Friday, February 08, 2008

Yes, he is Grace Kelly's grandson

Ladies and Gentlemen, this evening we journey in imagination to the House of Grimaldi and la Principauté de Monaco!
This week's prince is HRH Prince Andrea Albert Pierre Casiraghi, eldest son of HRH Caroline, Princess of Hanover. He is seen above on the left with his sister Princess Charlotte and his brother Prince Pierre at the funeral of their grandfather, Prince Rainier, the late ruler of Monaco.
TRH Pierre, Charlotte, and Andrea are here seen at the investiture of their uncle, His Serene Highness the Sovereign Prince of Monaco, Albert II.
HSH Uncle Al waves to the crowd.

Prince Albert has two children born out of wedlock. Should he have no legitimate heirs, as seems increasingly likely, the laws of Monaco have been altered so that his siblings and their heirs may inherit with preference given to males. Albert's elder sister Princess Caroline would thus inherit and Prince Andrea would succeed her in turn, presumably at that point taking the last name Grimaldi for the royal house. At this time he bears his father's surname.
Andrea and Pierre horsing around.

Prince Andrea was born June 8, 1984, to Princess Caroline and Stefano Casiraghi, "an heir to an Italian oil fortune." (Wikipedia, source of info here.) Princess Caroline and her brother Prince Albert are the children of Prince Rainier and Princess Grace, the former Grace Kelly, both now deceased.
Wikipedia notes:
Andrea was six years old when his father died in a boating accident.

Known for his delicate blond good looks and athletic skills — he rides, skis, plays football and also guitar; he was included by People Magazine in 2002 in the Top 50 World's Most Beautiful People. He is fluent in French, English, Italian, and German.

Papa Stefano Casiraghi was no slouch in the looks department either.

Now, ladies, if you continue to read this post I want you all to promise not to throw rocks at your husbands and boyfriends.
Here is a shot of Prince Andrea and a Spanish actress from 2003. Most of this post is for Grandmère Mimi--to cheer her up after her dutiful Disney trip--but this one is for johnieb.
Jane, dear, I am sure he might consider a contessa.
And, because Prince Andy seems to have other fans out there on the intertubes, we have some videos with musical accompaniment. Enjoy.









--the BB

10 comments:

Diane M. Roth said...

my goodness

June Butler said...

Wow! He's a looker, all right - and popular, too. I don't think I'd have a chance, but I tell ya: I like looking. Thank you for the treat, Paul.

You should collect these prince posts into a book. There could be money in it for you.

I wonder about the dancing bearded pair with swords in the coat of arms.

Kirstin said...

LOL, you really have fun with these.

Paul said...

Oh, Mimi! Great roars of laughter here. I'm so glad I could provide you a little treat. I did notice the bearded guys in the dark green dresses but had not speculated further. You're a caution!

Jane R said...

Pablito, I noticed in one of your photos that the prince's sister Charlotte looks amazingly like her mother Caroline and her aunt Stephanie. (Don't forget Bad Girl Stephanie.) Having been raised in France, I have been a Caroline-watcher since childhood. I know, bad habit for a good democrat (small c) and republican (small r) but she was always all over the magazines. She's a class act. Not very good chooser of men but a class act.

Her younger sister Stephanie has wanted to lead her own life and literally ran off with the circus a few years ago.

You are sweet to think of me, but the dear young prince is way too young for me. (Which is not to say that I haven't been interested in younger men, or they in me, but not THAT young) Andrea's uncle Al is more like it, but I'm not interested. Keep lookin' though, I may decide to get a social life sometime around spring or early summer.

Here are some Grimaldi Family photos for you -- just found them while hunting for the links on Stephanie. More dish here though it is sanitized and doesn't mention the relationship Stephanie had with the married elephant tamer (before the circus-acrobat husband, whom I hadn't heard of -- I've been lax in my princely readings, good thing I have you, Padre Pablito -- and from whom she apparently separated after a year or so).

I know you're fond of the gentlemen, but if you ever run out of princes you could do a princess series...

The official dish is here.

More dishy dish on the Grimaldis here.

And now I am going to go repent my sins of dishy-dishing on this late Friday night in Lent!

Paul said...

Well, Jane, you know I have tried so very hard to keep these posts tasteful and respectful of the royal families.... OK, not really. So dish away.

And actually, Albert is sort of teddy-bear cute (not to mention age appropriate). His taste seems to have fun to floozies--or perhaps he's the male floozy who's corrupted nice girls. In any case, sovereign prince or no he seems a bit dicey. I will now go read the dirt.

I have thought of featuring some princesses and may wall do so at some point. Rather enjoying the princes at the moment, as you can tell. It's all rather silly because I really don't care much about royal gossip and am definitely a democrat and republican who has no fondness for aristocracies.

Now, on to the dirt!

Anonymous said...

I liked the picture with girl boobies in it.

Fran said...

I don't know what I have loved more... the post or the comments!!!

Marcia said...

Bad research. Several mistakes.
Andrea, Charlotte and Pierre are NOT titled, and if they were, their title would be HSH, not HRH as Monaco is a principality.
Prince Albert is not nicknamed Al, but Albie.

Paul said...

Thanks for the corrections, Marcia. I like accuracy but what you don't know is that this entire series is very tongue-in-cheek and makes no claims to research. It was a take-off on folks who do Cat Blogging on Fridays and is thus done for pure whimsy.

Sadly, to my mind, a huge portion of hits here are from photos in the prince series and not for posts I consider actually interesting, but such is life.