Princess Diana: The Untold Story of the Queen of Hearts – HT
On a day like thousands of others, Diana, Princess of Wales, came out of her palace to see and be seen. It was a ritual, a formula, an unchanging routine. And what made it so special was her sense of style and fashion, her warmth and kindness. This was her role, her work, the reason for her inimitable performance and the cause of the overwhelming media attention that claimed her as its own.
If ever she doubted the sense of it all, she found her answer in the happiness she gave the sick and afflicted. But a year after her divorce and the loss of the title, her royal highness, Diana was ready to leave all this behind. The catalyst was Dodie Alfired, 42-year-old playboy son of Harrod’s owner, Muhammad Alied.
Diana, as a guest of the Alfred family aboard their luxurious yacht, the Johnny, had fallen in love with Dodie. >> And she said, “Elza, I adore him.” Not even naming him. I adore him. I can’t tell you for the first time in my life someone has looked after me so wonderfully. I feel that is interested in me.
I feel I can’t tell you how good they are to me to my morale. I mean she was enthusiastic. I said are you going to marry him? She said, “I can’t answer you as I’m coming to see you either Thursday or Saturday.” Saturday she was dead. For 15 years, Diana lived in Kensington Palace. With mostly just her staff for company, she had tried to create a family home.
She surrounded herself with momentos of her Spencer family ancestry, her fabled but flawed marriage, and above all of her two precious sons, constant reminders of her broken dreams. >> I think they were instrumental um especially at the time of the separation and the divorce. I think as all children do, not wanting to alienate either side and okay, in some respects they were slightly the go-betweens and yet um they always were very careful not to upset Diana by mentioning things they knew would upset her and they always
said, “Daddy loves you.” Charles was truly her prince charming. He was the one that um she was always in reference to throughout her life. Even towards the end, even any other relationship would always be kind of compared to or contrasted with her relationship with Charles. He was her reference point. >> Diana and Charles shared the custody of the boys, and in July 1997, she took them on holiday with Dod’s family aboard the Jonicle.
Following her divorce, Diana’s life centered around her sons. >> But the children, don’t forget, she took them on the boat and they had a wonderful time. Not probably William. William was not so happy. But the little one was thrilled all the games, all the thing. And it was probably to accustom them to the situation. And when I asked her are you going to marry him and what your children reaction she said Ela I rang up William.
So it was the answer and he said mommy I want you to be happy. Diana would have never married Doy without the consentment of the two children and Prince William more than that because she always said that Prince William was her anchor and she admired the boy enormously and she loved she loved the other one very much Prince Harry but she always said Prince Harry is a m is like a Spencer I don’t have worries about him but uh I think that the future king Prince William has the sense and sensibility of Diana As heir to the throne, William and his
brother Harry carry with them the traditions of the royal house of Windsor. Diana knew that any stepfather would have a very delicate role to fill. She also recognized that her sons were very much part of the Windsor household. Um I’m sure she wouldn’t have married somebody that they absolutely detested, but um I think she would have done her best to sort of bridge any gaps.
And she had already mentioned to me that she thought the Alfred family provided rather a nice context for William and Harry, that there was this sense of family and sense of warmth and that um Muhammad Ali was quite fatherly towards them. In the early years of family life, Diana felt at home in the country.
When her marriage broke up, she lost the country home highrove and the family life that had been her childhood ambition. Like their mother, William and Harry became products of a broken home. I think you’re right. >> Diana compensated by taking a dominant role in her children’s lives. >> She was concerned about the role of monarchy, about the paparazzi and how that might disturb her boys.
And she was also very concerned that they weren’t going to grow up spoiled or sort of too much within that tradition. And she used to love taking them to see, you know, the homeless and wear the jeans and just, you know, go down to brass tax. I mean she was terribly concerned that they should see that side of life and she drumed into them the most amazing good manners which she herself had absolutely impeccable um which is just such an asset and something I think she found rather lacking within the royal family.
