From secret palace dinners to handwritten love letters, Prince Edward’s former girlfriend is opening up about their once-hidden romance. Her new memoir promises an intimate glimpse into royal life and is already sparking debate.
A cache of old correspondence has prompted Ruthie Henshall to revisit a chapter of royal history that many assumed had long been closed.
Ruthie Henshall photographed on May 9, 1994. | Source: Getty Images
The West End star is set to publish “The Showgirl and the Prince” in July, a memoir detailing her on-and-off romance with Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh, during the late 1980s and early 1990s, before he met Sophie Rhys-Jones, now Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh.
The 58-year-old performer said the idea for the book emerged after she uncovered boxes of diaries and letters while clearing out her garage five years ago.
“I found old diaries which I began writing in the 1980s and then found all my letters from Prince Edward, and I was struck by how precious this time in my life was,” she shared. Those letters, written when the Prince was in his early 20s, form the emotional backbone of the memoir.
Ruthie Henshall during the 21st birthday of “Tkts,” the famous half-price theatre ticket booth, on September 11, 2001, in London, England. | Source: Getty Images
At the time they met in 1988, Ruthie was making her West End debut as a chorus girl in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Cats.” Prince Edward was working for the impresario and moved in very different circles — yet their worlds collided backstage and, soon enough, beyond it. She recalled:
“I was on the West End stage — my dream since I was a girl — and shared a love with a man very few people even know. If this was someone else’s story, I would think they had made it up. So here it is — a look behind the curtain of a crazy life in musical theatre and what happens next when a showgirl falls in love with a prince.”
Ruthie Henshall at the Sony Radio Awards on May 12, 2004, in London, England. | Source: Getty Images
In the early days, the relationship unfolded largely out of sight. Ruthie has said the Prince would telephone her during rehearsals and invite her to Buckingham Palace for dinner or to watch musicals.
When news of the romance eventually broke, the Evening Standard captured the contrast with a now-famous headline that read, “Prince and the Showgirl.”
Prince Edward during Day 2 of Royal Ascot 2005 on June 15 in England. | Source: Getty Images
Despite the tabloid framing, Ruthie has consistently maintained that the relationship was not fleeting. “I genuinely fell in love with him,” she once said, pushing back against suggestions that it was merely a youthful interlude.
According to Pan Macmillan, the book traces the relationship from its discreet beginnings to more formal moments, including visits to Buckingham Palace and tea at Windsor Castle with the late Queen Elizabeth II.
King Charles III, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Philip, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, Princess Anne, and Prince Edward at Clarence House to mark the Diamond Wedding Anniversary of the Queen and Prince Philip on November 18, 2007, in London, England. | Source: Getty Images
The publisher described it as “a funny, intimate, and touching memoir” and pitched it as “a real-life Cinderella story — if Cinders is a lycra-clad chorus girl from Bromley who drinks and smokes too much.”
