DATE: Sunday, September 7, 1997             TAG: 9709060093

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E11  EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, ENTERTAINMENT WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   81 lines

DIANA: REPORTER RECALLS GRAND NIGHT IN THE PRESENCE OF A PRINCESS

THE TIME was a summer evening in London. Charles and Diana, the prince and princess of Wales, sat five rows ahead at the Odeon theater.

The occasion? The Royal Command Performance.

Once a year, a movie is chosen for this charity event. It is usually a British-produced and British-filmed production. After all, the royals are in the business of promoting British commerce. The movie was ``Octopussy,'' the then-latest of the James Bond films. You don't get more British than 007.

London's Leicester Square was abuzz with anticipation.

As we say back home, it was a time of walking in tall cotton.

But it was not the first time I had attended a so-called ``Royal Command Performance.'' A few years earlier the movie was another 007 flick, ``The Spy Who Loved Me'' and the royal presence was Princess Anne, not one of the more popular royals, either then or now. I learned then that ``Royal Command Performance'' doesn't mean that her highness herself attends. Queen Elizabeth II generally sends the younger folks to most of the required moviegoing.

No one was disappointed, though, in 1984 when Charles and Diana were the moviegoers of the moment. She had given birth to the royal heir and was on a high wave of popularity.

Let's be perfectly honest about our reaction to the couple and that evening: He appeared to be perfunctory and dismissive of her. He walked a few feet ahead, which you could write off as pure royal protocol, but he never smiled at her. He never looked at her, except to essay a glance of what looked like disciplinary caution.

She, on the other hand, had the tucked-down head of a shy girl who is taller than she wants to be. She appeared much taller than her photographs suggested - a full head taller than he.

And the security!

No event I've attended had this kind of security. It makes an appearance by our own president seem quite casual. There was still talk of Lord Mountbatten's murder. Upon my arrival at the theater, a talkative bobby said that the building had been searched no less than five times during the day.

The crowd, perhaps a thousand people, was kept on the other side of the street. Those with tickets were required to enter immediately, not to mill about waiting to get a glimpse of the royal couple when they arrived.

``Move into the theater if you have a ticket,'' a stern but calm police officer reminded. ``If you don't have a ticket, move off the premises.''

The audience inside the theater watched the arrival via a closed-circuit TV set-up that showed the prince and princess crossing the lobby and, finally, emerging into our presence. They sat five rows ahead.

She laughed at several of Roger Moore's double entendres in the film. He looked at her as if to say, ``What's so funny?''

There was speculation about whether the princess was pregnant. Wearing a fashionable off-the-shoulder black evening gown, she looked ultra-thin. Not a sign. (Actually, her second son was born the next year.)

Security wasn't as tight after the film. I snuck out while the recorded orchestra played ``God Bless the Queen.''

And yes, she did extend a hand as she passed, to several people. It wasn't a handshake. It was more like a hand touch. The prince looked back at her in something like disdain.

Only later was I informed that one never touches the royals, even if she did extend her hand. But she touched several on her way out the theater, and she seemed to be fed by the friendliness - enough to make the outgoing gesture, even if it wasn't ``approved.''

This, even in 1984, was the ``people's princess.''

And, yes, it was a bit embarrassing that some of the photographers urged the prince to step back. They yelled, ``Diana, look this way.'' or ``Diana, over here.'' Yes, they were irreverent in that they didn't say ``Your highness,'' but they were orderly.

The security at this event was so thorough and so orchestrated that it makes you wonder if Diana would be alive today if she had kept the official royal entourage. They were hers until she removed them in favor of living a more private kind of public life.

But perhaps not even James Bond himself could have kept her safe. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Diana, Princess of Wales

FILE photo

The 1984 premiere of the James Bond film ``Octopussy,'' starring

Roger Moore, drew Prince Charles and Princess Diana to London's

Odeon Theater.

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