Following her unhappy experiences within the royal family, Diana shaped the boys in her own image and likeness. In the words of her brother Earl Spencer, Diana wanted their souls to sing freely. She would really want them to lean on each other and to remember as well together the times they had with their mother.
With her sons away at boarding school, Diana had to fill many long and lonely hours at Kensington Palace. >> Her friend was the telephone and she really did have the hotline to all sundry. Diana regularly invited friends to lunch, often greeting them herself in the forcourt. Security and protocol prevented people from just dropping in.
Isolated by her position as a princess, people came by invitation only to dine at Kensington Palace. >> The food there, as I said, was both beautiful, delicious, and incredibly healthy. Um I can remember one summer um there was sort of like an orange sorbet with beautiful nesters flowers all around the outside of these crystal plates.
She always had stunning flowers on the table of course and the food um lots of soulets cheese soulets spinach soulets um chocolate soulets sometimes very naughty ones but um mainly um it was sort of elegant food that she liked. I remember also once asking her that if she could choose a single item, if she sort of was locked away or sort of cast aside on a desert island, what would she take with her? And she said, “Oh, my juicer.
” She said immediately. And I thought, “What a strange thing to say.” And then she went into the whole business of, you know, look at this. You know, we can have 20 cucumbers blended down into this thing and it’s fantastic for your skin. And her skin was absolutely terrific. So, it obviously worked, but that’s the thing she swore by.
Diana’s day began at dawn. She slept badly. After many restless nights, she relied on exercise to face the pressures ahead. Before most people had arrived at work, Diana had already driven the short distance from Kensington Palace to Buckingham Palace to swim 20 lengths in the private pool there. Then it was on to the gym for a strenuous workout, often with a personal trainer.
In a quest for maximum fitness, she experimented with many exercise techniques. Health was um something which fascinated her all her life. She adored swimming. She was a real fish and she said that really relaxed her. She was an absolute fiend for the gym, but she said that gave her energy to begin with.
Also she you know played a lot of tennis which she said got rid of her anger when she was feeling very frustrated. So she recognized that exercise was terribly important for sort of releasing her feelings in a way. Those feelings arose from the broken promises and the betrayal of her youth. At 19 as Lady Diana Spencer she had no idea of the way ahead.
Marriage to Prince Charles was the culmination of her teenage dreams. >> She was to be the Princess of Wales and future Queen of England. >> Well, the day after the princess’s engagement was announced, her mother, Mrs. Shanki brought her into our shop and there was a great deal of excitement and her mother wanted to help her choose her truso.
So we showed her our new spring collection which she was very excited about and she asked us to also design for her some very specific things. And the the first outfit she chose from us was in fact a navy blue sailor’s suit which then appeared on the official first picture together with the queen and Prince Charles. She had been previously photographed just with Prince Charles on his own announcing the engagement.
But this was the first official picture with the queen. There was a tremendous change in the way the princess dressed over the years. Initially, when she first became known to the general public, she hadn’t learned what photograph well, how things reacted sitting in a car, standing, windy days, all those things have to be taken into consideration when you make clothes for a member of the royal family. She was quick to learn.
She made a lot of mistakes in the beginning, but she grew up fast. Once she learned the basic rules of royal dressing, she made them her own and she learned to use the styles that were current in fashion in absolutely the right way. From the start, Diana’s face became instantly recognizable. Her youthful good looks were seized upon by the professionals for magazines and souvenirs.
The photographers and makeup artists recognized her potential as a great beauty. Oh, the first thing that struck me was the color of her eyes. They were such a beautiful blue, so clear. But I thought I couldn’t find a color that would complement the eyes. So, what I did was I used a contrasting color. I did a brown, basically a brown eye makeup, which brought out the blue of the eyes.
To really emphasize them, I just to use a colored pencil, a blue pencil to match the color of her eyes along the bottom rim above the bottom lashes, which just emphasized the whites and brought out the blue of her eyes. I used navy blue mascara because I find it’s very flattering on people with blue eyes and it doesn’t look as hard as black, especially in a photograph.
