'The Crown': Did Dodi Fayed really propose to Princess Diana before they died?
"The Crown" season six depicts the final hours of Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed who died in 1997.
Before their fateful crash, Dodi is shown getting on one knee to propose. However, Diana stops him.
It's widely believed that while Dodi purchased a ring, he and Diana were not engaged.
In the "The Crown" season six, episode three, a proposal takes place — kind of.
After spending their summer basking in the Mediterranean sun far away (or so they thought) from the eyes and camera clicks of the lecherous paparazzi, Princess Diana (Elizabeth Debicki) and Dodi Fayed (Khalid Abdalla) head back to London by way of Paris.
In a hotel room at the Ritz, Dodi puts on Diana's favorite song ("When You Tell Me That You Love Me" by Julio Iglesia), pulls out a ring, and gets on one knee.
"I have a question I want to ask you, to which I hope you will indeed tell me yes," he says before Diana cuts him off.
"No, no, no, no, no" Debicki's Diana replies. "Stop, I can't bear it. It's madness. Please get up."
A heartfelt conversation followed between the pair, who agreed they shouldn't marry. Diana had been divorced for just a year, while Dodi had been engaged to someone else just weeks earlier.
So the question "Will you marry me?" is never outright asked, allowing room for "The Crown" to work inside the shades of grey over whether the real Diana and Dodi were engaged when they died.
Here's everything we know.
Dodi Fayed did purchase a ring that Diana singled out in a jeweler's days before their deaths
As depicted in the show's third episode, Dodi purchased a ring from the French luxury jewelry brand Repossi following his and Diana's visit to a store in Monte Carlo.
However, according to the British newspaper The Telegraph, they weren't forced into the store after fleeing the paparazzi like the episode depicts but visited leisurely.
Ten days later, Dodi was captured on CCTV footage visiting the jeweler's Paris branch.
Per the 2007 inquest into Diana's death, a ring bearing the inscription "Dis-moi Oui" ("Tell me Yes") was recovered from Dodi's Parisian apartment after his death, as well as a receipt, which listed the purchase of a £11,600 ($14,450) "bague de fiançaille" (engagement ring) on August 30, 1997, The Guardian reports.
Dodi's father, Mohamed Al-Fayed, strongly maintained that his son and Diana were engaged
"The Crown" suggests that Dodi's father, the former owner of Harrods, orchestrated their whole relationship and pressured Dodi to pop the question.
Mohamed, who died at the age of 94 in August, firmly believed that his son and Diana were engaged before they died and were planning to announce it on September 1, 1997.
Speaking on the ITV documentary, "Diana — Secrets Behind the Crash," in 1998, Mohamed claimed that after asking for Diana's hand in marriage, Dodi called him and shared the good news. He said he also spoke to Diana during the call, who "was completely full of happiness" because she had "found a family she related to."
Mohamed also alleged during an interview with Piers Morgan in 2003 that Diana was pregnant with Dodi's child at the time of her death, another claim that the inquiry found was insubstantial based on "overwhelming evidence" to the contrary, including the report from the coroner who examined Diana's body.
An inquiry found that it was unlikely that Dodi proposed to Diana before they died
As Dodi purchased the ring the day before his and Diana's fateful car crash, he had a limited time to present her with it.
The 2007 inquiry conducted by Metropolitan Police found that while Dodi may have been planning a proposal, that evidence points to the conclusion that one did not take place, per CBS News. The ring was found at Dodi's apartment, which Diana had not visited that day (it was where the couple were heading at the time of their accident).
It also cited a friend of Diana's who had spoken to the Princess two days before she died, who said that Diana had told her: "I need marriage like a rash on my face."
"The weight of evidence is that the Princess of Wales was not intending to get engaged or married to Dodi Al Fayed," the report read.
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