Princess Diana once disguised herself as a man to sneak into a gay bar in London with late Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, according to claims in a new biography.
In the recently released Dianaworld: An Obsession, author Edward White recalls how royal - who was killed in a Paris car crash in 1997 aged 36 - ”took a trip to [the Royal Vauxhall Tavern] one of London’s most famous gay bars”.
According to White, the former Princess of Wales was joined by comedy actress Cleo Rocos, and late radio personality Kenny Everett, who was the first DJ to play Queen’s monster hit Bohemian Rhapsody.
“At some point in the evening, Rocos claims, Diana persuaded them to take her to the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, a place that Everett warned was ‘not for you … full of hairy gay men,'” the biographer wrote.
Diana was said to be insistent, however, so Everett helped her disguise herself in his own clothes, comprising of: “a camouflage army jacket, hair tucked up into a leather cap and dark aviator sunglasses. Scrutinizing her in the half-light, we decided that the most famous icon of the modern world might just …JUST, pass for a rather eccentrically dressed gay male model.'”
He went on to claim that the cunning plan had “seemed to work,” quoting Rocos in saying: “It was fabulously outrageous and so bizarrely exciting …no one, absolutely no one, recognised Diana.”
According to the book, the party of friends “stayed for one drink and left. Diana returned to Kensington Palace and sent back Everett’s clothes the following day.”
Acknowledging that the “story sounds far-fetched,” White remarks that “there are other, slightly less fantastical tales about Diana disguising herself on nights out, such as when she accompanied Hasnat Khan to Ronnie Scott’s jazz bar in Soho, the princess obscuring her true self beneath a wig and glasses.”
He concludes that “the story of Diana in drag at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern has been taken up as an illustration of her connection with the gay community and a metaphor for her own search for a family in which she felt truly accepted.”
