Mail on Sunday spoke to Mr Markle, 74, for almost nine hours over three days

He reveals he believes his daughter, 36, won't let him see any grandchildren

Her father also says he believes she might be better off if he were to die

When Meghan Markle celebrates her 37th birthday next Saturday, she will doubtless be showered with love and gifts from adoring husband Prince Harry and receive the warmest of greetings from other members of the Royal Family, including the Queen.

But 5,495 miles away in Mexico, her devastated father will spend the day nursing a broken heart.

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For Thomas Markle today claims in The Mail on Sunday that Meghan has cruelly excised him from her life – and he fears he may never see any children that she and Harry might have.

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Retired award-winning Hollywood lighting director Mr Markle has not spoken to his 'beloved Bean' – his childhood nickname for Meghan – for more than ten weeks and claims the rift is punishment for him staging fake paparazzi pictures before the wedding and then daring to speak out in his own defence.

Thomas Markle, 74, lives 5,495 miles away from his daughter Meghan in Rosarito, Mexico

'I'm really hurt that she's cut me off completely. I used to have a phone number and text number for her personal aides at the Palace, but after I said a few critical words about the Royal Family changing Meghan, they cut me off.

'Those numbers were disconnected, they no longer work. I have no way of contacting my daughter,' he says.

'It's her birthday on August 4 and I want to send her a card. But if I send a birthday card to Kensington Palace, or wherever she's living now, it'll just be one among thousands. She'll probably never see it.

'I thought about sending it by Priority Mail Express, but the Palace would probably just soak it in water for three days to make sure it doesn't explode.'

In his most incendiary interview yet, Mr Markle spoke to The Mail on Sunday for nearly nine hours over the course of three days to say he has been left reeling by Meghan's 'sense of superiority' since this newspaper first exposed him for staging a set of paparazzi pictures just six days before the May 19 wedding at Windsor.

And he claimed:

He fears Meghan will never let him see any future grandchildren;

Meghan might be better off if he were to die: 'Everyone would be filled with sympathy for her';

Frustration at the 'mixed messages' he has received, with Harry and Meghan telling him not to apologise for the staged paparazzi pictures debacle, just hours before a Palace aide called and offered to help him 'make an apology';

Reports that he faked a heart attack and is an alcoholic are false.

Speaking at his modest $695 (£500)-a-month rental home overlooking the Pacific in the sleepy Mexican town of Rosarito – a 30-minute drive from the US border – Mr Markle invited the MoS to share cold, non-alcoholic, drinks on his sunny patio as he spoke candidly of the rift with his daughter that he fears may never heal, before adding ominously: 'I won't be silenced.'

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He is soft-spoken but brutally honest. He answers every question thoughtfully, veering between sadness at the 'loss' of his daughter to flashes of anger at the 'confusing' way he has been treated by the Palace.

Aged 74 and 6ft 4in tall, he says his body 'isn't what it used to be' and winces as he rises from his chair, complaining that years of hard graft hanging heavy stage lights for TV shows have left him with bad knees and arthritis.

He also suffers from heart problems and says, astonishingly, that it might be better for his daughter if he died: 'It's lucky I'm still alive.

'The men in my family rarely live over 80 so I'd be surprised if I had another ten years. I could die tomorrow.

Retired award-winning Hollywood lighting director Mr Markle has not spoken to his 'beloved Bean' – his childhood nickname for Meghan (pictured with husband Prince Harry at the polo in Berkshire) – for more than ten weeks

'It wouldn't be so bad. I have something of a Buddhist philosophy about death. Perhaps it would be easier for Meghan if I died.

'Everybody would be filled with sympathy for her. But I hope we reconcile. I'd hate to die without speaking to Meghan again.'

Staging fake paparazzi pictures, including one of him being 'measured' for a wedding suit at a shop in Rosarito that actually sold party supplies, was a 'huge' mistake, he admits.

In an interview with MoS columnist Piers Morgan on Good Morning Britain last month, he apologised for the fake pictures but broke protocol by revealing Prince Harry's political views (he is 'open to the experiment of Brexit' and thinks US President Donald Trump should be 'given a chance').

He also spoke of his daughter's longing for a baby. Mr Markle believes his candour led to him being frozen out: 'What's sad is that some time in the next year Meghan and Harry will have a baby and I'll be a grandfather, and if we're not speaking I won't see my grandchild.

'How tragic is that, to deprive a child of its grandfather because I said a few things critical of the Royal Family?

'They're just like a Monty Python sketch. Say a few critical words about the Royal Family and they put their fingers in their ears, cover their eyes and pull the blinds down. They don't want to know about it.

