Dodi Fayed’s best friend opens up 20 years after his death

Her memory lives on.

Twenty years after her untimely death, the world this week remembers Princess Diana.

Hundreds of TV specials, newspaper articles and magazine pull-outs have chronicled her life and death these past few weeks, while royal experts and former friends have recounted what a beautiful soul she was.

Dodi Fayed’s best friend Andrew Wainrib told DailyMail.com he does not want his late friend to become a ‘footnote’ in history as the world marks 20 years since Princess Diana’s death 

But for those close to Diana’s then boyfriend Dodi Fayed – the man who died next to her in a Paris tunnel – they fear that the Egyptian billionaire’s son has once again been forgotten in the renewed outpouring of grief for ‘The People’s Princess’.

And in an exclusive interview Dodi’s best friend Andrew Wainrib has told DailyMail.com that he doesn’t want his friend to become a ‘footnote’ to history.

Diana, Princess of Wales and film producer Dodi died in Paris in the early hours of August 31, 1997.

They were killed when the Mercedes they were traveling in hit a concrete pillar in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel.

They were being pursued by the paparazzi after leaving the Ritz Hotel and driver Henri Paul, who was also killed, was drunk and driving at high speed.

Since that day the fascination with Diana hasn’t faded.

Now film and TV director and serial entrepreneur Andrew says he hopes his friend Dodi will also be a fixture in people’s remembrance.

‘It was a terrible tragedy but my biggest concern at the time, and I still feel this way 20 years later, I’m concerned that my friend shouldn’t be a footnote to history, he shouldn’t be forgotten.

‘It was all about Diana then and it will be all about Diana once again.’

Dodi will be forever remembered simply as Princess Di's lover - an aloof millionaire's son who died at her side - rather than celebrated as the 'wonderful' man his close friends and family remember, Andrew says

Dodi will be forever remembered simply as Princess Di’s lover – an aloof millionaire’s son who died at her side – rather than celebrated as the ‘wonderful’ man his close friends and family remember, Andrew says

Best friends: Andrew had worked for Dodi throughout the late 80s as a film developer and said 'he got to know the man inside out' (Pictured in 1987) in Vail, Colorado 

Best friends: Andrew had worked for Dodi throughout the late 80s as a film developer and said ‘he got to know the man inside out’ (Pictured in 1987) in Vail, Colorado 

Andrew recalls how the Playboy could walk into any nightclub in New York or Los Angeles 15 minutes before closing and convince them to stay open just for him and his friends

Andrew recalls how the Playboy could walk into any nightclub in New York or Los Angeles 15 minutes before closing and convince them to stay open just for him and his friends

Speaking for the first time in two decades about the tragedy, Andrew, 62, who lives in Thousand Oaks, California, said Dodi, at the time of his death, was a successful Hollywood film producer with an Oscar-winning movie to his name and a promising career in Hollywood ahead of him.

He says he was a generous, kind-hearted man loved by those close to him.

But because Diana was in the car that day Dodi’s life and legacy were put in the shade.

In his view, Dodi will be forever remembered simply as Princess Di’s lover – an aloof millionaire’s son who died at her side – rather than celebrated as the ‘wonderful’ man his close friends and family remember.

Andrew had worked for Dodi throughout the late 80s as a film developer and was asked to be Dodi’s best man when he married Susanne Gregard on New Year’s Day in 1987 – a marriage that lasted less than eight months.

‘We were always very close friends, we spent a lot of time together in the 80s,’ Andrew said.

‘I went on to work closely with him and got to know the man inside out.’

During their drinking sessions the two men shared stories about their past and their upbringing.

Dodi and Diana made headlines in the summer of 1997 after they were spotted vacationing in St Tropez

Princess Diana, right, and her companion Dodi Fayed, walk on a pontoon in the French Riviera resort of St. Tropez, days before their deaths

Dodi and Diana made headlines in the summer of 1997 after they were spotted vacationing in St Tropez 

The two were tragically killed when the Mercedes they were traveling in hit a concrete pillar in the Pont de l'Alma tunnel on August 31, 1997 

The two were tragically killed when the Mercedes they were traveling in hit a concrete pillar in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel on August 31, 1997 

Growing up, Dodi divided his time between family homes in Egypt and France and told Andrew his family’s immense wealth meant he became used to a gilded life of privilege and was raised in celebrity circles.

He attended the exclusive Le Rosey school in Switzerland and did a short stint at Sandhurst, the British military academy for young men seeking social status.

According to Andrew, Dodi – who was shorter than most of the other kids in class – was ‘mercilessly picked on’ during his time at both schools over his Arabic heritage.

‘He was bullied almost every day because he was a short Arab, it was a thing and it was always two on one, three on one,’ explains Andrew.

