EXCLUSIVE: Will there be a 'Princess Diaries 3'? What Julie Andrews says

It may be 20 years since "The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement" hit theaters, but fans are still dying to return to Genovia. So TODAY.com went straight to the top to ask Queen Clarisse Rinaldi herself —ahem, Dame Julie Andrews — for the inside scoop.

Will there be "The Princess Diaries 3"?

“Ah, I have been asked that so many times,” Andrews says while chatting about the new picture book she wrote with her daughter, Emma Watson Hamilton.

The movies follow San Francisco resident Mia Thermopolis, played by Anne Hathaway, as she learns she is actually the princess of the small kingdom of Genovia. Andrews plays her regal grandmother who has to teach the American teenager to fit in to their royal family.

TODAY.com has been keeping an eye out for news of a third installment of the series for years.

In 2019, TODAY.com reported that Anne Hathaway, who played Mia Thermopolis in the first two movies, said there was a script for the third movie on an episode of Bravo's "Watch What Happens Live."

She told Andy Cohen, “I want to do it. Julie (Andrews) wants to do it. Debra Martin Chase, our producer, wants to do it. We all really want it to happen.”

TODAY.com also reported on Andrews' 2022 interview with The Hollywood Reporter prior to being honored with an AFI Life Achievement Award. At that time, Andrews said that it was likely "too late" for a third film, especially after director Garry Marshall died in 2016.

Andrews seemingly confirms the conclusion of the series in her conversation with TODAY.com this week.

"There was dialogue about it," she says, but "nothing had been realized. And I think I may be wrong, but I think it’s been shelved now. I can’t be sure."

Andrews does think the franchise will live on in some form, however: "I’m sure there will be another version on another day."

Pausing to muse about the possibility of a third movie, Andrews says, "It’s quite a long time now since the two ‘Diaries’ were done, and I’m not sure, but sometimes it’s best to leave a good thing alone. I don’t like it when people milk and milk and milk the subject, you know, 'til it’s dead."

But don't assume that Queen Clarisse will abdicate quite yet.

"I’d be very happy if we did do another one," she adds. "But I don’t expect to."

This article was originally published on TODAY.com