'I'd spoken to Harry and Meghan and offered to make a public apology for the posed photos, but they said it wasn't necessary.

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'They said an apology would probably only make things worse by dragging the story out a few more days. Then an aide called me saying: 'You have offended the Royal Family but I can help you make an apology.'

Mr Markle was left confused and baffled by the volte-face: 'I was shocked because I'd offered to apologise and been told it wasn't necessary.

'Then suddenly I'm being told that I needed help apologising, as if there's a special way to apologise to the Royal Family.

'Perhaps you do it with gravy and flowers on the side? I was taken aback to be asked if I needed help apologising, like I was a child. That wasn't going to happen.

'Meghan was apparently upset with me for saying that she and Harry will probably have a baby soon.

'But Meghan's been saying that herself for the past six or seven years, talking about how much she wants a family. Harry's been saying it too. That's fine.

'But the moment I say it, I'm persona non grata.

'I tell you, I've just about reached my limit with Meghan and the Royal Family. They want me to be silent, they want me to just go away. But I won't be silenced.

'I refuse to stay quiet. What riles me is Meghan's sense of superiority. She'd be nothing without me. I made her the Duchess she is today. Everything that Meghan is, I made her.'

Mr Markle worked as an Emmy-award winning lighting director on hit US TV shows such as General Hospital and Married With Children before retiring to Mexico eight years ago.

Meghan was sent to exclusive private schools from kindergarten onwards and her father paid for her $30,000 (£23,000)-a-year tuition at Northwestern University, Illinois, with $750,000 winnings from a lottery.

He funded a teenage Meghan's expensive holidays abroad, including a visit to Britain, where she was photographed outside Buckingham Palace.

A proud man, he says he has never asked his daughter for a penny, despite suffering financial setbacks over the years and losing the vast majority of his lottery winnings in a bad business deal. He now supports himself on his pension and social security payments.

He is angry that Meghan has talked about the support her yoga-loving mother Doria – the only member of the Markle family to attend the Royal wedding – has given her, but gives him no credit for her success.

'Oh, she's a mummy's girl now and Doria gets a lot of the credit,' he says, a trace of bitterness in his voice.

'But Meghan seems to have forgotten that she lived with me up until Doria and I divorced, when she was six, and even then I was still a big part of her life.

'Whenever she finished school, I was the one who picked her up because I didn't have to be at the studios until late and would then work until midnight.

'When Meghan was 11, she moved back in with me up until she was 17 and went to college.

'I was having my good years then, making good money, and could afford to give her the best, with a good school, good education, good home.

'She became the woman that she is today thanks to everything I did for her.

'And did I get any recognition for it? Any thanks? She doesn't even speak to me now. How cold is that?'

He says he has been deeply wounded by reports he faked a heart attack to pull out of the wedding because of embarrassment over the fake pictures.

The Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center in San Diego, California, where Mr Markle claimed he had surgery to unblock an artery days before the wedding, said no patient with his name had ever been admitted.

But he says angrily: 'It's disgusting they said I didn't have a heart attack. Hospitals are bound by confidentiality laws and when you check in you can say you don't want your name on their records if anyone calls in to ask.

'I lost 40 lb after my heart attack, so I suppose that's good, though it's a hell of a way to lose weight.' He recently quit smoking after 50 years.

He has been accused of being an alcoholic but says: 'I hardly drink at all, just a little wine with my dinner, nothing much. I don't do drugs, haven't for more than 20 years.

'I've been seen carrying a six-pack of beer and they say I've a drinking problem. I regularly buy a six-pack for the guys on the guard gate [at his gated community] because they're stuck in a hot shack for hours each day and could use a cold one. I don't drink beer at all.'

Mr Markle staged the paparazzi pictures in an attempt to change his image after being photographed with beer and fast food; a plot that backfired spectacularly when the MoS exposed the snaps as fake six days before the wedding.

In the posed pictures, he was shown using an exercise bike, a rusty contraption sitting forlornly in the garden where he conducts this interview.

He was also shown exercising with weights and reading about Harry and Meghan in an internet cafe. But CCTV images obtained by the MoS revealed British paparazzi photographer Jeff Rayner accompanying him into the cafe to set up the shots.

Despite Mr Markle's earlier harsh words, it is still clear he adores his daughter.

Regardless of his misgivings, he plans to send her a birthday card tomorrow: 'Just wishing her birthday greetings, nothing more.'

His eyes fill with pride when he speaks about her.

His longing for a reconciliation is heartfelt: 'Meghan is everything to me. I love her and I always will.'

