Grace Kelly was once one of the most sought-after actors in Hollywood. In 1954, she took home the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in The Country Girl, but Kelly is most remembered for her work with acclaimed director Alfred Hitchcock throughout the early '50s. In 1955, the actor met Prince Rainier III of Monaco and a year later, the two were married.
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00:00Grace Kelly became the Princess of Monaco when she married Prince Renier III. But was
00:04married life truly more luxurious than her former life in Hollywood? Here's why Grace
00:08Kelly's marriage was more complicated than you thought.
00:12In 1955, Grace Kelly was on a trip to the Cannes Film Festival in France when she agreed
00:16to be a part of a magazine cover with Prince Renier III. Per Biography, she rerouted to
00:21the Prince's Palace of Monaco for the shoot, only to jet back to Cannes afterward. As her
00:25friend Gone with the Wind star Olivia de Havilland recalled to People, she was in a state of
00:29enchantment. Enchanted she may have been, but the blonde beauty was already engaged
00:33to fashion designer Oleg Cassini. When Kelly called off her wedding to Cassini, he reportedly
00:38bluntly said of Prince Renier,
00:40One of the reasons I believe you're marrying this man is because this is the best script
00:43that you ever received in your life."
00:46And while Grace did indeed get the role of her lifetime, her complicated marriage would
00:49eventually take center stage. In fact, according to the book Once Upon a Time, Behind the Fairy
00:54Tale of Princess Grace and Prince Renier, the actor hinted that maybe it wasn't her
00:58choice who she ended up marrying, as she reportedly told a friend,
01:01Do you realize if my mother hadn't been so difficult about Oleg Cassini, I probably would
01:05have married him? That one decision changed my entire future.
01:09While the union between Grace Kelly and Prince Renier III wasn't officially an arranged marriage,
01:14many have alleged otherwise. As the author of the book Once Upon a Time wrote, Grace
01:18once alluded that her parents pushed her to marry Prince Renier. But what exactly did
01:22a royal have to gain from it?
01:24According to Grace Kelly, The Secret Life of a Princess, at the time, Monaco had an
01:27independence agreement with neighboring France, which ruled that the sovereign city-state
01:31would revert to French control if the Grimaldi royal family failed to produce an heir. Although
01:36Prince Renier was in a relationship with a French actor before meeting Grace, the woman
01:40wasn't able to have children. As a result, the rear-window actor was subject to a physical
01:44examination to make sure the same issue didn't happen to the Grimaldis again.
01:48After the exam and a shocking $2 million dowry, Prince Renier and Grace courted for a mere
01:53two weeks, and then he popped the question. While the marriage may have been political,
01:58it was allegedly economical, too. As film producer Robert Evans claimed in his autobiography
02:02The Fat Lady Sang, it was actually Aristotle Onassis who came up with the idea. For Evans,
02:07Onassis told Renier,
02:08"...the right bride could do for Monaco's tourism what the coronation of Queen Elizabeth did
02:12for Great Britain."
02:14Like any royal wedding, the 1956 union between Prince Renier III and Grace Kelly was a highly
02:19publicized affair. As Vanity Fair details, there were almost 2,000 reporters present
02:23during the ceremony. Plus, MGM filmed the wedding and broadcast it live to over 30 million
02:28European viewers. While there's no doubt a royal getting married is an exciting moment,
02:33it's the historical timing of it that makes it so iconic. As their son, Prince Albert,
02:37told People years later,
02:38"...it was such an incredible affair, and it's left such a mark on people. But what
02:42it's meant for Monaco, for people around the world, and how their story continues to fascinate
02:46people, that's something unimaginable."
02:48While many dubbed the fairy tale the wedding of the century, Grace reportedly quipped that
02:52it was the carnival of the century, per Vanity Fair. Prince Albert indeed confirmed his mother's
02:56anxiousness around the entire event, telling People,
02:59"...Mom said it was overwhelming. It was so exhausting. When they left on their honeymoon
03:03and got on the boat, they both just kind of passed out from exhaustion and had a good
03:06night's sleep before they got on with enjoying their honeymoon the next day."