‘But Dodi couldn’t fight, he told me, “money was my fighting, money was my kung-fu”.

Andrew was asked to be Dodi's best man when he married Susanne Gregard on New Year's Day in 1987

Andrew was asked to be Dodi’s best man when he married Susanne Gregard on New Year’s Day in 1987

Pictured here is Dodi Fayed with ex wife Suzanne Gregard at their 1986/87 New Years wedding

Dodi's marriage with actress and model lasted less than eight months

Dodi’s marriage with actress and model lasted less than eight months

‘To him getting picked on as a kid and getting his a** kicked was his life-changing event, he decided it wasn’t going to happen again.

‘He’d heard a few derogatory names, taken a few punches, and as soon as he found out how he could control the universe, he jumped on it.

‘He took the licks and learned how to win.’

After completing his education Dodi worked briefly as an attaché in the United Arab Emirates Embassy in London before plowing his time into the family business.

Pictured here is a newspaper clipping kept by Andrew Wainrib reporting on the Dodi Fayed and Suzanne Gregard 1987 New Years wedding in Vail, Colorado

Pictured here is a newspaper clipping kept by Andrew Wainrib reporting on the Dodi Fayed and Suzanne Gregard 1987 New Years wedding in Vail, Colorado

The immense wealth of his father Mohammed Al-Fayed, former owner of Harrods department store in Knightsbridge, London, meant Dodi enjoyed homes in New York, London, Paris, Los Angeles and Switzerland.

He developed a passion for fast cars and beautiful women, liked to hang out with celebrities and quickly garnered a reputation as a millionaire playboy.

But as a young man Dodi inevitably moved in the shadow of his tycoon father and was desperate for his own success.

With a huge monthly allowance – by most accounts $100,000 – he had little need to worry about financially.

But despite his charm and good-natured generosity, he couldn’t shake his reputation of being a slacker – the privileged son of a multi-millionaire who lacked the drive and ruthlessness to make it on his own.

But Andrew says that image doesn’t do his friend justice.

He says Dodi did have the drive for success in buckets.

After all few would know, even today, that Dodi won an Oscar for his work as a film producer.

He formed the production company Allied Stars that helped to finance six Hollywood films, including Chariots of Fire, which won an Academy Award for best picture in 1981.

He also produced ‘Hook’, starring Dustin Hoffman, and in 1995 produced ‘The Scarlet Letter’ with Demi Moore.

He also helped finance ‘Breaking Glass’ in 1980, and ‘F/X’ in 1986 followed by ‘F/X2 — The Deadly Art of Illusion’ in 1991.

Pictured here is an interior photo of a balloon filled room in Dodi's Vail, Colorado home where he married Suzanne Gregard the night before on New Years 1987

Pictured here is an interior photo of a balloon filled room in Dodi’s Vail, Colorado home where he married Suzanne Gregard the night before on New Years 1987

Flipping through pages of an old photo album from 1987, Andrew reminisces about the time he spent working with high-flying Dodi as a film developer, amid a variety of other roles.

‘Everyone was pitching something to Dodi all the time, whether it was a movie or something they wanted him to buy.

‘One of my favorite stories is some charter airplane company thought Dodi could be a potential buyer for one of these converted 727 private planes with giant master bedrooms and gold plated everything.

The son of an Egyptian business magnate, Dodi was an extremely generous man, picking up 'every tab' for anyone who ate or drank with him, according to Andrew 

The son of an Egyptian business magnate, Dodi was an extremely generous man, picking up ‘every tab’ for anyone who ate or drank with him, according to Andrew 

‘Whenever Dodi would charter a jet he would bring big-names at the time; celebrity friends like Melanie Griffith, Tony Curtis, Cheryl Tiegs.

‘And I remember Tiegs and her dog were on this particular coast-to-coast flight.

‘The way it worked was the charter company had a salesman on the plane and they would try to close the deal about halfway through the trip.

‘So Dodi is out cold in one of the sumptuous, beautiful, gilded bedrooms.

‘I’m like, “dude there is a guy who has to talk to you now about the plane.”’

Dodi half-asleep tells Andrew, ‘you have to tell him you’re the guy and he has to talk to you.’

Andrew scoffs as he recalls: ‘I played this role so many times. During meetings with Dodi I’d always think of that old baseball adage, ‘here comes the pitch’.

Knowing very well that Dodi had no interest in buying the extravagant converted aircraft Andrew played along.

‘I had to nod, ask questions and look interested throughout the remaining three-hour long sales pitch,’ he said.

Andrew says Dodi was an extremely generous man, picking up ‘every tab’ for anyone who ate or drank with him.

‘To Dodi it was a show. It was his brand, he wanted people to know he was the guy that made things happen,’ says Andrew.

