It has been 25 years since The Princess Diaries premiered and turned its star Anne Hathaway into an overnight sensation. Three years later the film spawned a sequel, Royal Engagement, and now, two decades on, a third film is set to bring the story to a close.
Details of the plot have been kept under wraps, but director Adele Lim has promised familiar faces when the franchise returns. "If you were a fan of the original first two movies, I think you can look forward to a lot of fun returns," she said. "We're going to be able to shoot in Europe and really show the audience Genovia in its full glory."
Anne Hathaway's rise, backlash and comeback
The Princess Diaries launched Anne Hathaway, then 18, into becoming one of Hollywood's biggest names. She went on to win an Oscar, become one of the industry's best paid actresses and build a movie collection that has grossed $6.8 billion worldwide.
But the highs came with crushing lows. In the early 2010s Hathaway suffered a wave of online hate so vitriolic it spawned the nickname "Hatha-hate," costing her film roles and taking a toll on her mental health. She was dubbed "fake" and "theatrical" and was named The Most Annoying Celebrity of 2013 in a poll by The San Francisco Chronicle. Even her 2013 Oscar win for Les Miserables was overshadowed, after the opening line of her acceptance speech, "it came true," went viral with viewers branding her pretentious.
Today Hathaway is this summer's box office queen, tipped for Oscars glory once more. She revived her role in The Devil Wears Prada earlier this year, is currently in cinemas with The Odyssey, and won acclaim for the indie musical Mother Mary. She is next set to promote the sci-fi film The End of Oak Street, out in August, and the thriller Verity, out in October. The Academy has also changed its voting rules to allow actors to be nominated for multiple performances in the same category, meaning Hathaway could compete against herself at the 2027 Oscars. She announced in June that she is expecting her third child with husband Adam Shulman.
Julie Andrews' return after losing her voice
Julie Andrews was already an Oscar winner for Mary Poppins when she took the role of the Queen of Genovia. The part marked a comeback after a routine 1997 throat surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, to remove non-cancerous nodules, left her with permanent scar tissue and destroyed her famous four-octave singing range. When she sang publicly for the first time since the operation in the 2004 sequel, crew members reportedly cried when she nailed the first take.
Andrews has since slowed her acting career, sticking mostly to voice roles in Shrek 2, Despicable Me and Bridgerton. She celebrated her 90th birthday last October. "I probably feel like in my 50s, honest to God," she said on the Wiser Than Me With Julia Louis-Dreyfus podcast in 2024. "As long as the brain holds out, I'm doing okay." She said she now lives a "quieter" life. "I don't go out as much, and I love being home. But I kind of enjoyed that, pulling back a little bit now. And of course I've got a million thoughts and ideas and hope that I can keep going for a great deal longer. But who knows? And I'm just pleased that I've arrived here."
Héctor Elizondo and Heather Matarazzo
Héctor Elizondo, who earned a Golden Globe nomination for just ten minutes of screen time in Pretty Woman, turned bodyguard Joe into a fan favourite. He later reunited with director Garry Marshall on New Year's Eve and Mother's Day, joined the USA Network series Monk as Dr Neven Bell in 2008 and reprised the role in 2023's Mr Monk's Last Case, and played Ed Alzate on Last Man Standing. Proud of his Latino heritage, he has said he turns down roles he sees as stereotypical, revealing he rejected a part in Scarface. "I didn't want to be associated with Latinos when the association is violence," he said. "I didn't know that in my culture. The violence I experienced was from the non-Latinos."
Heather Matarazzo, who made her name in 1995's Welcome to the Dollhouse, played Mia's eccentric friend Lilly Moscovitz. She went on to appear in the Scream franchise as Martha Meeks, plus Sorority Boys, Saved! and Hostel: Part II. Three years after The Princess Diaries, aged 21, she came out as a lesbian in an interview with The Daily News. She is now married to writer Heather Turman, whom she met in 2016 on the Los Angeles set of Jillian Armenante's film Stuck, and the couple moved to Michigan in 2023, where they live with their two cats. Matarazzo recently played Judi Spannagel in Wednesday, but in 2022 admitted a career wobble in now-deleted tweets: "I have hit my limit with Life today... I've given my life to acting for over 30 years. And am done struggling just to survive. I just need a win. A life-changing win. Cause this ain't it."
Mandy Moore's career and abusive marriage
The Princess Diaries was Mandy Moore's first big film role after entering the industry as a singer, and she proved her range playing mean girl cheerleader Lana Thomas. She has since starred in A Walk to Remember, License to Wed and 47 Meters Down, voiced Rapunzel in Tangled, and played Rebecca Pearson in NBC's This Is Us, earning Golden Globe and Emmy nominations. She received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2019.