No money was requested or given for this interview.

'Diana would have loathed the way I’ve been treated': Thomas Markle hits out at Palace for taking 'strained' Meghan away from him... and admits he doesn't care if Prince Harry ever speaks to him again

By Peter Sheridan And Caroline Graham In Rosarito Mexico For The Mail On Sunday

It was perhaps only a matter of time before Princess Diana’s name was invoked in the increasingly fraught outpourings from Thomas Markle.

And so, entering dangerous new waters, Meghan’s father has speculated to The Mail on Sunday that Diana would have ‘loathed’ the way his daughter’s new family has ostracised him.

Mention of his mother, of whom Harry spoke so movingly on the 20th anniversary of her death last year, will be an especially hard issue for him to forgive.

If there is one consolation for the Prince, it is that Mr Markle claims his daughter will be able to help modernise the Royal Family, just as Diana did before her.

Thomas Markle claims Prince Harry's late mother Diana (pictured with her son) would have loathed the way the new Royal couple are treating him

Mr Markle said: ‘They [the Royal Family] have Meghan treating her father in a way that Harry’s mother, Princess Diana, would have loathed. That’s not what Diana stood for.’

He added: ‘Princess Diana is credited with changing the Royal Family, but she wasn’t perfect. She was still very much one of them.

‘I think Meghan’s the one who’ll bring them into the 21st Century, if they’ll let her.’

Perhaps aware that such sensitive comments may risk enraging his Royal son-in-law, he insisted: ‘I don’t care if Harry never speaks to me again, I’ll survive.’

On the other Royals, he has more mixed views. Of the Queen, he said: ‘She can speak to Donald Trump if that’s what she’d rather do, though Lord knows why she agreed to meet with that man.’

Then, as if checking himself, he added: ‘I have a lot of respect for the Queen. I think she’s done a tremendous job maintaining the dignity of the Royal Family in difficult times.’

However, Mr Markle added: ‘Who cares these days about a dusty old crown?

‘Okay, maybe it’s been polished, but it’s an ancient institution, stuck in its ways.

‘Still, I think the Queen has worn that crown rather well, and I think Charles will wear it well too, he’ll be a good king.’

Mr Markle, 74, says Prince Charles (pictured walking Meghan down the aisle on her wedding day) will be a good King

The Prince of Wales is, he believes, ‘a man of fine style and elegance. I admire his choice of tailor.’

It is an ironic comment, perhaps, from a man who was caught posing for fake pictures while supposedly being measured up for his royal wedding suit by a tailor who was, in fact, a party shop attendant.

If such observations risk alienating him yet further from the Royal family, then Mr Markle is untroubled, warning that there may be worse to come.

‘I tell you, I’ve just about reached my limit with Meghan and the Royal Family,’ he said ominously. ‘I’m about to unload on them.

‘They want me to be silent, they want me to just go away. But I won’t be silenced. I refuse to stay quiet.

‘But if Meghan never speaks to me again, I don’t know how I can go on without my heart breaking.

‘I blame the Royal Family. I can see the strain Meghan’s under, it’s in her face. The Royal Family has taken her back to the 1930s, and it’s ridiculous.

‘Oh, she shows a little shoulder here, a touch of ankle there, but she’s not the Meghan I knew for years. You can even see her wondering whether she’s doing it right every time she crosses her ankles rather than her legs.’

Perhaps aware his comments risk deepening the rift between Meghan and her family – including her wayward half-siblings Thomas Markle Jr, 52, and Samantha Markle, 53 – he added: ‘I feel for Meghan, because she does have a difficult family. But it’s still her family.’

'What's in it for me?': Wilful streak Duchess inherited from her mum

Thomas Markle suggests that Meghan has a wilful streak that she inherited from her mother, Doria.

‘Meghan got her attitude from her mother,’ he said.

‘Doria always told Meghan: “If they’re not doing anything for you, why should you do anything for them?”’

He added: ‘I like to think that a little kindness goes a long way. I like to give people the benefit of the doubt.

‘A kind word goes a long way. Meghan’s been an actress for long enough: she’s had to deal with fans, to know that treating them with kindness is best.’

Criticising his former wife is unlikely to win Mr Markle support in Britain, where the public was impressed by Doria’s display of quiet dignity at Meghan and Harry’s wedding in May.

Thomas Markle suggests that Meghan has a wilful streak that she inherited from her mother, Doria (pictured with her the day before her wedding)

Unlike other members of her family, Doria has declined to speak publicly. According to Mr Markle, Meghan should set aside criticism from her half-sister, Samantha, and respond with compassion.

