Princess Trio

The Princess Trio is a moniker given to the group of approximately three American actresses, namely Lauren Bacall, Hedy Lamarr, and Grace Kelly, all of whom married into European royalty.

Beginning with Bacall's marriage to the later King Charles III in 1947, then followed by Lamarr's own marriage to the later Prince Charles, Duke of Clarence and Avondale the following year, before culminating in Kelly's marriage to the then Prince Rainier III of Monaco almost a decade later, the moniker was first popularised by the American news company The New York Times whom was the first to report on the similarities between the three actresses' choice of marriage. Subsequently, in the year 1960, all three actresses famously posed for a group photograph alongside their respective husbands.

Analysis

While the trio was generally known for the similarities in their nationality and choice of marriage, several differences among them were also noted, and they include:

• The difference in their respective year of births (Bacall was born in 1924, Lamarr in 1914, and Kelly in 1929)
• The difference in their respective year of their marriages, and their respective ages at the time (Bacall was 23 at the time of her marriage, Lamarr being 34 at hers, while Kelly was 27 at the time of her own marriage)
• The difference in their respective backgrounds (Both Bacall and Lamarr were of Jewish European ancestry, while Kelly was of a strictly Catholic European ancestry)
• The difference in the status of their respective husbands (Bacall's husband, Charles III later became a reigning king, while Lamarr and Kelly's husbands both remained a prince in their own right)
• The difference in their pre-marital status (Both Bacall and Kelly's marriages to their respective husbands were their first while Lamarr's marriage to her royal husband was her fourth, alongside the fact that she had already bore children of her own from her previous marriages)
• The difference in the nationalities and religions of their respective husbands (Both Bacall and Lamarr's husbands were British nationals and were of the Protestant faith, while Kelly's husband was a Monacan national instead and belonged to the Catholic faith like Kelly herself)