Monaco royal wedding a high point among scandals and tragedies
(CBS) The wedding of Monaco's Prince Albert II and Charlene Wittstock will be a celebratory event, for sure, but it's also a high point among a number of tragedies and scandals that have beset the principality's ruling family.
Pictures: Charlene Wittstock
Pictures: Prince Albert II and Charlene Wittstock
Special section: Monaco's royal wedding
In 1982, Albert's mother, movie star Grace Kelly - who became Princess Grace when she married Prince Rainier III in 1956 - died in a car crash. And the couple's three children - Princess Caroline, Albert and Princess Stephanie, have all been unlucky in love, with the whole world watching.
Caroline's first marriage, to French playboy Phillippe Junot, ended in divorce in 1980 after she accused him of infidelity. Her second marriage, to Stephano Casiraghi, ended in tragedy; he died in a speedboat accident in 1990. She's now married to Prince Ernst August of Hanover, though in 2010 he was allegedly photographed kissing another woman in Thailand, fueling rumors that the couple may divorce.
Stephanie, Grace and Rainier's youngest child, survived the 1982 crash that killed her mother. She went on to have three children out of wedlock, including two with her former bodyguard Daniel Ducruet, and was also briefly married to Portuguese circus acrobat Adans Lopez Peres.
Perhaps his sisters' marriage troubles are part of the reason behind Albert's longtime bachelorhood, during which he's had two scandalous revelations of his own. In 2005, he publicly acknowledged having an illegitimate son with a former flight attendant from Togo. A year later, he also admitted to fathering a daughter, born in 1992, out of wedlock.
Albert and Wittstock made their official debut as a couple in 2006. Their wedding celebrations will be a $70 million, three-day affair, complete with two ceremonies, a gala ball and a concert by The Eagles.