In one outburst, Samantha criticised Meghan and Harry for paying tribute to Nelson Mandela, writing on Twitter: “How about you pay tribute to your own father?! Enough is enough.

‘Act like a humanitarian. Act like a woman! If our father dies I’m holding you responsible, Meg!’

She later said Prince Harry was ‘a wuss to allow the Duchess of Nonsense to mistreat everyone who has been close to her’.

But Mr Markle insisted: ‘Meghan could have won Samantha over with just a few kind words and Samantha would have praised Meghan for all her days.

'Instead, Meghan turned her back on Samantha and now Samantha won’t stop talking negatively about Meghan.’

At least being followed by paparazzi means I'm less likely to be kidnapped!

He was exposed by The Mail on Sunday for colluding with them and he claims to hate them, but Thomas Markle has identified one advantage of being followed by the paparazzi – it reduces the chance of his being abducted.

‘One of the few good things about being followed by paparazzi is if anyone tries to kidnap me we’d have a dozen photos of them,’ he said.

Mexico has around 1,200 abductions a year and Mr Markle, pictured left, believes his daughter’s marriage could make him a target.

Thomas Markle (pictured leaving a convenience store near his Mexico home) has identified one advantage of being followed by the paparazzi – it reduces the chance of his being abducted

‘I was offered security during the Royal Wedding and the Palace sent someone over to discuss security with me,’ he said.

‘Unfortunately I was in hospital with my heart attack when they came and I never saw them. And then when I couldn’t go to the wedding, I never heard about security again.

‘I don’t worry about being kidnapped, even though it’s something that happens in Mexico, with wealthy people held for ransom.

'But it’s a concern that the more I’m written about the more kidnappers might consider me a target.’

As Thomas Markle reaches boiling point with the Palace, Royal author INGRID SEWARD urges Meghan to ring her father... for his sake and hers

What started as a series of unfortunate upsets is in danger of blowing up into something far more destructive.

Lonely and vulnerable, sitting thousands of miles away from his daughter, Thomas Markle has every reason to fear that his beloved Meghan has now turned her back on him completely.

And while the success of her wedding to Prince Harry earlier this year had seemed to secure a special place for Meghan in the affections of the British public, her decision to leave her father isolated threatens to undo that good work – and leave her with a colder reputation.

Yes, his outbursts on these pages about his daughter, Harry, and the rest of the Royals may sound hostile and insensitive.

But who would not have sympathy with a father of the bride who has not even met his new Royal son-in-law?

Is it not a matter of simple duty that his daughter get in touch?

The emotional legacy of Diana is something that her sons, William and Harry, have been at pains to honour, both in their public statements and in their choice of charity to support.

Yet there is nothing warm, supportive or particularly family minded about the position in which Mr Markle now finds himself.

For Meghan’s part, some might imagine that her new-found Royal status is to blame – that she now lives in such a straitjacket of demands, conventions and protocols that communication between father and daughter has become difficult, if not impossible.

Yet this is simply not the case.

No one has been telling Meghan what to do or what not to do when it comes to her personal relationship with her father.

The Queen does not intervene in family matters – although she might wish she had done when it came to the breakdown of her son’s marriage to Diana – so it is up to Meghan how she chooses to deal with her relatives.

In other words, the new Duchess of Sussex is free to repair the damage, and I cannot be alone in hoping she will do so.

Both she and her Prince are suffering from the fallout. It is notable how happy she has been to embrace publicly her demure, yoga-teacher mother, yet her heavy-set father has been less fortunate.

Is she embarrassed by Thomas Markle, the man who, at the very least, was a dutiful father and paid for her to attend a private school?

Meghan is not wholly to blame for the situation she finds herself in, but it was a mistake not to visit her father with Harry before their engagement.

Today, Mr Markle feels that his only outlet is through the media, which is at least prepared to print his true feelings.

Neither media savvy nor particularly sophisticated, he simply wants to be heard.

True, he has worked in Hollywood but his position as a lighting director has in no way prepared him for the extraordinary world in which his daughter is now immersed.

He needs patience and understanding. He does not need to be cut off from all communication with the daughter he loves and who is now one of the most famous people in the world.

His frustration is palpable. His anxiety all too human. And yet his persistence in being heard is embarrassing.

Meghan, like her late mother-in-law, would like to be known as a humanitarian, but she must understand that charity begins at home.

Only she can sort out this escalating problem – and she would be wise to do so.

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Most people understand how difficult families can be, but in her public position Meghan has to be seen to care, or else her hard-earned reputation could be tainted for ever and no one would wish that on her.