From Hasnat Khan to Dodi Fayed: Princess Diana's Highly-Publicized Romances

The trailer for Season Six of The Crown kicks off with Elizabeth Debicki's Princess Diana playing a tune on a grand piano. It's not her, but rather Dodi Fayed, the Egyptian billionaire she's been dating—and the one she was with the night she died. In a paparazzi scene set in a theatrical oceanic drama, a dejected Diana says overdramatically, 'I truly can't fathom how I ended up here.'

Just as she scrutinized her potential marriage to Prince Charles in the fourth season, and promised to cast a brief, melancholic lens on her relationship with Dodi Fayed in the fifth season. Though with a certain dramatic license: The Crown is ultimately a work of fiction.

No modern personality has been more extensively described in detail than Princess Diana, whose personal life was more widely covered than Charles's hunt for a fourth season and whose love for Hasnat Khan in the fifth season promised to bring a brief, melancholic lens to their relationship. Though there were few days when her name wasn't in the papers, especially during the decade that followed her wedding dissolution.

Charles, the Prince of Wales

In 1977, a young Diana Spencer first visited Althorp House, the ancestral home of Prince Charles of Wales, in Northamptonshire, England, with its 1,500-acre family estate, when she was just 16 years old. Three years later, she and Prince Charles began dating, and she proposed on February 24, 1981. When a journalist asked Charles if they were in love, he famously replied, 'Whatever "in love" means.'

Approximately 750 million people watched their wedding a few months later. According to the documentary Diana: In Her Own Words, Diana referred to it as 'the worst day of my life.' 'I felt like a lamb being led to slaughter,' she once said. 'And I knew it.'

In 1986, out of nowhere, both participated in an extramarital relationship. In 1994, Charles told his official biographer, Jonathan Dimbleby, that he had resumed things with Camilla Parker Bowles. Meanwhile, it was alleged that Diana's relationship with army captain James Hewitt began around this time, and rumors of their troubled marriage started to surface in the press.

In 1992, the couple officially separated.

James Hewitt

Amidst her unhappy marriage to Prince Charles, Princess Diana started a relationship with army captain James Hewitt, which began in 1986 and ended around 1990. In 1994, Hewitt shared their story in a tell-all memoir that reportedly sold for millions of dollars. It was reported at the time that he was negotiating the sale with tabloids for years to come. ('Hewitt's notoriety, it seems, has taken a toll,' wrote People in a cover story published that October.) As of 2011, he was still giving interviews about his relationship with the princess: 'If Charles hadn't,' he told Entertainment Tonight.

Dr. Hasnat Khan

Princess Diana began her relationship with Dr. Hasnat Khan in September 1995. The two kept their relationship extremely private during their two years together. (Or, as much as two people can keep it private after journalists discover the romance.) Nevertheless, despite intense media scrutiny, it was considered a comparatively normal relationship (Diana's nickname for Hasnat was 'Mr. Wonderful.') In one episode of The Crown, they are depicted going to see a movie together—Princess in disguise.

Today, Khan has spoken very little about their relationship. One exception? In 2004, during the investigation into Princess Diana's death, he gave a statement to the police, which was read in court. He spoke affectionately of the deceased princess: 'I have lost someone with whom I was very much in love,' he said. Khan also acknowledged that their relationship ended because of unwanted media attention.

Dodi Fayed

Following Khan, Diana dated Dodi Fayed, a film producer and billionaire businessman. Before heading to Paris, the couple spent the summer of 1997 cruising the Mediterranean on Fayed's yacht, the Jonikal. Wherever they went, cameras followed them.

There, a tragic event unfolds: The couple is killed in a fatal car accident in a tunnel. Their deaths were investigated, revealing that their driver was intoxicated and driving at speeds of up to 121 miles per hour while being pursued by paparazzi.