'Grace of Monaco' Preview: Nicole Kidman's Grace Kelly Stands Up to Her Princely Husband

Sure, we know how it turned out — how the entirety of Grace Kelly’s life turned out, for that matter — but in this clip from Grace of Monaco, we also see that Princess Grace (Nicole Kidman) didn’t give up her Hollywood career without a fight.

The movie, which premieres on Lifetime on May 25, opened the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, but languished due to a series of behind-the-scenes conflicts. Disagreements about the final cut of the film between U.S. distributor Harvey Weinstein and director Oliver Dahan, criticisms from Princess Grace’s children about historical inaccuracies in the movie, and negative reviews ultimately scuttled the U.S. theatrical release. As a result, the Lifetime premiere is the first chance most viewers will have had to see the biopic, which focuses on a year in the life — 1962 — of Oscar winner-turned-royalty Grace Kelly.

Kelly married Prince Rainier III of Monaco in 1956, in a media event dubbed “the wedding of the century.” Despite her career success — which included a 1955 Best Actress Oscar for The Country Girl, as well as another Oscar nomination and three Golden Globes — Kelly left Hollywood behind to become a wife, mother, and the first lady of Monaco. But, as seen in the clip, when she was offered the lead in Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie, Princess Grace wanted to resume her career, only to be forbidden to do so by Rainier, who was then in a battle with French President Charles de Gaulle for control of Monaco.

Joining Oscar and Golden Globe winner Kidman in the movie: Tim Roth as Prince Rainier; Frank Langella as Father Francis Tucker, an American priest who was a Rainier aide, and according to People magazine, Rainier’s “chief talent scout for eligible Catholic girls”; Parker Posey as Madge Tivey-Faucon, Grace’s lady-in-waiting (a “scheming” lady-in-waiting, wrote Variety); Milo Ventimiglia as Rupert Allan, Kelly’s publicist and later a consul to Monaco; and Paz Vega as opera singer Maria Callas, who became a close friend to Kelly when Callas dated Rainier pal Aristotle Onassis.

Grace of Monaco premieres May 25 at 9 p.m. on Lifetime.