03:10Of course, being one of the most in-demand actors in the mid-1950s meant Grace Kelly
03:14had a thriving social life. 1954 was a big year for the star, as she received her first
03:18Academy Award nomination and even won her first Golden Globe. At that point, she signed
03:23a seven-year contract with MGM and also began working with the legendary Alfred Hitchcock,
03:27who became her, quote, "...friend and mentor." And in 1955, she won an Academy Award for
03:32her role in Country Girl.
03:33"...When I was acting, my private life was very much my own."
03:38However, Grace Kelly's marriage in 1956 to Prince Renier III effectively wiped her Tinseltown
03:43dreams away. According to Once Upon a Time, behind the fairy tale of Princess Grace and
03:47Prince Renier, Princess Grace would invite her A-list pals to visit her in Monaco and
03:51spend time at the palace. However, Renier would apparently cringe, especially when friends
03:56would call his wife Gracie instead of using her princess title.
03:59The tension between the couple was portrayed in the 2014 movie Grace of Monaco, starring
04:03Nicole Kidman. Sadly, Kelly didn't realize that marrying Prince Renier would mean throwing
04:08her acting dreams aside. Grace told the Los Angeles Times in 1964,
04:13I miss acting. Once you're bitten with the acting bug, you never really get over it."
04:16"...I don't feel as though I achieved enough in my career to stand out more than many other
04:23people."
04:24Unfortunately for Grace, Renier disapproved of the actor resuming her silver screen career.
04:29He reportedly once declared to the press, per Kinfolk,
04:31"...I don't want my wife to work."
04:33This sentiment would continue later on in their lives, too. As biographer James Spada
04:37told the south floor of Sun-Sentinel,
04:39I feel that the prince contributed to her unhappiness in later life. He was not an emotionally
04:44giving person. He did not let her live her own life. When she began giving her annual
04:47poetry readings, her way of finding a means of self-expression, he didn't attend them
04:51for several years.
04:53In the mid-'70s, an opportunity came for Grace to get a taste of her old life back. According
04:58to Once Upon a Time, in 1976, the Rear Window Star's old agent, Jay Cantor, contacted her
05:03about a business opportunity with 20th Century Fox to have Grace serve as the first woman
05:07on the board. To Cantor's surprise, Grace accepted. However, the main reason for Princess
05:11Grace's desire to serve as a board member was the opportunity to be involved in show
05:15business again, as meetings were either in Los Angeles or New York. Kinfolk quotes her
05:20as explaining,
05:21"...it gets me away from Monaco at least four times a year."
05:24If you push aside the apparent fact that Prince Renier III and Grace Kelly came from different
05:28backgrounds, thus causing snags in their marriage, their time together was complicated romantically,
05:32too. In fact, many have suggested that both parties were involved in extramarital affairs.
05:38According to celebrity biographer Wendy Lee, within a mere month of their wedding, Renier
05:42had gotten involved with at least three other women. Lee wrote in her book True Grace,
05:46"...Grace was humiliated and she was extremely unhappy."
05:49Interestingly enough, it's reported that Princess Grace didn't take her husband's salacious
05:53romps quietly. She once reportedly revealed to her hairstylist, according to The Express,
05:58"...I know my husband has affairs with other women. That's very frustrating to me and makes
06:01me very unhappy."
06:03As a result, the former actor reportedly reignited some of her old flames, such as with Marlon
06:08Brando and Frank Sinatra.
06:09"...Not everybody's lucky enough to marry a prince."
06:13Grace Kelly and Prince Renier III had three children, Prince Albert, Princess Caroline,
06:17and Princess Stephanie. However, their familial relations weren't exactly flourishing. Caroline
06:22revealed in Albert II of Monaco, The Man and the Prince,
06:25"...For my brother and I, Nanny Maureen was the key figure in our life. When we were little,
06:29we were probably closer to our nanny than to our parents."
06:32That being said, it's not like the Grimaldi children didn't have any strong ties to their
06:36parents. Albert was apparently much closer to his mother than his father. Albert told
06:40People,
06:41"...Coming to live here and having to behave in a certain way must have been hard for her
06:44at first."
06:45"...My children give me a great deal of happiness."
06:49As for Prince Renier, it seems that as his children grew up, he finally wished he'd treated
06:53them with more paternal fondness, with the Chicago Tribune quoting him as musing,
06:57"...my only regret is to have not been available enough to take care of my children during
07:01their tender years, and it is too late to make up for lost time."
