In just a few weeks, Titanic star Kate Winslet will be a special guest at the Princess of Wales’s Christmas concert. The actress will likely come face-to-face with King Charles at the event.
Kate and the monarch actually met once before—almost 30 years ago—and the encounter was quite funny! During an interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live! on November 18, Kate shared the story. At the time, she was a 20-year-old attending the premiere of her film Sense and Sensibility in 1996. She had chosen a daring, sheer lace dress for the event, not realizing she would be meeting the then–Prince of Wales.
“He came to the premiere. I somehow didn’t understand or realize that I would actually meet him, so I forgot that I was wearing a very see-through dress.”
Thankfully, Kate avoided a truly awkward moment thanks to her quick thinking: she threw on a long black coat. “When he approached me, I immediately thought, ‘Oh God, nipples!’” she recalls. “And then someone shouted, ‘The coat!’ I said, ‘Your Majesty!’ and covered myself just in time to save the moment.”
A month later, Kate met the king again at the annual Foundation Awards ceremony, where she became the first person to bow to His Majesty. Meryl Streep was beside her. “When Meryl and I were walking toward the king, we were freaking out. She asked me, ‘Do you think we have to curtsy?’ I said, ‘Of course we do.’ She asked, ‘But how? I don’t even know if we’re supposed to.’ We were in a full panic because we had no idea how to do it properly,” Kate laughs.
Although curtsying to the monarch is traditionally considered polite, it’s not technically required. Women usually greet the monarch with a slight curtsy, while men bow their heads. At the same time, the official royal family website notes that there are no strictly “mandatory rules” for meeting the monarch.
