Marita Georgina Phillips (b. 28 May 1954, London), a British songwriter and playwright,[1][2] was born the third daughter of Lt.-Col. Harold Pedro Joseph Phillips and his wife, Georgina Wernher, who was the elder daughter and co-heiress of Sir Harold Wernher, 3rd Bt, by his wife Countess Anastasia de Torby (later Lady Zia Wernher, CBE). She had a brother Nicholas Harold Phillips (1947–1991), two older sisters including the Duchess of Abercorn, and a younger sister Natalia (the Duchess of Westminster).[1]
Marita is a direct descendant of the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin.[3] Through Pushkin, she is descended from his African great-grandfather, Abram Petrovich Gannibal (otherwise Ibrahim Hannibal) who was Peter the Great's protégé.[1]
She has written lyrics for artists such as Peter Skellern, Demis Roussos, William Lovelady and Art Garfunkel. She furthermore wrote the libretto for the opera “The Poet and the Tsar”, based on the lives of her great-great-great-grandfathers, Alexander Pushkin and Tsar Nicholas I of Russia.
Marita Phillips studied acting at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama and ballet at the Nesta Brooking School before training as a mime with Adam Darius, with whom she founded and ran The Mime Centre, London.[4] She has written the book and lyrics for the children's musicals; "The Dream Dealer" and "Buzz - the story of Glorybee". She has also written the novel "The Dream Dealer"
Marita and her three other sisters, including the Duchess of Abercorn and the Duchess of Westminster are close to the British Royal Family, and are related distantly, via their Russian great-grandfather, to HRH The Duke of Edinburgh.[1][5]
Their maternal grandmother Lady Zia Wernher was born Countess Anastasia de Torby (later Lady "Zia" Wernher), younger morganatic daughter of Grand Duke Michael Mihailovich of Russia (a grandson of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia) by his wife Countess Sophie of Merenberg, morganatic daughter of Prince Nicholas of Nassau (himself brother of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg by his wife, the younger daughter of Russia's greatest poet Alexander Pushkin. Lady Zia's sister Nadezhda (or "Nada") was wife of the George Mountbatten, 2nd Marquess of Milford Haven, elder maternal uncle of Prince Philip. The Torby sisters were third cousins of the prince through their common ancestor Nicholas I. It is through their Russian grand ducal father that Marita is descended from Sophia, Electress of Hanover.
Marita's sister The Duchess of Westminster is a godmother of The Duke of Cambridge.
Marita's mother, Lady Kennard, was a close friend of the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh.
In 1982, Marita married Randall Crawley (1950–1988), a son of Aidan Crawley MP and his wife Virginia Cowles, journalist and author. Randall Crawley was killed with his brother Andrew in a private plane crash near Turin in Italy on 10 September 1988,[6][7] leaving issue two sons and one daughter. The posthumous younger son Galen Crawley is a godson of The Prince of Wales.[8] In 2006, Marita remarried, her second husband being the journalist, turned media baron, Andrew Knight (b. 1939).[1]
She is currently 1536th in line for the British throne.
| Preceded by Eliza Burnett |
Line of succession to the British throne | Succeeded by Aidan Crawley |