07:05After silver screen legend Grace Kelly became Princess Grace of Monaco, many believe that
07:09she became incredibly depressed living in the microstate. In fact, the book High Society,
07:13The Life of Grace Kelly reveals that the actor even once boldly told a reporter,
07:17"...I don't expect to be happy, and I don't look for happiness."
07:21While the biography suggested that Grace wasn't suffering from depression all the time, she
07:24still had periods of sadness and loneliness. Grace herself alluded to the difficulties
07:29of suddenly moving across the pond, as she said in a 2020 interview in 1982,
07:33"...Mediterranean countries don't accept change very easily."
07:37Many have compared Princess Grace's experience marrying into royalty as that of the late
07:41Princess Diana's. And interestingly enough, the two crossed paths, too. As Lady Diana
07:45once revealed in Diana, Her True Story and Her Own Words,
07:49"...I remember meeting Princess Grace and how wonderful and serene she was, but there
07:53was troubled water under her. I saw that."
07:56Much like the incredible amount of paparazzi that has plagued the British royal family,
08:00Prince Renier III and Grace Kelly never really had any privacy. As the author of Grace Kelly,
08:05Hollywood Dream Girl, revealed to Closer Weekly,
08:07"...The one thing that she would talk about was time. She would say that she wanted privacy
08:11a little bit."
08:12The former Hollywood icon allegedly had no idea how rarely she would be able to escape
08:16for some one-on-one time with her husband. Interestingly enough, at the time of Grace
08:20and Renier's wedding in the mid-1950s, Monaco wasn't the glamorous playground for the wealthy
08:25that it is now. Biographer Geoffrey Robinson told Closer Weekly,
08:28"...The electricity and plumbing were 19th-century French, and even the telephones didn't work."
08:33With the sudden shift of lifestyle, along with her personal life suddenly being put
08:36under the microscope, it's no wonder that this royal marriage was as complicated and
08:40exhausting as it was. Unfortunately for Grace and Renier, the paparazzi weren't just after
08:45them, but their children, too. Her daughter Stephanie had to go to her gymnastics classes
08:49in the trunk of their car, as Princess Grace revealed in a 1982 2020 interview, just so
08:54the paparazzi wouldn't follow her.
08:56After her death in 1982, many people have come forward to discuss Grace Kelly's alleged
09:01difficulties with her husband, Prince Renier III. However, it's also possible that Kelly
09:05embraced her new family and marriage after leaving Hollywood. Princess Grace mused to
09:092020, the same year of her untimely death,
09:12The paparazzi make up things. They make up romances. According to the press, my husband
09:16and I are constantly being divorced, which is also not the case. As for Renier, while
09:21rumors of infidelity plagued the royal, he may have genuinely held a lot of love for
09:24his wife. According to My Days with Princess Grace of Monaco, Prince Renier never recovered
09:29from the loss of Grace and never remarried.
09:32For The New York Times, Grace Kelly died in Monte Carlo on September 14, 1982, suffering
09:37a cerebral hemorrhage as a result of a fatal car accident.
09:40It's been suggested that the Grimaldi royal family, much like a handful of other historical
09:44families, are cursed. According to Britannica, the Grimaldis originally hailed from Genoa,
09:49Italy, officially gaining control of Monaco in 1419. Prince Renier III's great-grandfather,
09:54Albert I, gave Monaco a constitution in 1911. That being said, the menacing lore that has
10:00plagued the family persisted even before then.
10:02Per ABC News, the story goes that in the 13th century, Prince Renier kidnapped a witch who
10:07cursed the entire family's bloodline and declared,
10:09"...never will a Grimaldi find true happiness in marriage."
10:13Sure enough, things haven't exactly been easy for the Monaco royal family since then, and
10:17as The Independent so succinctly put it,
10:19"...scandal, divorce, and rumors of infidelity have dogged them for decades. They have been
10:23dubbed Europe's most dysfunctional family."
10:26Rumors of curses aside, it seems that Grace Kelly and Prince Renier III's marriage was
10:30filled with talk of infidelity, and the world is yet to recover from Princess Grace's traumatic
10:34and untimely death.