Dunaway to star in as UK royal

The love affair between the Duchess of Windsor and a gay American playboy is to be turned into a film starring Faye Dunaway, it emerged today.

The movie will tell the story of her illicit relationship with Jimmy Donahue, heir to the Woolworths fortune.

Dunaway will star as the Duchess while British actor Michael York will play the Duke of Windsor in the film, The Bahama Triangle.

The country was rocked in 1936 when King Edward VIII announced his abdication in order to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson.

In 1950, at the age of 54, the Duchess embarked on an affair with Donahue, grandson of FW Woolworth, founder of the High Street chain.

He was almost 20 years her junior and openly homosexual, but the Duchess fell madly in love with him and their affair lasted four years.

Much of their relationship was played out in and around the Bahamas, giving the film its name.

The affair came to light in a book published three years ago, which claimed the Duke knew all about his wife’s infidelity but was powerless to stop it.

Last month papers released by the Public Records Office revealed that Donahue was not the only man with whom the Duchess enjoyed a fling.

In 1935 she secretly two-timed Edward, then the Prince of Wales, with car salesman Guy Trundle.