Princes regret rushed last call with Diana

Britain’s Prince William and Harry have spoken of their regret over the last conversation they had with their mother Princess Diana before she died, saying the telephone call was “desperately rushed”.

In a documentary called Diana, Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy timed to coincide with the 20th anniversary of Diana’s death in a Paris car crash on August 31, 1997, the two princes said they spoke to their mother shortly before she died. “Harry and I were in a desperate rush to say goodbye, you know ‘see you later’ ... if I’d known now obviously what was going to happen, I wouldn’t have been so blase about it and everything else,” Prince William said.

Prince Harry said: “It was her speaking from Paris, I can’t really necessarily remember what I said but all I do remember is probably regretting for the rest of my life how short the phone call was.”

Nick Kent, the film’s executive producer, said he believed the document offered a glimpse of “the private Diana”.

The princes recall their mother’s sense of humour, with Prince Harry describing her as “one of the naughtiest parents”. They also recall the pain of their parents’ divorce and how they dealt with the news of her death and its aftermath.

The princes said that their mother was a “fun” parent who was a “total kid through and through” and understood the “real life outside of palace walls”. “When everybody says to me ‘so she was fun, give us an example’ all I can hear is her laugh in my head. One of her mottos to me was, you know, ‘you can be as naughty as you want, just don’t get caught’,” Harry said.

“She was one of the naughtiest parents. She would come and watch us play football and, you know, smuggle sweets into our socks.” 

Prince William said his mother was “very informal and really enjoyed the laughter and the fun”. He described her as a “sort of joker”.