I wanted to get this blue across, you see. So, I sort of had this haze of blue, which I achieved with the navy blue mascara. And then using a darker blusher under the cheekbones to push them in, sort of following the shape. Basically, if you smile, you lift up the cheek pads and you leave that color, leave that area alone, and you apply the blusher underneath and that sinks in that area there.
We had a hairdresser on on the shoot, but uh he didn’t have to do very much to it apart from just run his fingers through the fringe to lift it off the eyes so I could get to the eyes to make them up. >> Blue became her favorite color in clothes and jewels. Gad, the crown jewelers, was asked to create Diana’s engagement ring.
They prepared a selection of magnificent gems for the young bride to choose from. In Gard’s workshops, skilled craftsmen use their expertise to make the most famous engagement ring in the world. I think it was a very romantic gesture for Charles and Diana to choose that huge sapphire and diamond cluster uh which of course suited her fantastically well because of her wonderful blue eyes and the size I think was just right.
It was also a very traditional ring. I mean, the saffron and diamond cluster is the the most popular combination or it was the most popular combination at the time in the 80s. And it helped her make her mark as a as a princess, as a very bejeweled and beautiful princess. For her going away outfit, Diana’s choice was a deliberate contrast to her extravagant fairy tale wedding gown.
One of the things she particularly wanted to have was an outfit that actually had a straight skirt. She felt that was very grown up, very sophisticated. She was very specific about the color. She loved a coraly shade and she asked us to design an outfit that had a little jacket. So, in fact, it was a dress and a jacket.
and she was worried about what kind of a day the wedding would be. So we designed in fact two jackets, one with a short sleeve and one with a long sleeve. And as it happened, the day of the wedding was a gloriously sunny day and she wore the short sleeve jacket. >> A few months later, Diana was expecting her first child, and her adoring public were overwhelmed.
Her fashion designers set to work on the creation of a stylish maternity wardrobe. This was the coat she wore on the day her pregnancy was announced. The fabric for that particular coat was a multicolored tweed in a lot of very bright colors which she loved the texture of. And when we showed her a pattern of the particular fabric, she said, “Oh, that’s great.
That will make a wonderful coat, and I’d love it to have some kind of fringing around the collar. >> In spite of her pregnancy, many of Diana’s days were still devoted to tedious public duties, but she was still expected to look like a princess, wearing appropriate outfits. When it was officially announced that the Princess of Wales was pregnant, she came in to see us and we designed for her a group of coats, day dresses, and long evening dresses that were very specific.
And the turquoise coat was specially designed for the Princess of Wales to wear at Windsor during Christmas. And it was in turquoise velour and it had multicolored little flowers embroidered around the yolk of it. It was rather romantic and slightly peasant in mood. >> Four royal generations celebrated the christristening of Prince William, born in June 1982.
Princess of Wales asked us to design an outfit for the christristening of Prince William. And the christristing was held at Buckingham Palace. And we in fact designed for her a pink prince silk dress and little tie bolaro jacket which she then later wore in Australia. Diana’s first major tour in 1983 lasted 6 weeks.
She said she was a different person by the end of it. She began to feel more liberated from the stuffiness of British royal court. Two years later on her second Australian tour, Diana experimented with royal heirlooms. Queen Mary’s emeralds were a wedding gift from the queen and Diana added her own sense of style with an exotic twist. Again, Diana was very inventive, very original in the way she used these um beautiful emeralds. um historic stones.
Um and she had great courage. She wasn’t in in awe of them. And she took the Cambridge emeralds and turned them into again a choker, a fairly narrow choker, which she also wore again as a bando, very 20s style. Um was a very young and exciting look. And she wore the bando round her head uh during the tour of Australia when she took to the floor swept off by Prince Charles.
And again, it’s a very memorable image of the young Princess of Wales. In America, in 1986, Diana wore her most fabulous jewels to dine and dance at the White House with President and Mrs. Reagan. She had cleverly adapted her beautiful sapphire brooch, a wedding present from the queen mother into a stunningly elegant necklace.
