march 1959 has a highly publicized affair with young King Hussein of Jordan, whom she met at a Hollywood party. He's 23; she's 31. She calls him "the most charming man I ever met."
12 April 59 flies to New York this Sunday night, thereby encouraging rumors she is having a romance with Jordan's King Hussein, who is currently in Detroit and due to be in New York on Tuesday. She is in New York to star in an off-stage personal version of The King and I. Her arrival is ostensibly to try out for a play, but she refuses to give details of the theatrical venture. Of Hussein she says, “I am introverted to the extend that I don’t care to discuss my most personal affairs in public.”
13 April 59 this Monday night in Detroit, King Hussein denies any romantic link to her, saying she may have been among the many people he had met while in Hollywood. “But I did not date her.”
21 April 59 in his newspaper column, Earl Wilson writes that Café Society resented Hussein's claiming he did not know her. He said he merely sat across a narrow table from her the entire evening at a Hollywood party ten days ago, feasting his eyes on her and her sari. Her close friends consider that remark unkingly and ungallant.
22 April 59 is still secretly seeing King Hussein. His statement that he doesn’t know her was “purely political.”
MAY 1959 Hussein discovers that she's Jewish and ends the affair
is seen driving Princess Margaret's Bentley, a gift from Hussein, and a Mercedes with the personalized license plate "SOOOZ"
6 May 59 Earl Wilson takes her and her escort Marty Mills to El Morocco, Toots Shor’s, and the Latin Quarter, where she tells them how she ducked the New York press recently when the best reporters were looking for her. Very simply, she got out of town—went right to Washington. She insists she did not see Hussein after she left Hollywood. Would she see him again? Long, long pause. “I think he has too many worries in his country without getting involved with any one person. He’s harassed on all sides, even by his neighbors. He’s a very sensitive person, and I respect him.” What did she call Hussein when the dated? Formally, she called him “Your Majesty,” but she has a sense of humor, and the name she likes most in all the world is Sam. Wilson hears she called Hussein “Your Majesty, Sam.”