Diana ‘pushed stepmother down stairs’
PRINCess Diana’s relationship with her stepmother Raine spencer was famously so volatile that she would call her ‘Acid Raine’.
And now it has been revealed how on one occasion jealousy boiled over – and the princess pushed Raine down the stairs.
The bitter conflict between the two women has been laid bare by staff at Diana’s ancestral home, Althorp, in a new documentary.
In it, Raine’s personal assistant, sue Howe, reveals how Diana flew into a violent rage during a family gathering to mark the first marriage of her brother, Charles spencer, in 1989.
The princess, a mother-of-two who was 28 years old at the time, believed the then Lady spencer had slighted her mother, Frances shand Kydd, who had undergone a bitter divorce from Diana’s father, Johnnie.
As a result, she reached out and shoved her stepmother down the stairs.
‘she was badly bruised and dreadfully upset,’ Miss Howe told Channel 4’s Diana’s Wicked stepmother, which aired last night.
‘It was not justified at all, it was a cruel heartless thing to do and I think it was Diana’s perception of how Raine was treating Mrs shand Kydd. I think Diana was very stressed. This sounds really wrong but she wasn’t centre of attention on this occasion.’
Divorcee Raine, daughter of legendary romance writer Dame Barbara Cartland, married Diana’s father, the 8th earl spencer, in July 1976. she was hated by his children, who resented her ‘hold’ over their father.
Diana herself spoke about the row on the infamous tapes recorded by her voice coach Peter settelen, some of which were controversially broadcast, by coincidence, on Channel 4 last week.
In them, she says: ‘My stepmother and I ended up having this row. And I pushed her down the stairs. Which gave me enormous satisfaction.’
Just when you believe you’ve seen Lady Di’s life story from every angle, another astonishing anecdote resurfaces to make you think again.
Amid all the tales of love affairs, feuds and vengeance in Princess Diana’s ‘Wicked’ Stepmother (C4), we were casually reminded that the troubled Princess of Wales confessed to pushing Countess Raine spencer — her hated rival for her father’s affections — down the stately staircase at Althorp, their sprawling mansion in the country.
Quite true, confirmed a cluster of witnesses in this extraordinary documentary. ‘the Countess was badly bruised and dreadfully upset,’ said Raine’s personal assistant, sue Howe. ‘It was a cruel and heartless thing to do.’
the occasion was the wedding day of Diana’s brother Charles. the Princess later claimed she was angry because her own mother, Frances shand Kydd, was not being treated with sufficient respect by Raine, who was Earl spencer’s second wife.
Not quite true, murmured those who were there. the real cause of Diana’s fury was that her stepmother was upstaging her. For once, she was not the centre of attention, and she didn’t like it one bit.
this hugely affectionate and sympathetic programme certainly gave Raine the last word. Our final glimpse of her was footage of the Countess in several acres of pink taffeta, arranged coquettishly off the shoulder, as she descended that staircase like a movie queen.
With a gracious smile, she waved to the camera and swept through doors held open by two flunkeys. As she vanished from view, spots of neon lipstick seemed to dance before my eyes. the only woman who ever wore pinker dresses was the romantic novelist Dame Barbara Cartland — who was Raine’s mother, after all.
And throughout most of this hour, the Countess monopolised the screen, with Diana shoved off unceremoniously to the fringes.
Muted taste never was Raine’s style. When she married Johnnie spencer and moved in at Althorp, she had an enormous and garish painting of herself hung in the portrait gallery. then she had all the priceless 18th-century furniture lacquered in gold leaf.
the effect was so tacky, it would make sir Philip Green wince. Raine didn’t care. she was ‘an all-round force of nature,’ said one friend. ‘A barbed- wire powder decided another.
And after all, as Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes pointed out, you have to admire a woman who married two earls and a French count . . . making herself a countess three times over. that takes ambition.
At heart, she seemed more celebrity than aristocrat. to puff,’ raise money for her favourite causes, she recorded a charity single in the Fifties. the New Musical Express declared it the worst release of the year. Raine had a voice like a penny whistle played by a tone- deaf primary schoolchild, but you can’t deny she was a game girl.
that willingness to get stuck in meant she was often in the gift shop at Althorp, flogging replicas of her stepdaughter Diana’s wedding ring for £6.72 a pop.
Later, when she became a director at Harrods, she happily worked behind the till at the perfume counter. In her heart, she was as much shopgirl as grande dame.
A few weeks before she died last October, Raine gave a farewell supper party for ‘about 30 of her closest friends’ and made a little speech in praise of each of them. In turn, they recalled her with love and sometimes tears.
Diana’s nickname for her stepmother was ‘Acid Raine’. this delightful portrait revealed her as something very different — a spectacular cloudburst.
TOBACCO AD OF THE WEEK: Detective Robin (Elisabeth Moss) used her lighter to overpower a killer in Top Of The Lake (BBC2). In this surreal show, smoking is good for you — e-cigarettes can’t fight off madmen.