The huge again the dramatic sapphire and diamond cluster which had which was a present to her from Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother is the most spectacular piece of jewelry. And at the beginning she wore that huge sapphire and diamond cluster in a rather conventional way, rather traditional way.
And then um as her style developed, she began to impose her own personality, her own style, to wear her jewelry in in very new and fresh and original ways. And it became one of her signature pieces, particularly towards the end of her life when she began to wear those uh spectacularly sexy evening gowns with just one huge piece of jewelry.
Among the gems amassed by Diana, the 2 million pound wedding gift from the Saudi royal family was the most staggering in quantity, beauty, and value. One of the most important of her wedding gifts came from the crown prince of Saudi Arabia. And it was a whole suite of of jewels. But her favorite piece from this suite was a necklace um of a necklace of diamonds on which was hung a huge Burmese sapphire surrounded uh in a much more modern style with baguette diamonds in a setting that we call a ballerina setting.
>> The Saudi suite was adapted to suit Diana’s taste. She made a choker from some of the gems. The most dramatic change she made to that set was to create for herself uh a choker with the sapphires on a band of velvet which she wore not only as a choker but also as a bando around her head around her forehead very 20s style.
Um and this was something that she did was great fun. She did it on on several occasions and again very much made her mark through her jewels as the new and dazzling Princess of Wales. During an official visit to Germany in November 1986, Diana wore a fabulous set of jewels, a gift from the Sultan of Aman comprising a modern diamond necklace and matching earrings.
It was known as the crescent set. Worth around1 million, it became one of Diana’s favorites, and she wore it with both historic and contemporary jewels. Diana was very clever in mixing old and new. As I said, this was a very contemporary design and she wore it very well with with the Spencer family tiara or with the uh love knot tiara.
And so she created a very special, very royal, very regal look for herself by combining the old and the new in this way. >> Diana’s most important royal heirloom was the Queen Mary’s lover’s knot tiara given to her as a wedding present by the Queen. It emphasized Diana’s regal position. She used her own personality um to make the tiara part of her of her image and the lovers not tiara which was a wedding present to her from her majesty the queen I think has created some of the most dramatic images of of Diana that we will all remember and
cherish. It is too much a part of of Diana’s legend. I don’t think anyone could wear that again. So it’s difficult to imagine what will happen to them. She loved to surprise. So, she loved that element of wearing something that took all the press and the media by surprise. And she loved clothes that looked sexy on her.
I think she was able to wear very stylish things when the occasion was right. And um I think that young people probably in each different age of the princess related very much to the certain things that she did. She loved to wear things like pattern stockings and saucy sweaters that had funny motives on. And of course the royals do have two very specific wardrobes.
They are functional clothes that are seen by the public and then they have a private wardrobe. And in her so-called private life, which wasn’t very private as far as the media was concerned, she enjoyed wearing very casual, fun fashion clothes that made up the wardrobe of any young girl of her generation. In her offduty moments, Diana enjoyed the early days of motherhood.
Unlike previous royal heirs, her boys were not educated at home with private tutors. School runs became part of everyday life. By now, Diana had matured. She’d grown decisive about her clothes and her image. She liked to put the dress on, look at herself in it, and that was it. She never fiddled. She never changed things.
She left it entirely up to you. She was very professional in the in the fact that she would listen to what you said and go along with it. She could wear almost any color and the spectrum was enormous. She looked very good in pastel colors and she could wear strong colors extremely well. For Sandringham at Christmas, the princess wore a coat dress in purple tweed with a white and purple striped collar.
Princess loved blue, but she loved red. And in fact, she loved color. And she had a very wide spectrum of colors that suited her, which not a lot lot of women do have, cuz she had fair hair, but skin that really reflected most colors. She looked wonderful in color. >> Diana was very interested in colors. And she went through a long period where she felt only comfortable wearing black and she would say to me, “I just can’t really wear any other color at the moment.
