13 Actresses Who Have Portrayed Princess Diana On-Screen

The first image of Elizabeth Debicki as Princess Diana in season five of The Crown been released, and she is the spitting image of Diana.

Season five of the hit show will follow the Princess of Whales through the early 1990s after her split from Prince Charles. It is still unclear if Diana's fatal 1997 car crash will be depicted in the show.

Another actress who is practically identical to the late Princess while in character, is Kristen Stewart, who will star in the upcoming and highly anticipated biopic Spencer.

The image shows Stewart in a Princess Diana-esque outfit, including a red coat and black hat. The Twilight star also dons a blonde wig and looks like the spitting image of Di in this sneak peek.

We are counting down the days until both of these actresses portray the iconic princess, but in the meantime, we're taking a look back at all the times the late Princess Diana was portrayed on-screen—and the women who brought her to life.

01 of 13

Caroline Bliss in Charles & Diana: A Royal Love Story

In 1982, just 14 months after their nuptials, Charles & Diana: A Royal Love Story premiered on ABC with Caroline Bliss as its leading lady. The TV movie reenacted the "wedding of the century," as it's frequently dubbed. This was Bliss's first major role and David Robb played Prince Charles opposite her.

02 of 13

Catherine Oxenberg in The Royal Romance of Charles and Diana

The 1982 CBS film stars Catherine Oxenberg as Princess Diana and Christopher Baines as Prince Charles and follows the couples courtship leading up to their wedding.

03 of 13

Nicola Formby in The Women of Windsor

In 1992, The Women of Windsor captured the demise of both Princess Di and Sarah Ferguson's marriages, which at the time plastered every British tabloid. Actress Nicole Formby played Diana alongside Sallyanne Law as Sarah and Jim Piddock as Prince Charles. In real life, Prince Charles and Princess Diana announced their separation two months after the movie's release.

04 of 13

Serena Scott Thomas in Diana: Her True Story

In 1992, NBC released Diana: Her True Story, starring Serena Scott Thomas as Princess Di and David Threlfall as Prince Charles. The movie was an adaptation of the 1992 Andrew Morton biography and followed Diana's highs and lows of royal life.

05 of 13

Julie Cox in Princess in Love

The 1996 CBS TV movie was adapted from the 1994 Anna Pasternak book of the same name and starred Julie Cox as Princess Diana and Christopher Bowen as Charles. The movie told the story of the alleged affair between Princess Diana and British Army officer James Hewitt (which she later admitted to being true) and premiered just several months before Prince Charles and Princess Diana's divorced was finalized.

06 of 13

Amy Seccombe in Diana: A Tribute to The People's Princess

A year after Princess Diana's passing, this 1998 British movie was released in honor of her and followed the last year of her life, which included the romance between her and Dodi Fayed before they were both killed in the Paris car crash. Diana: A Tribute to The People's Princess starred Amy Seccombe as the late Princess Diana and George Jackos as Fayed.

07 of 13

Genevieve O'Reilly in Diana: Last Days of a Princess

The 2007 TLC docu-style movie (which took some creative license) focused on the final days of Diana's life and used some dramatic reenactment, with Genevieve O'Reilly as Diana, as well as real footage and interviews. A year later, the court found their deaths unlawful due to "gross negligence" of the driver (who was also killed) and the paparazzi who started the chase that ultimately took their lives, according the E! News.

08 of 13

Lesley Harcourt in William & Catherine: A Royal Romance

The Scottish actress briefly portrayed Diana in a clip from a television interview during Hallmark Channel's William and Catherine: A Royal Romance. The TV movie aired in 2011 just four months after Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding.

09 of 13

Naomi Watts in Diana

Naomi Watts as Princess Diana — Neil Mockford/Getty Images

The 2013 film followed Diana's (played by Naomi Watts) relationship with heart surgeon Hasnat Khan followed by her coupling with Dodi Fayed. According to E News!, Watts told reporters she was hesitant to take the role initially.

"Ultimately, the reason I wanted to say 'no' so much became the reason I wanted to do it as well. I was intrigued by the challenge," she said. "I mean, in the beginning I thought, how do you possibly take on the most famous woman of all time when everybody feels they know her so well? How do you take possession of that character? So that was daunting, to use a word of hers…"

10 of 13

Bonnie Soper in Harry & Meghan: A Royal Romance and Harry & Meghan: Becoming Royal

Bonnie Soper as Princess Diana — Lifetime

The New Zealand actress played Dianna in not one but two Lifetime movies. Bonnie Soper starred as Princess Diana in the 2018 movie Harry & Meghan: A Royal Romance, which aired a week before their nuptials and the 2019 movie Harry & Meghan: Becoming Royal about the couple's first year of marriage. Different actors played Harry and Meghan in the two films but Soper remained as Princess Di.

11 of 13

Emma Corrin in The Crown

The British actress took on Princess Diana in the fourth season of the Netflix hit The Crown, which detailed Charles and Diana's romance from the beginning, when Diana Spencer was just 19 years old. The show even recreated her iconic wedding dress, a spitting image of Diana's gown.

12 of 13

Elizabeth Debicki in The Crown

The actress known for her roles in The Night Manager, Tenet, and Widows will finish out the final seasons of The Crown as the late princess. The news of her casting as Princess Di was announced in August 2020. The Paris-born actress made a statement saying, "Princess Diana's spirit, her words, and her actions live in the hearts of so many. It is my true privilege and honor to be joining this masterful series, which has had me absolutely hooked from episode one."

According to Variety, production for season 5 started in the U.K. in July 2021 and will follow the Princess of Whales through the early 1990s during the demise of her and estranged husband Prince Charles' [played by Dominic West] relationship.

In the first look from filming, Debicki is Princess Di's doppelgänger. Netflix released a photo of the actress laying on a couch with her head against a pillow, her styled in Princess Diana's signature cut.

13 of 13

Kristen Stewart in Spencer

Stewart practically broke the internet with her first look as Princess Diana in 2021. And even before this image surfaced, the world had been buzzing about the newest installment of Princess Diana's story. This movie aims to re-humanize the late Princess and will cover three days during her life. During an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live in November, Stewart said the movie is a "poetic internal imagining." And while the actress was just seven at the time of Diana's death, she still recalls seeing it on the news.

"I was really young, didn't really know what was going on. But now, it's hard not to feel protective over her," she shared.

The director of Spencer, Pablo Larraìn, spoke to Deadline about the upcoming film, saying, "Diana is such a powerful icon, where millions and millions of people, not just women, but many people around the world felt empathy toward her in her life. We decided to get into a story about identity, and around how a woman decides somehow, not to be the queen. She's a woman who, in the journey of the movie, decides and realizes that she wants to be the woman she was before she met Charles."