Andrew recalls how the Playboy could walk into any nightclub in New York or Los Angeles 15 minutes before closing and convince them to stay open just for him and his friends.

They would drink champagne and eat caviar and Dodi would pick up the $5,000 tab.

‘It was almost like he was programmed to control the group he was in,’ Andrew says.

‘I remember one time we were out in New Jersey with friends and we went to this restaurant at a turkey farm in the countryside.

‘Well they didn’t take credit cards, only cash.

‘We had cash in our pockets Dodi didn’t, so the look on his face when he couldn’t pick up the check, he couldn’t manipulate the moment. He was visibly frustrated.’

Andrew says his friend’s ‘big character’ came from Dodi’s love of the movie Scarface.

He said Dodi modeled himself on Tony Montana, the powerful lead character of the 1983 Brian De Palma film.

‘He had a fascination with Scarface and it was one of his favorite movies,’ Andrew explains.

‘He even used Tony Montana as an alias when he would check in to various hotels.

‘He’d say, ‘I’m at the Beverly Hills Hotel and I’m registered under Tony Montana,’ and I would tell him ‘argh that is so cheesy’.’

Dodi, Andrew says, was a man of many acquaintances and few friends, but those he did allow to become close to him he treated with great affection.

Dodi was also no stranger to life under public scrutiny.

Andrew says his friend's 'big character' came from Dodi's love of the movie Scarface - and he would even use Tony Montana as an alias when he would check in to various hotels

Andrew says his friend’s ‘big character’ came from Dodi’s love of the movie Scarface – and he would even use Tony Montana as an alias when he would check in to various hotels

According to Andrew, Dodi - who was shorter than most of the other kids in class - was 'mercilessly picked on' during his time at both schools over his Arab heritage

According to Andrew, Dodi – who was shorter than most of the other kids in class – was ‘mercilessly picked on’ during his time at both schools over his Arab heritage

Growing up as the son of Egyptian billionaire Mohammed Al Fayed gave Dodi a small understanding of what Diana might have experienced living in the public eye.

Andrew recalls how Dodi was very image savvy and media conscious.

‘He had a lot of worldly pressures on him being the son of a very powerful and influential business man, but he was also a man of good spirits and he was a generous man.

‘He liked to play it cool, he liked to be the mysterious character, there was definitely a certain allure to that.’

The busy playboy wasn’t easy to get hold of in his final months but Andrew remembers receiving a call from his friend asking him and his father to Thanksgiving in Aspen, Colorado.

Andrew declined, joking with Dodi: ‘I have to work for a living, so I will be staying in LA and won’t be going to Aspen with your list of celebrity friends.’

Less than nine months later Dodi was killed in an event that shocked the world.

Andrew said he first heard Dodi was dating Princess Di through newspaper and magazine clippings that were sent to him from around the world and recalls thinking that Diana was ‘looking for a knight in shining armor’ and that his friend would step into that role well.

At the time Andrew, living in a small private coastal community in Malibu, California, said news reporters began knocking on his door to find out more about his friend.

The reporters wanted to learn more about Dodi and his best-man’s wild times traveling around the world on private planes, visiting ski lodges, and sunning themselves on yacht trips in the late 80s.

Dodi, Andrew says, was a man of many acquaintances and few friends, but those he did allow to become close to him he treated with great affection

Dodi, Andrew says, was a man of many acquaintances and few friends, but those he did allow to become close to him he treated with great affection

Despite his charm and good-natured generosity, Dodi couldn't shake his reputation of being a slacker - the privileged son of a multi-millionaire who lacked the drive and ruthlessness to make it on his own 

Despite his charm and good-natured generosity, Dodi couldn’t shake his reputation of being a slacker – the privileged son of a multi-millionaire who lacked the drive and ruthlessness to make it on his own 

Not long after the relationship went public Andrew did appear on GMTV, a breakfast television show in England, and told the presenters to ‘leave him (Dodi) alone, that’s his job.’

‘Dodi is supposed to date princesses and movie stars, maybe I need to send you a brochure, but that’s the deal, that’s his job,’ he told the show.

He said: ‘It was all very sudden, because he started dating her and some of my good friends would say ‘hey you see what Dodi’s up to?’ and try to rib me about it. I said wow Dodi is a genius, I’m sure he’s getting more press than ever and a lot of heat.’

In 1997 Andrew was no longer working with Dodi but was admiring his showmanship from the US. In July that year Dodi began dating Diana and rumors around the liaison were confirmed when the pair were photographed together while on Dodi’s luxury yacht the Jonikal in the French Riviera.

The famous photograph showing the pair embracing stunned the world and confirmed Diana had found love again.

Andrew recalls ribbing his best friend over the relationship.