Moore married musician Ryan Adams in 2009; the couple split six years later citing irreconcilable differences. She later accused him of psychological abuse, one of several women, including singer-songwriter Phoebe Bridgers and an anonymous woman who was reportedly 14 when she began corresponding with Adams, who told The New York Times he was verbally and emotionally abusive after offering to advance their careers. Adams denied the most serious accusations but wrote: "To anyone I have ever hurt, however unintentionally, I apologize deeply and unreservedly." Moore is now married to musician Taylor Goldsmith, and the couple share sons Gus, five, and Ozzie, three, and daughter Lou, two.
Caroline Goodall and Robert Schwartzman
English-Australian actress Caroline Goodall began her career on stage with the Royal Shakespeare Company before playing Mia's mother, Helen Thermopolis, a role she reprised in Royal Engagement. She later reunited with Mandy Moore in Chasing Liberty, worked twice with Steven Spielberg on Hook and Schindler's List, starred alongside Bruce Willis and Henry Cavill in The Cold Light of Day, appeared in The Dressmaker and played Lady Doris in the first season of The Crown. She has since turned to producing, working on 2020's The Bay of Silence.
Robert Schwartzman, a member of the Coppola acting dynasty, played Mia's love interest Michael Moscovitz. He is the nephew of Francis Ford Coppola and cousin of Nicolas Cage, Sofia Coppola, Roman Coppola and Christopher Coppola, and appeared in Sofia's films Lick the Star and The Virgin Suicides. Music became his main focus, and he founded the band Rooney, which still tours and has performed alongside Weezer, The Strokes, Travis, Keane and Queens of the Stone Age. He directed 2023's The Good Half, starring Nick Jonas, Brittany Snow and David Arquette, and founded the production company Utopia.
The rest of the cast today
Erik von Detten, who played heart-throb Josh Bryant, is also known for Days of Our Lives, Escape to Witch Mountain, Toy Story, Brink!, Meego, Complete Savages and So Weird, and voiced Erwin Lawson on Recess. His last credit was reprising Sid Phillips in 2010's Toy Story 3. As of 2018 he has worked for a precious metals asset management firm and as a sales manager at a commodities brokerage. He married real estate agent Angela in 2018, and they have three children.
Patrick John Flueger made his film debut playing Jeremiah Hart, then landed small roles on JAG, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit and CSI: Miami before breaking out as Shawn Farrell on The 4400. He appeared in The World's Fastest Indian alongside Anthony Hopkins and Antony Starr, and now plays rookie officer Adam Ruzek on Chicago P.D. after a recurring role on Chicago Fire.
Sean O'Bryan, who played Patrick O'Connell, Mia's English teacher who dates her mother, began his career in the Nineties with roles on Roseanne, Six Feet Under, Criminal Minds, The King of Queens and Dexter, and later appeared on CSI, Bones, Melissa & Joey, Hot in Cleveland, The Mentalist, Leverage and The Middle. His most recent film credit is 2024's horror movie Traumatika.
Sandra Oh, who played vice principal Geraldine Gupta, first rose to prominence in Canada for 1994's Double Happiness. Her role as Cristina Yang on Grey's Anatomy proved her breakthrough, earning her a 2005 Golden Globe and a 2006 Screen Actors Guild Award, plus five consecutive Emmy nominations by 2009. Her role in the 2018 BBC America series Killing Eve brought global fame and a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a TV Drama, making her the first Asian woman to win in that category in almost 40 years. She most recently appeared alongside Seth Rogen and Keanu Reeves in Aziz Ansari's directorial debut, Good Fortune.
Larry Miller, who played flamboyant hairdresser Paolo Puttanesca, first gained attention as a store clerk in Pretty Woman and went on to appear in The Nutty Professor, 10 Things I Hate About You and Max Keeble's Big Move, reprising his 10 Things role for a 2009 TV adaptation. He started a podcast, This Week with Larry Miller, but suspended it after falling and hitting his head in 2012. His agent, Michael Hansen, later revealed Miller had fallen into a coma and was on life support for a month. "He was hovering between life and death," Hansen said. "It's a miracle he woke up... He's lucky to be alive." Miller later returned to podcasting, saying, "I'm very thankful to have recovered from a traumatic brain injury so quickly." He is married to TV writer Eileen Conn, and they have two children.
