When Prince Charles said 'whatever in love means' during engagement interview with Diana

It's been four decades since Prince Charles announced his engagement to Lady Diana Spencer, who soon became the Princess of Wales, as well as a favourite of royal fans who dubbed her the "People's Princess."

However, the engagement announcement at Buckingham Palace on February 24, 1981, can also be seen as a forewarning of what later happened in the couple's tumultuous marriage. During the engagement interview, a BBC reporter asked them a normal question, but Charles' answer to it became the stuff of legend.

The reporter asked the couple, "Can you find the words, to sum up how you feel today, both of you?" ending it with a final question: "And I suppose, in love?" While Diana was visibly amused by the question, and replied "of course," Charles gave his infamous awkward comment: "Whatever in love means."

The interview was Charles and Diana's first as a couple, and also the biggest media story at the time. Charles' inappropriate comment was relatively ignored at the time, as their apparent fairytale romance kept the public engrossed, but it resurfaced when the troubles in his marriage with Diana made it to the news. It went viral again last year after it was recreated in "The Crown," the Netflix hit series about the royal family.

The comment was reflective of Charles's relationship with his true love Camilla Parker-Bowles, who was married to Andrew Parker-Bowles at that time. The Prince of Wales had forever been in an on-and-off relationship with Camilla, who is now his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall.

While Diana didn't react to Charles' comment back then, she confirmed that it "traumatised" her in an interview she gave after her separation from the British royal. She stated: "We had this ghastly interview the day we announced our engagement, And this ridiculous [reporter] said, 'Are you in love?' I thought, what a thick question. So I said, 'Yes, of course, we are,' and Charles turned around and said, 'Whatever in love means.' And that threw me completely. I thought what a strange answer. It traumatised me."

Nonetheless, the engagement announcement was seen as one of the most iconic moments in the history of the British monarchy, and was soon followed by a fairytale wedding in July that year. Charles and Diana went on to welcome two sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, but their marriage eventually broke down. They were divorced in 1996, a year before Diana's unfortunate demise in a car crash in Paris.