Um it’s it’s just an introverted color. She’d kind of gone into herself. She’d withdrawn from public life and um I think she felt very sort of contained in black. And then we saw her later on towards the end of her life just blossoming in these incredibly vibrant colors. The last time I saw her, which was on July the 30th, I had lunch with her and uh she was wearing the most stunning Versace tulip neck dress in sort of shocking pink and she just looked fantastic.
So, she was very colorful towards the end of her life. Diana displayed her most adventurous styles and daring clothes during her regular visits to America. In the early days, it was her hairstyles that really caught the attention of the fashion editors. >> Generally, women grow into their hair. I mean, I think during the sort of 18, 19,20 age group, you were finding out what your hair does and doesn’t do.
And most of us are allowed the 20s to experiment, but the princess was not allowed that because obviously the media attention was so huge. So, I suppose she very sensibly got herself organized with hairdressers who um could deal with the way she wanted it. But that is what happened to her hair as far as I can see is it’s all to do with rel relation to the neck and as she became more um aware that she could expose her neck.
So the hair started to come up and get shorter and shorter and shorter. And as her confidence grew, she was able to deal with much shorter hair. And the princess very soon came round to thinking well you know maybe I’ve got this nice thing here and the jawline and the the chokers and the bit and if I get goes up up.
Diana quickly learned that carefully chosen accessories added a crucial finishing touch that could make or break an outfit. >> In the 1980s, Diana had more than 75 hats in her wardrobe. I think in the early stages, she wore them in the way English women wear hats to weddings, plonked on the head with a veil pulled over or the fluff, the feather.
And now and she in very very very fast we found her wearing them where they should be worn which is across here. I mean despite the fact that the photographers probably couldn’t get into the eyes or couldn’t see anything but she really im almost immediately maybe two years into being the princess of Wales and having to wear a lot of hats she suddenly realized she had to wear them the way they should be worn because she has great shoulders and terrific posture.
She looks marvelous with those you know very broad hats. And once you wear those hats you actually begin to like wearing them. With her natural elegance and grace, Diana grew to enjoy wearing wide-brimmed hats complimenting her formal outfits. Generations of royal ladies have loved pearls. They bring light to the face and a touch of glamour to any outfit.
Diana added costume jewelry as well as real pearls to her collection. I think it’s hard to talk about Diana’s jewels or any Princess of Wales jewels without talking about pearls. Um, she wasn’t frightened by the by the heritage of pearls in in royal jewels. She wasn’t frightened by protocol to experiment with wearing pearls in in different ways.
But they’re so bound up with with the legend of royalty and particularly with the Princess of Wales that again they became part of her they became her her trademark in the 1980s. And there’s one memorable occasion when again Diana using her famous wit and her great sense of humor which which we know about she wore um a long rope of of beautiful sumptuous pearls just knotted very casually um down the back of of a dress with a V.
>> Diana looked to an earlier Princess of Wales for inspiration. Princess Alexandra, wife of King Edward IIIth. She was paying a very pretty compliment to the former Princess of Wales, to Princess Alexandra, who had actually been a fashion leader in much the same way as as Diana was to become. Alexandra had made the choker very much her own.
And I think it was it was very witty and very charming of Diana to choose the um Eduwardian choker, Queen Alexandre’s choker. And again, it was a phenomenal success. I mean it launched a million chokers and everyone started wearing Edwardian chokers and that was really this the start of her huge fashion and jewelry influence.
A regular part of Diana’s day involved shopping in Chelsea, the fashionable district of London. One of her favorite stores, Butler and Wilson, sells costume jewelry. Diana mingled easily with other shoppers who were unaware that a princess was shopping next to them. >> She was all so relaxed and funny and would always start laughing when they realized who it was and she just was so great about it and would tell them what she thought about it.
She was always very easy with the staff, always had a great sense of humor and enjoyed shopping. We have seen a lot of very famous people and they never they’re always a foot smaller or they’re not as beautiful as what you imagine. With her, she was the reverse. She was a foot taller than what you imagined. She w she actually glowed.
