Pre-wedding jitters or a sign of things to come?
“Oh yes, very much so,” 20-year-old Diana replies with what might be a hint of mischief in her eyes, “looking forward to being a good wife.”
“Gracious,” sputters Charles, then 32, with an awkward smile.
Diana follows up, “I have to say that, you’re sitting there!”
Princess Diana and Prince Charles.Terry Fincher/Princess Diana Archive/Getty Images
Years later, it’s known that Diana often stayed in London while Charles spent time with his longtime love Camilla Parker-Bowles, who would eventually marry into the royal family and become theDuchess of Cornwall(Highgrove is located in Cornwall). And it’s said that Diana discovered around the time of the wedding that Charles and Camilla’s affair had not ended, as she believed it had.
Angela Rippon, who conducted the interview alongside Gardner, looks back on the conversation 40 years later for the CNN series.
“There was something more to Diana,” she recalls, “something that was not the marshmallow or the Play-Doh that was going to be molded into what they [the royals] wanted.”
She continues, “Running through all of it was a backbone, a knowledge of her own self.”
Nick Skinner/Daily Mail/REX/Shutterstock
And it was Diana’s growing sense of self — and the embrace of the public — that, in part, led to the dissolution of her relationship with Charles. After 11 years and two sons,Prince WilliamandPrince Harry, the couple’s separation was announced in December 1992. Their divorce was finalized in August 1996, and a year later the princess died at age 36 in a car crash in Paris.
The scope of her remarkable achievements is explored in CNN’s six-part series, which “re-examines the life of an icon through the lens of modernity: reframing her story to discover the real woman behind the ‘People’s Princess,'” according to a press release.
Dianaaims to show how she was “truly a blueprint for the modern woman.”
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source: people.com
