PARIS - Prince Albert is giving Monaco a new princess.
The boyish if balding monarch is ditching decades of eligible bachelorhood, and is now engaged to South African ex-swimming champion Charlene Wittstock. Albert's betrothed has iconic shoes to fill, stepping into a role vacant since the much-beloved Princess Grace died in a car crash in 1982.
Royal watchers are ecstatic at Wednesday's palace announcement, and they're wondering: Is the bespectacled playboy prince manning up? And most importantly, will the 52-year-old Albert finally produce a legitimate heir?
"It's been 30 years since Grace died, 30 years they've been waiting for a first lady, a princess, a dream beauty, glam. And voila!" says Colombe Pringle, executive editor of Point de Vue magazine, which has followed Albert's amorous adventures.
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