So she had wonderful piercing blue eyes and she was extraordinary. So whenever she was wearing anything, it always enhanced it. >> On one occasion, Diana bought a fashionable jeweled snake to wear at a pop concert. She went for very classic things, but then she would try something like the snake. She would wear things that were quite adventurous, but she always bought very classic things too that she would that you would see her wearing all the time.
She bought little pair of earrings that were French glass earrings, black French glass earrings. She wore them all the time. They were £5. So, it wasn’t intrinsic things. It was because it went she wore things because it actually fitted with what she was wearing. another famous pair of earrings that she wore all the time or silver earrings just a plain gold.
So she accessorized herself. She was so she would try things from the very simple to the very exciting things. You a big star necklace or a wonderful star pinned on the back of her hair. >> Costume jewelry was easy to wear, but formal occasions often demanded a tiara which presented its own problems. >> It’s a long time to put on the to put on a tiara. You need a lot of help with it.
It’s heavy. you have to have your hair done. Diana complained that it gave her a headache and a neck. Um, and I think at times when she had to prepare for her evenings out very early in the day, uh, she said that she had to wear it all through nursery tea with her with her boys, which uh, must have been a little bit uncomfortable.
>> The demands of the job meant that Diana’s day was constantly updated, but she kept hold of some particular favorites. The Princess of Wales asked us to design a printed silk dress. She said, “I want one that children will relate to. They love bright colors and I want to be able to wear this as a working dress to visit hospitals and generally just an easy dress that I can put on that is very much a function dress.
” And she seemed to like this particular dress cuz she wore it on many, many occasions over quite a few years. And the press of course picked this up and did make a lot of comments about it. Over the years, Diana evolved beyond the decorative princess of her youth into a mature woman concerned with more serious caring issues.
She devoted much of her time to the problems of sick and handicapped children who always responded to her tender touch. >> No other member of the royal family had Diana’s special empathy with children. friends recall her ability to relate to children and her caring side. >> I think she had a touch for that.
She had a touch for children from day one. She had a knack for how to treat children. I think that she always have a tendency for love as I said and people in need. Obviously the disaster if we can call of her marriage help her to asentuate the work in charity because the emptiness she find at home the fulfillment she find towards the people.
In August 1982, Diana attended the wedding of her good friend and former flatmate Carolyn Pride to William Bartholomew. She kept strong links with old friends who knew her as Lady Diana Spencer in the days before her extraordinary and troubled life as the Princess of Wales. These friends knew a side of Diana that the public did not see.
She felt she wanted to go and visit some of the down and outs under the arches at Chering Cross and it wasn’t picked up by the press because it was a sort of thing that she didn’t want publicity for. She didn’t think that they would want her there if they knew she was coming and she felt very much she wanted to put herself over in her own right and that’s why she went and as far as I know the press never picked it up.
>> How will Diana’s friends and former flatmates remember her? went to Australia >> and you >> I remember her firstly as a friend >> and then I remember her as a princess as we all will. I would also remember her as a very loyal, mature, steadfast, strong person. >> She had the most incredible level of compassion.
Um and she was not afraid of illness or sickness or death. And the other thing was about Diana was that she felt particularly with the terminally ill that it was very honest and that there was nothing left to lose and so people lost their shyness. So she could really talk to them and she was quite remarkable and it was her intuition that guided her on every front.
I mean one might say the only time she actually lost her intuition was getting in that car on that fateful night with with Dodie. One of Diana’s closest friends was Rosa Monton. In December 1993, Rosa asked Diana to turn on the Christmas lights in London’s Bond Street, where she runs the famous jewelry shop Tiffany.
She recalls the extent of Diana’s loyal friendship where she supplied endless comfort and support. As a friend, she was a complete stalwart. She stood by me through some very difficult times. And it’s a compassion not not just for her friends but but for other people. And it was a compassion that not a compassion that politicians have that is switched on and off.
It was a genuine compassion that welled up from her heart. >> Diana was godmother to Rosa’s daughter Dominica born with Down syndrome. Rosa remembers Diana’s kindness. >> She was absolutely extraordinary. She was again just stood by me, supported me, let me rant and rave, you know, let me go through all the things I needed to do about not being able to cope.
