Soraya, the Sad Iranian Princess in movie clips
Born 1932 in Isfahan, Iran, Soraya was daughter of Khalil Esfandiary, a Bakhtiari nobleman and Iranian ambassador to West Germany in the 1950s, and his Russian-born German wife Eva Karl. In 1946, Soraya's beauty dazzled the divorced (last) Iranian King, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. At this time Soraya had finished high school in Switzerland and was studying English in London. They were soon engaged and later married in 1951. The engagement ring had a 22.37 carat (4.474 g) diamond.
The imperial couple's marriage disintegrated by early 1958 due to Soraya's apparent infertility, for which the couple had sought treatment in Switzerland, France, and America. The Shah had suggested that he take a second wife in order to produce an heir but Soraya had disagreed. On 21 March 1958, the Iranian New Year's Day, a weeping Shah announced his divorce in a publicly broadcast speech.
After her divorce, Soraya moved to France and launched a brief career as a film actress. She starred in the 1965 movie I tre volti (The Three Faces) and became the companion of its Italian director, Franco Indovina. But Indovina's unexpected death (1972) in a plane crash, pushed Soraya into depression, which she outlined in her 1991 memoir, Le Palais Des Solitudes (The Palace of Loneliness). The following clips are from "the Three Faces":
Princess Soraya did not communicate with the Shah's third wife Farah Diba, even when both of them lived in Paris. On October 26, 2001 (birthday of former husband and Iranian King Mohammad Reza Pahlavi), Princess Soraya died of undisclosed causes in her apartment in Paris, France. A week later, her younger brother, Bijan died in Paris. They were buried in a cemetery in Munich, Germany next to their parents.
Since Soraya's death, several women have come forward claiming to be her illegitimate daughter, reportedly born in 1962, according to the Persian-language weekly Nimrooz; the claims have not been confirmed. The newspaper also published an article in 2001 which suggested, without proof, that Princess Soraya and her brother had been murdered.
An Italian/German television movie about the princess's life, Soraya (a.k.a. Sad Princess) was broadcast in 2003, starring Anna Valle (Miss Italy 1995, pictured above) as Soraya.
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