‘Dodi and I would exchange voice messages a lot and we sure would rib one another,’ he said.

‘Dodi’s father had bought him a house about 600 yards down the beach from me in Malibu and I left Dodi a message saying ‘when you’re in town you know that Diana’s going to get here and come up to me on the beach and ask ‘Uhhh what happened to your dog?’, said Andrew referring to his three-legged pooch Elvis who has a weak bladder.

‘And I’m going to say he lost his leg from a landmine, and it’s over for you and it’s all about me. She’d only have love for me and Elvis.’

‘Dodi then left me a message telling me he saw me on TV and I’m aging and it’s not looking good.’

Andrew recalls first learning of Dodi and Diana’s death while on the same beach walking his dog that fateful day August 31, 1997.

‘I could hear my answer machine go off. It was my mother’s voice, so I saunter back into the house and play the message over, it said: ‘Turn on CNN. Dodi is dead and Diana…’

‘I’m like ‘What the f**k’ So I turn on the television.’

Andrew describes himself as being ‘completely stupefied,’ spending the next ten hours glued to his television watching it all unfold with the rest of the world.

Twenty years later Andrew is still in disbelief over the deaths.

‘How can two of the most elite humans on the planet, that should have the least likelihood of exposure to danger, have their lives unceremoniously snuffed out by the most pedestrian of acts – a road accident.’

Andrew, perhaps cruelly, lays a little of the blame for the crash with Dodi.

‘In my mind all I can think is what my guy would be doing in the car,’ he said.

CCTV footage of from The Ritz Paris shows Dodi and Diana just hours before they died 

CCTV footage of from The Ritz Paris shows Dodi and Diana just hours before they died 

Diana, Dodi Fayed, and driver Henri Paul were all killed in the tragic car accident 20 years ago

Diana, Dodi Fayed, and driver Henri Paul were all killed in the tragic car accident 20 years ago

Tributes to Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Faye at Harrods, Knightsbridge, London,  1997

Tributes to Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Faye at Harrods, Knightsbridge, London, 1997

‘Instinctively, I would think that he’s not all worked up over it, he’s just sitting in the back telling the driver to lose these guys (the paparazzi).

‘He’s maybe had a little to drink, a delicious dinner and they want to get to their villa and there’s all this paparazzi and he’s yelling at the guy (the limo driver) ‘go faster’.

‘I can just picture him, cool clothes in the back of the car telling the driver pick it up because he wanted to have an air of control, as well as showing that he was the boss to Diana.

‘She was royalty and I’m sure that was in his mind.

‘Not only was he very conscious of that but he assumed a big character to cope with it. That was the message that he was always having to send.’

‘And the driver, who they say was under the influence, has the boss in the back telling him to kick ass so he puts the hammer down. He makes a mistake and everybody dies.’

Andrew added that Dodi was used to be surrounded by security and ordering limo drivers around.

‘I’d been out with Dodi on the town just the two of us,’ he said.

‘There was always a bodyguard and a driver. He had a service here in the US and he had all his dad’s guys when he was in London.

‘Anywhere he went he always had extra security whether he needed it or not, he was used to that world.’

But still Andrew was dumbfounded by the crash.

‘They were a couple that should’ve been buffered from this, to think that this could come down to a drunk driving accident is just about the most tragic thing I can possibly think of. These two people should have been protected.’

He added: ‘Dodi stepped into that hornets nest and to whatever degree he cultivated the relationship with Diana, or was truly committed or whatever, it shouldn’t have been a death penalty for him.’

Andrew believes he can talk with a ‘voice of authority’ when discussing Dodi’s life.

Few people knew him as his best friend did.

‘I would see Dodi at his most vulnerable,’ he explains.

‘I studied his behavior because we were in very close quarters for quite sometime. So I would know how he would react to certain situations, especially with women he was dating and fraternizing with.

‘I think that he liked to punch above his weight class if it meant having some leverage on his dad. His dad had all the leverage, his father pulled all the strings.’

Were it not for Dodi’s premature death, Andrew knows that their friendship would have stood the test of time.

Dodi saw Andrew’s potential from early on and gifted him his first camera, leading to a documentary film career and an award winning short documentary animation in 2009, Cohen on the Bridge.

He’s now created the potentially life saving anti-virus spray, KissSafe – following the loss of a close friend from cancer.

Andrew was baffled by the death of his clean-living friend before he learned about the Human Papillomavirus, or HPV, which can cause cervical cancer in women and oral cancer in men.

HPV can be spread through kissing and oral sex, so Andrew has decided to develop a product to fight its spread – KissSafe, a mint flavored breath spray that stops the transmission of HPV by 99.9%.

For more information go to www.kisssafe.com and read about Andrew at www.wainrib.com 

 

Read more at DailyMail.co.uk