And she said, “Listen, I’m going to be there for her, for you forever.” And of course, she’s not. >> Diana enjoyed regular holidays abroad with her girlfriends, traveling to exotic locations around the world for some rest and relaxation. She had an extensive circle of friends, but her friendships weren’t without their ups and downs.
>> She had a lot of friends. I mean, and can you imagine the amount of people wanting to be her friend? So, she was spoiled for choice. She could spot a fake a mile off or somebody who just wanted to know her because of who she was. That’s something she was also careful to teach her boys about. Um and she had her her school friends, her friends that she shared the flat with before she married into the royal family.
She also um as her life developed, as her charity work developed too, she began to include people from all sorts of walks of life. Um and she had a tremendous gift for friendship as well. She could um strike this rapport with somebody and then she would follow it through. you know, she would make sure that she called the person.
She had a lot of energy. She was dynamic in terms of friendship. Um, she wouldn’t wait for someone to get in touch with her. She would make all the running and she would make all the overtures. She was a very good friend in that respect. But she did also fall out with people, a lot of people. Um, and when she felt that she’d outgrown them, that was that.
>> When you used to say to Diana, Diana, I’m sorry, I’ve seen this and this and this. It happened this to me very recently and I think you’re making a mistake towards having a friendship with this person and if she didn’t like it she would not call you for two or three weeks and then something will you have a call from her one invitation or why she would through a third person said why Roberto has not come to this dinner party or this do and the person will say because he’s offended with you and then she would come back to you she was very
she was not people say because she was not stable. It’s not that. It’s because she wanted to know as many interested people as she could. That’s the reason she became the queen of popularity. And also she would become annoyed when she she knew you were right, but she didn’t wanted to listen to you. She was very stubborn lady.
>> Diana’s stubbornness led her to ignore the warning signs of her own obsession with bodily perfection. She identified with ballet dancers and actively supported the London City Ballet. Diana suffered from the eating disorder bulimia nervosa, but kept her condition a secret. Well, when she went to see Susie Orbach, the psychotherapist who specializes in eating disorders, um, she really began to get to grips with the psychological mechanism behind the bulimia.
Um, and I think that’s when she really got the insights into her early family life, her childhood, about her mother leaving, about how that created a hunger inside her, how that sort of became translated into a food addiction almost. And um, and also her desire for control. Eating disorders are very much about control.
And Diana was very self-disciplined and wanted to be in control of what was happening. So her body was the first thing that she wanted to be in charge of. One of Diana’s onoff relationships was with her sister-in-law Sarah, Duchess of York. Despite being close friends since their youth, their relationship turned sour.
In fact, um they they weren’t even on speaking terms in the final few months of Diana’s life. >> And I think it was really all symptomatic of of this bulimia. It’s all part of it. You know, wanting to have this friendship, devouring the person, and then that’s it. You know, throw it all up. We don’t want that anymore.
Diana had speech coaching which increased her confidence. At one stage, she even joked about press reports of her eating disorders. >> Have your patron here today. I’m supposed to have my head down the L for most of the day. I’m supposed to be dragged off in a minute with men in white coats. So, so if it’s all right with you, I thought I might postpone my nervous breakdown to a more appropriate moment.
To conquer her bulimia and depression, Diana treated her body with a variety of unconventional and alternative therapies. Well, Diana had an incredibly curious mind about all sorts of alternative remedies. There was virtually nothing that she wouldn’t try. I think actually some of the therapists were sort of horrified because they would think that only their regime should be taken in isolation.
And a lot of these therapies actually contradicted each other. So it created a bit of a chaos actually in Diana’s body to tell you the truth. She had fads as well, but um certainly things like acupuncture were terribly important to her um throughout her life. And uh this also has a spiritual dimension. She even um took her boys to see her acupuncturist and she used acupuncture for um insomnia.
