The Queen's Wedding

29 November 2007 - Channel 4's High Society season returns with four fascinating documentaries examining secret scandals and notorious figures from the higher echelons of British society.

This month Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip will celebrate 60 years of marriage.
It is a marriage that has stood the test of time and has helped keep the monarchy secure. The Royal Wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten in November 1947 was a day of national celebration.

However, the young couple's path to the altar had been strewn with controversy and difficulties. Behind the smiling faces and the colourful regalia lay a story of political machination, public hostility and court intrigue.

The Queen's Wedding focuses on the three main protagonists in the romance: the young Princess Elizabeth herself, her handsome sailor suitor Philip, and his uncle Lord Louis Mountbatten, the matchmaker who wouldn't rest until the union was secure.

This film captures the story of the princess's young life from the moment when her love life became a matter of dynastic and political importance.

Suitability

It shows how Philip's suitability was called into question: his "fortune-hunting", his "Teutonic strain" and how he was believed to have "played the field".

It also describes his ambitious uncle's determined manoeuvrings to remove any obstacles placed in the way of the young couple. The stakes could not have been much higher: the popularity and therefore the future of the monarchy itself.

The film features a rich array of visual material, including: film archive, photographs and diary entries; and interviews with the Queen's cousin and bridesmaid The Hon. Margaret Rhodes, Philip's cousin (and Mountbatten's daughter) Patricia Mountbatten, royal biographers Robert Lacey and Philip Ziegler, and historians of the period David Kynaston and Richard Weight.

29 November 2007 @ 9pm on Channel 4