Princess Diana ‘Tension’ With Prince Charles Before Wedding ‘Spoke Volumes’ About Marriage

They famously had a contentious marriage and acrimonious divorce, but the signs things may not end well between Prince Charles and Princess Diana were already there prior to their big televised wedding.

In a Channel 5 documentary “For Charles and Di: The truth Behind Their Wedding,” (via New Idea), BBC journalist Angela Rippon revealed the signs of tension she saw in the couple the night before their July 1981 wedding were there then—and that looking back now, they were a sign of everything else that was to come.

“When I say ‘wishing you a lifetime of happiness together,’ he looks towards her and she looks down at the floor,” she recalled. “That expression on Diana’s face at the end speaks volumes...gosh. Might have told so much more about what was to come.”

“And obviously, with the knowledge of hindsight, you read so much more int body language, what was said, looks that were given, reactions, that’s the value of hindsight isn’t it?” she added.

She also recalled that the queen’s then press secretary, Michael Shay, was also in the room at the time, and may have been intimidating to the future princess, who had him within her eye-line.

“When we went into the room, Michael was standing behind me, out of camera shot but behind me and in Lady Diana’s eye-line,” she said.

Sadly, Rippon’s reflections come after the couple did have a very contentious time together and a marriage that was plagued with rumors of infidelity on both sides, though the most famous affair was the one Prince Charles had with his former girlfriend, and future second wife, Camilla Parker Bowles.

In the end, the couple separated in 1992, before officially divorcing in August 1996. Tragedy struck one year later, however, when Princess Diana was killed alongside boyfriend Dodi Fayed in a car accident in Paris.