Free from the constraints of royal family life, Diana relied on an inner circle of trustworthy friends to organize her social activities. During a private visit to Rome in 1996, the Italian press swooped on their guest. Following her elder sister Sarah, Diana ran the gauntlet, closely shadowed by her friend Roberto Deereik.
Frenzid scenes abroad were sometimes part of these visits. Somehow Diana kept her dignity and remained unruffled. >> This trip to Rome was organized by Roberto Deick. He recalls that memorable night. last year in July, funny enough, be almost a year before she died. And we went on a trip to a big gala, the Palacio Farna, the French embassy in Rome.
And it was a very extraordinary lavish party. She was overwhelmed with the lavishness of the whole thing. And in the way out, she said, “Let’s go. Let’s go and say hello.” And I said, “Diana, these are the people who cook for you.” And she said, “Well, tell them that was a delicious dinner. Pity didn’t give me more pasta.
” And she gave the hands to each of them and hold the hands and said, “I love Italian food.” Now, she didn’t need to do that. There were no cameras there. There were no paparazzi. She did it from the heart. She made everybody wait five minutes. But can you imagine for those two women, she make their life. And that was the catch.
Diana >> Diana was always welcome in America where her hosts valued her presence to help raise funds for their pet charities. >> She appreciated recognition for her achievements and her charity work and in 1995 she was presented with a humanitarian of the year award by statesman Henry Kissinger. >> She was tremendously fond of people like Kissinger adored sitting next to him at dinner.
They got on like a house on fire. You see, this is the thing that Diana appreciated. Somebody who could um not be so withdrawn with her or shy of her, but somebody who could sort of just connect with her. >> In the final year of her life, Diana grew more serious. The battle against landmines brought a new direction for her. >> Within the treatment, do you cope with the psychological side of it as well? Her trip to Angola in January 1997 publicized the suffering of landmine victims all around the world.
>> Despite criticism from politicians at home, Diana continued her efforts and ignored suggestions that she had become a loose cannon. >> Firing. >> She wanted to show the world the reality of landmines. I think she was trying to make a big contrast from the days of the royal state tours when she would be dressed up with the hats and the outfits and the ladies and waiting.
And I think she just reveled in the fact that we’re coming into the sort of into the ‘ 90s and this feeling of dressing down, of being simple, um, and of really getting on with the job. But she was still incredibly chic. During her life, Diana’s role as the people’s princess focused the world’s attention on many forgotten causes.
Committed to her landmine mission, she had become a serene, confident woman ready for the next stage of her life. It was at a polo match in July 1988 that Diana’s life was destined to change forever. She was invited to present the prizes by the event sponsor Muhammad Al Fed. On this occasion, she was introduced to his son, Dodie.
Nine years later, they fell in love. In the romantic atmosphere of the south of France, they enjoyed a brief summer of love. On the yacht, the Jonicle, Diana planned a new life. I think Dodifiad is it was the the premier example of a person a person like Diana would have. You seek for love, you seek for recognition.
The more you knock the doors, the worse it become. And I think Dodie Fiat has been the fireworks uh into a gloomy period of Diana. >> Diana had finally found the love she had sought since childhood. Her last evening with Dodie was spent at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. I knew that he was so much in love with Diana that at the hotel that same night before they died, he met a cousin of Eve called Hassini.
And that man told a friend of mine. He told him, “What are you doing with Princess Diana?” And I said, “No, I’m very serious.” He said, “Are you?” He said, “I’m marrying her on the 24th of October.” >> Their lives ended in tragedy. For Diana, the bright day was done. She leaves behind a lifetime of memories. Night had fallen forever on the world’s most adored princess.
An unforgettable chapter in British history had tragically come to an end. What would Diana have made of the unforgettable scenes at her funeral? I think she would have been so touched. I’m sure that those would have been the words she would use. Um, completely overwhelmed by the level because she never believed that people loved her.
She I mean she was, you know, the the queen of hearts and yet uh love was something that she was in search of. She never really realized the extent to which people loved her. Heat. Heat.