Why a "Sweet" Photograph of Princess Diana and David Bowie Caused So Much Controversy for the Royal Family

Princess Diana was regularly connected with celebrities, from dancing with John Travolta to sneaking into a gay bar with Freddie Mercury. But according to one photographer, Kensington Palace attempted to stop the release of a photo of Princess Diana posing with David Bowie for a very specific reason.

Per The Telegraph, photographer Denis O'Regan snapped an iconic photo of Princess Diana with musician Bowie after she attended his Glass Spider concert at Wembley Stadium in June 1987. According to O'Regan, Princess Diana asked the photographer if Bowie would consider posing for a picture with her, to which he replied, "I think he would." O'Regan told the outlet, "I thought it was so funny," and he described Diana as "so sweet."

But according to O'Regan, Kensington Palace tried to prevent the photo from being released. "So the next day, my agent got a call from [the] palace, saying, 'Don't use the pictures,' because word had gone out about James Hewitt," the photographer explained.

At the time, Princess Diana was having an extramarital affair with Hewitt, her horseback riding instructor—a fact the palace presumably wanted to conceal. "So that's when it kind of erupted," O'Regan said. The photographer continued, "They just didn't want Diana in the press...It was really [that] they didn't want to fuel the fire."

According to O'Regan, Kensington Palace didn't want the world to know Diana attended Bowie's show with Hewitt. Reflecting on the unusual situation, the photographer told the outlet, "[E]ven though I didn't get the multi-million dollar shot of [Diana and Hewitt] together, because no one knew who he was...it was obviously a tiny moment in history."