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Sisi-mania: Austria's Starry Empress Returns to Screens

Two movies and two new series -- including one being made for Netflix -- are set to reignite the fascination with Empress Elisabeth, who was popularly known as "Sisi" ALEX HALADA AFP
Two movies and two new series -- including one being made for Netflix -- are set to reignite the fascination with Empress Elisabeth, who was popularly known as "Sisi" ALEX HALADA AFP
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Sisi-mania: Austria's Starry Empress Returns to Screens

Two movies and two new series -- including one being made for Netflix -- are set to reignite the fascination with Empress Elisabeth, who was popularly known as "Sisi" ALEX HALADA AFP
Two movies and two new series -- including one being made for Netflix -- are set to reignite the fascination with Empress Elisabeth, who was popularly known as "Sisi" ALEX HALADA AFP

She was the Princess Diana of the 19th century. An impossibly glamorous Austro-Hungarian empress whose star-crossed love life and tragic end entranced the public.

Now two movies and two new series -- including one being made for Netflix -- are set to reignite the fascination with Empress Elisabeth, who was popularly known as "Sisi".

The first of the films, "Corsage", premieres at the Cannes Film Festival on Friday while the series, "Sisi" -- which covers her early life and turbulent marriage to Emperor Franz-Joseph -- is streaming in Germany on RTL+.

It has already raised eyebrows there with its frank depiction of the young empress' sexuality while garnering favorable reviews from critics.

The series' Swiss-American star Dominique Devenport told AFP that part of the upsurge in interest in Sisi is a desire "to find more female narratives".

She may have been one of the most famous women of the 19th century, but Devenport said Sisi's life was "full of extremes, full of pain".

Married to Franz-Joseph when she was just 16, Sisi chafed against the rituals and strictures of life at the stiff and stuffy Habsburg court.

Devenport said the questions she asks of herself in the series are ones many young people today can relate to: "How can I stay myself; what decisions do I make, how do I keep up with what is expected from me?"

The rival Netflix series, "The Empress", is still in production, with release slated for later this year.

- A royal star -
Historian Martina Winkelhofer said Sisi was "one of the first very famous women in Europe".

"You have to consider that she came into Austrian history at the beginning of mass media," she said.

The advent of photography turbocharged her fame -- "suddenly you had the wife of an emperor who you could really see."

With the current thirst for stories with strong female characters, it was no surprise that Sisi's story would be revisited, Winkelhofer argued.

Sisi was also obsessed with her own image, and her figure.

In the elegant 19th century Hermes Villa on the outskirts of Vienna where the empress spent some of her later years, curator Michaela Lindinger pointed to the exercise equipment which Sisi used in an effort "to keep young really until her last day".

Vicky Krieps, the acclaimed Luxembourg-born actress who made her breakthrough opposite Daniel Day-Lewis in "Phantom Thread", plays this later Sisi in "Corsage", withdrawing from her husband and from life at court.

In Sisi's bedroom, a gloomy statue entitled "Melancholia" is a sign of the sadness that overcame her after the suicide of her son and heir to the throne, Crown Prince Rudolf, in 1889.

Just under 10 years later, she herself died at the age of 60, assassinated by an Italian anarchist.

- Enduring fairy tale -
Traditionally, however, it has been the fairy tale aspect of Sisi's life that has drawn attention and made sites like Vienna's Schoenbrunn Palace among Austria's most popular attractions.

Sisi has become a representation of Habsburg glamour far beyond Austria's borders, and is a particular cult figure in China.

Indeed, Andreas Gutzeit, the showrunner of the series "Sisi", said he got the idea to revisit the story after watching the trilogy of 1950s films in which the empress was portrayed by Vienna-born actress Romy Schneider, whose life was also a high-octane mix of glamour and tragedy.

Gutzeit said the RTL+ series has already been sold to several countries in eastern Europe and as far afield as Brazil.

The many different facets of the empress' life mean that "in each period, you have your own Sisi", insisted historian Winkelhofer.

Over the ages her image has moved from a focus on her physical beauty to her use of charm, to more modern depictions of her as a more assertive and empowered proto-feminist figure.

"You can discover a new woman in each lifetime," Winkelhofer said.

