanut butter pretzels.

The feelgood soundtrack – This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) by Natalie Cole – was actually used in promos for Meghan’s Netflix show.

Yet much of the time, it’s the contrast rather than the similarities which are instructive.

A glimpse of Gwyneth Paltrow’s truly beautiful Montecito view, and a peek at her own kitchen, reminds us that Meghan filmed her hostessing tips in a £6 million mansion she’d rented for the purpose.

Gwyneth’s make-up free face and crumpled PJs make Meghan’s expensive wardrobe of neutral cashmere and masses of gold and diamonds look effortful and inauthentic. (As every mother observed upon watching With Love, Meghan, who on earth makes a tomato sauce while wearing a white linen shirt?)

Gwyneth’s kiss with her beloved dog Gaucho surely isn’t a heartless swipe at Meghan, whose late beagle Guy makes a number of heartwarming cameos in her show.

You might think this ‘take-down’ was so juicy it’s bound to be some sort of joint marketing tactic.

But no. There is plenty of evidence that it’s real, not least the fact that Gwyneth follows the clothing brand As Ever NYC on Instagram. That’s the brand which considered suing Meghan over the launch of her jams brand, As Ever. Meanwhile, Gwyneth doesn’t follow Meghan, or Meghan’s actual official As Ever brand, and Meghan is not among the 8.7 million who follow Gwyneth.

Naturally, anything overt would never be Paltrow’s style. Yes, in Dynasty, super-rich rivals Alexis and Krystle thrillingly once came to actual blows (in a lily pond). But in real life, in 2025, this is how very rich women duke it out. On Instagram. With apparently elaborate politeness.

It’s pure Paltrow – who can forget her wonderfully icy micro-aggression after wiping the courtroom floor with her accuser following a trial over a ski crash: ‘I wish you well.’

Only a week previously, Paltrow appeared to be mellowing towards her rival. Speaking to Vanity Fair magazine about her acting comeback in forthcoming movie Marty Supreme, she was seemingly gracious about Meghan.

Or was she?

‘I don’t know Meghan and Harry. I’m surprised, given how close they live,’ she said, adding: ‘I mean, I’ve met Meghan, who seems really lovely, but I don’t know her at all.’

She went on: ‘Maybe I’ll try to get through their security detail and bring them a pie.’

The Oscar-winning actress then seemingly welcomed Meghan into the lifestyle space.

‘[When] there’s noise about certain women in the culture, I do have, always, a strong instinct to stand up for them.

‘I was raised to see other women as friends, not foes. I think there’s always more than enough to go around.

‘Everybody deserves an attempt at everything that they want to try.’

And yet surely this was the faintest of faint praise?

An attempt? At what they want to try?

Treating Meghan, who is so proud of what she achieved with her lifestyle blog The Tig as a bare beginner is surely the most deliciously pointed barb of all.

Gwyneth’s many followers and fans are certain they have been able to read her message to Meghan with ease.

‘Love this,’ wrote one online of her video. ‘No fake house, fake kitchen. Just your beautiful true self. Such a breath of fresh air to see.’ Another said: ‘What no edible flowers?’, referring to the plentiful sprinkling of flowers in Meghan’s show.

A few called Gwyneth out in comments on her video for being ‘threatened and petty’ and ‘declasse’ for apparently swiping at her younger rival.

But on X, formerly Twitter, many were greeting the feud with undisguised glee. ‘She doesn’t even need to say a word. Authentic, better in every single way in her pjs no make-up & so elevated,’ one commented.

Another wrote: ‘Gwyneth Paltrow continues to throw shade & I’m here for it! No make-up in her actual kitchen! And being as relatable as she can be, in her pjs, hair not styled, no make-up, sipping coffee. No one praising her. Just her phone filming. Simple and easy.’

Within a few hours, Meghan had posted her own breakfast-making on Instagram.

This time she was in a kitchen – not the one rented for the show – with Kelly McKee Zajfen, who is a friend of Gwyneth’s too.

The two women are shown ‘making’ a breakfast which is a single banana split, drizzled with yoghurt, berries and granola… and eaten with a flourish and a knife and fork.

‘Voila!’ says Meghan. After taking a mouthful she then inexplicably says, ‘Cheers!’ to her friend, who has also eaten a mouthful of banana using cutlery.

She captioned the reel: ‘When one of your besties reinvents a banana split for breakfast.’

What are we to make of breakfast wars? Perhaps that Meghan is not going to let Gwyneth ‘mean-girl’ her and have the last word.

And maybe Gwyneth isn’t the only person who wants to hold Meghan slightly at arm’s length.

There is persistent talk that Oprah, having landed the interview everyone wanted with Meghan in 2021, has been distancing herself from the actress-turned-philanthropist ever since.

It certainly seems curious that Oprah does not follow Meghan on Instagram.

She does, though, follow her long-time friend Gwyneth.

In the blistering take-down of the couple in Vanity Fair earlier this year, one anonymous neighbour was quoted as describing Harry and Meghan as clueless and saying they were ‘the most entitled, disingenuous people on the planet’.

We are all now left wondering just which one of those wealthy and famous neighbours might have offered such an unflattering opinion. And if a few of them share it.