Even Queen Elizabeth II wants to dodge house guests on occasion.
In a recent ITV documentary titled “Inside the Crown: Secrets of the Royals,” it was revealed that the monarch once ducked into a bush to avoid speaking with a particularly controversial palace guest — Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu.
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The documentary details Ceaușescu’s 1978 trip to London with his wife Elena, per E! News, during which he was invited to a sit-down dinner with the royal family.
Queen Elizabeth II.
(The Royal Family/YouTube)
While the Queen, now 94, is no stranger to meeting with controversial world leaders, she seemed to be not too keen on this particular visit — as was the public.
“The press started to question the foreign secretary,” said journalist and filmmaker Robert Hardman in the doc. “Why are we inviting this monster to come to Britain?”
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As is custom, the Queen and husband, Prince Philip, greeted Ceaușescu at London’s Victoria train station when the leader arrived before taking him and his wife to Buckingham Palace, the documentary explained.
Nicolae Ceaușescu le 24 novembre 1989, Roumanie. (Photo by William STEVENS/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)
“On the occasion when they were staying she took the corgis out for a walk in the palace gardens and she could see the Ceaușescus coming the other way,” said Hardman. “She thought, ‘I really can’t face talking to them,’ so the first and only time in her life, she actually hid in a bush in the palace gardens to avoid her guests.”
British Foreign Secretary Lord David Owen also recalled the incident in the documentary.
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“The Queen puts up with many different people, but Ceaușescu was too much for her,” he remembered. “She made it quite plain she didn’t like that visit.”