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Tears, Trauma and a Million-Dollar Necklace as Defiant Kim Kardashian Faces Paris Robbery Suspects 

Kim Kardashian leaves the justice palace after testifying, regarding a robbery of millions of dollars in jewels from her Paris hotel room in 2016, in Paris, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP)
Kim Kardashian leaves the justice palace after testifying, regarding a robbery of millions of dollars in jewels from her Paris hotel room in 2016, in Paris, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP)
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Tears, Trauma and a Million-Dollar Necklace as Defiant Kim Kardashian Faces Paris Robbery Suspects 

Kim Kardashian leaves the justice palace after testifying, regarding a robbery of millions of dollars in jewels from her Paris hotel room in 2016, in Paris, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP)
Kim Kardashian leaves the justice palace after testifying, regarding a robbery of millions of dollars in jewels from her Paris hotel room in 2016, in Paris, Tuesday, May 13, 2025. (AP)

Defiant in diamonds, Kim Kardashian appeared in a Paris courtroom Tuesday to testify in the trial over the 2016 armed robbery that upended her life. The reality star and business mogul gave emotional, at times harrowing, testimony about the night masked men tied her up at gunpoint and stole more than $6 million in jewelry.

Here’s what she revealed — and what’s still to come.

A night that changed everything Kardashian said she was starting to doze off in bed in the early hours when she heard stomping on the stairs. She assumed it was her sister Kourtney returning from a night out. “Hello? Hello? Who is it?” she called.

Moments later, two masked men burst in. They dragged the concierge in handcuffs. They were dressed as police.

“I thought it was some sort of terrorist attack,” she said.

She grabbed her phone but froze — “I didn’t know what 911 was (in France).” She tried to call her sister and her bodyguard, but one man grabbed her hand to stop her. They threw her on the bed, bound her hands and held a gun to her back.

“I have babies,” she recalled telling the robbers. “I have to make it home. They can take everything. I just have to make it home.”

Her robe fell open — she said she was naked underneath — as one man pulled her toward him. “I was certain that was the moment that he was going to rape me,” Kardashian said.

One attacker leaned in and told her, in English, she’d be OK if she stayed quiet. He taped her mouth shut and took her to the bathroom.

Kardashian later managed to free her hands by rubbing the tape against the bathroom sink. She hopped downstairs, ankles still bound, and found her friend and stylist, Simone Harouche. Fearing the men might return, the women climbed onto the balcony and hid in bushes. While lying there, Kardashian called her mother.

The men took a diamond ring she’d worn that night to a Givenchy show and rifled through her jewelry box. They took items including a watch her late father had given her when she graduated high school. “It wasn’t just jewelry. It was so many memories,” she said.

Investigators believe the attackers followed Kardashian’s digital breadcrumbs — images, timestamps, geotags — and exploited them with old-school criminal methods.

The robbery reshaped Kardashian’s sense of safety and freedom. “This experience really changed everything for us,” she said. “I started to get this phobia of going out.”

She often rents adjoining hotel rooms for protection and no longer stores jewelry at home, and now has up to six security guards at home.

"I can’t even sleep at night” otherwise, she said.

She also said she no longer makes social media posts in real time unless at a public event. Her Los Angeles home was robbed shortly after the Paris heist in what she believes was a copycat attack.

In a powerful courtroom moment, the chief judge read aloud a letter from one of the accused, who is too ill to testify. The letter said he had seen Kardashian’s tears on television and expressed regret. Kardashian was visibly moved.

“I’m obviously emotional,” she said in response.

“I do appreciate the letter, for sure,” she added. “I forgive you for what had taken place. But it doesn’t change the emotion, the trauma, and the way my life is forever changed.”

Kardashian, who is studying to become a lawyer, added that she regularly visits prisons. “I’ve always believed in second chances,” she said.

Kardashian made a fashion statement in court, wearing a $1.5 million necklace by Samer Halimeh New York. The jeweler's press release for the necklace came out even as she was on the witness stand, a reminder that visibility remains currency, even if the rules have grown more complicated.

The choice reflected defiance and the reclaiming of the image and luxury once used against her.

Kardashian said Paris had once been a sanctuary, a place where she would walk at 3 or 4 a.m., window shopping, sometimes stopping for hot chocolate. It “always felt really safe,” she said. “It was always a magical place.”

Twelve suspects were originally charged. One has died. One was excused due to illness. The French press dubbed the group “les papys braqueurs” — “the grandpa robbers” — but prosecutors say they were no harmless retirees.

The defendants face charges including armed robbery, kidnapping and gang association. If convicted, they could face life in prison.

Kardashian said she was grateful for the opportunity to “tell my truth” in the packed Paris courtroom.

“This is my closure,” she said. “This is me putting this, hopefully, to rest.”

The trial is expected to conclude May 23.