Barbra Streisand opens up about her unexpected connection with 'utterly charming' King Charles, who once said she had 'great sex appeal'
Barbra Streisand opened up about her long friendship with King Charles III in her new memoir.
The "Funny Girl" star and the future monarch first met in 1974.
According to his biographer, Charles once said Streisand had "great sex appeal."
In her wide-ranging new memoir "My Name Is Barbra," legendary actress and singer Barbra Streisand opened up about her decades-long connection with King Charles III.
Streisand first met the royal when he visited Los Angeles in 1974. Charles was apparently adamant that he meet Streisand, and so he stopped for a brief visit at Warner Bros. Studios, where the star was recording music for her upcoming film "Funny Lady."
"The prince was utterly charming when he came to the studio, but frankly, it's hard to have a real conversation when you're surrounded by fifty photographers snapping pictures," Streisand recalled in her memoir. "I was drinking tea and offered him a sip… and the future king of England actually drank from my cup, which was apparently unprecedented. When the British press reported on this, they turned it into the equivalent of an international incident."
Per Streisand, Charles asked her what kind of tea she was drinking, and she told him it was Constant Comment.
"I couldn't think of anything else to say, and I'm so work oriented that I was feeling guilty about all those musicians who were waiting for me to get on with the session. So I'm afraid I wasn't as gracious as I should have been," Streisand remembered of her first meeting with Charles.
"The fact is, both Prince Charles and I are shy, but somehow we still managed to connect… because that proved to be the beginning of an unexpected friendship," she added.
Though they only met in person for the first time in 1974, the monarch's interest in Streisand apparently started years earlier, when he was in college at Cambridge.
"I was told that Charles has said I was his 'only pinup' (apparently he had a poster of me in his room at Cambridge), and he described me as 'devastatingly attractive' with 'great sex appeal.' Who knew?" Streisand quipped in her memoir.
Charles' quotes about Streisand's "sex appeal" previously appeared in Charles Anderson's 2022 biography of the monarch titled "The King: The Life of Charles III."
According to her memoir, Streisand and the monarch later reconnected in 1994 when she played several shows in London, including one benefiting his charity. Streisand revealed that Charles was so taken with her performance (and grateful for her contributions to his charity) that he sent her a bouquet of hand-picked flowers the next day.
"The flowers were fresh from his garden! What a lovely gesture. And he wrote: 'It was such a treat to attend your concert last night — You were wonderful and I adored every minute of it! Bless you for being so kind and generous to my trust — they so appreciated it,'" the "Yentl" star recalled of Charles' gesture.
Streisand said her and Charles' "extraordinary" friendship has lasted "decades," and gave her the chance to visit to Charles' home, Highgrove, in 1995. Per the singer, the two also regularly exchange birthday cards (Charles recently sent a card with a hand-painted watercolor of his on the front) and gifts, and Streisand said she's "so happy" he's now king.
Streisand previously spoke about her and Charles' friendship during a 2021 interview on British TV.
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