Our Enduring Fascination With the Kennedys

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From the New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is the Daily on Sunday. Thank you. Here in Manhattan, downtown in the East Village, there's this tiny Indian restaurant called Panna. Two. It's a bit of a hole in the wall, but like any restaurant that survives, it has its charms.

For Panna 2, one of those charms is that it is filled with Christmas lights. Absolutely covered. Like imagine the most Christmas lights you could fit into a restaurant and then double or triple that. That's how many lights are in Panna 2. Panat 2 has been a novelty for New Yorkers for decades. But lately it's been drawing a different kind of crowd. just I was asking my mom like where should we go for dinner and she was like you should try like you know the place that was in love story Yeah.

Love story. The fictionalized retelling of the relationship between John F. Kennedy Jr., son of a president, one of the most famous New Yorkers of the 1990s. Big J. And Carolyn Bassett, the Calvin Klein publicists. whose relationship with JFK Jr. vaulted her into what the show portrays as an unwelcome spotlight. In the series, JFK Jr. takes her to the unpretentious and empty Panatou on their first date. This is your go to dates five. I'm a sucker for a laminated men.

The show, which ended this week, has been ascending into a real cultural moment. Even if you haven't heard of Love Story, you might still be aware of it, or at least know about the kind of phenomenon it's become. It's like a huge thing on TikTok. Like all my friends It's what people are texting about, posting about, criticizing, loving. people's parents. And suddenly, and this is according to Hulu, it is the most streamed limited series in its history.

royalty we've ever had in America. So I think this is like very impactful. It's got its own center of gravity. So much so that a single scene in a single episode could bring a fresh wave of business to a small Indian restaurant in Manhattan. Yeah, really. Food's not that great. Like I just want to go for the vibe. So today we're going to explore why this show has become so popular right now.

My colleague Alexander Jacobs, who writes about culture here at The Times, will join me to talk about nostalgia, the Kennedys, and the eternal allure of Cinderella. Yeah. It's Sunday, March 29th. Alexander Jacobs, welcome to the Daily. I see that you are wearing a leopard coat and big sunglasses and very simple minimal jewelry. Did you dress perhaps for our conversation today? Uh not consciously, but I have found that the aesthetic of Carolyn Bassett Kennedy has snuck into all of our wardrobe.

I think that is exactly right. Speaking from personal experience. We're gonna talk about that. We're gonna talk about a lot of things today. But firstly Alexandra, you have spent a lot of time thinking and writing about America's fascination with the Kennedys. You wrote a piece last summer, long before Love Story started airing, about the continued cultural fascination with JFK Jr. specifically. What prompted you to write that piece?

Well vacation for the piece was that CNN was doing a documentary about JFK Jr. Um and uh my reporting for the piece Um suggested that this documentary was gonna happen anyway. It wasn't just because Ryan Murphy was coming out with a show that CNN had done this documentary. However, I felt the timing was a little bit close. Like something about this guy is in the air right now. You know, the Kennedys have never left the political conversation, but with

RFK Jr. in the mix, Jack Schlossberg on on social media. There was just a sort of swirl, swirl of interest around the family and around this couple.

So s okay, so speaking of the show, for people who are listening to this but have not yet seen it, no spoilers, but tell us what it's about. The show is a pretty simple idea. It traces the romance between John F. Kennedy Jr., who was at the time the country's most eligible bachelor. I know like five people here. You wouldn't know that from the way everyone's staring at you. And Carolyn Bissett Kennedy, who was an unknown basically, you know, of she worked at Calvin Klein.

I don't wanna get your hopes up. Please, I'm not about begging in front of all of my closest friends. You know where I work. And they are living and falling in love in the nineties, which was really a a prosperous slightly frivolous time when glamour industries such as magazine publishing and fashion were very much centered in the office and the streets. I ended up at the tunnel. Let's make it rock. Like hooking up.

I don't know, I don't remember, but the sun was coming up when I left, so now I'm just racing for impact. It's based on a popular book called Once Upon a Time by Elizabeth Beller, which is a biography of Carolyn Bissett Kennedy. And you know, that title it just evokes the fairy tale nature of the romance and sort of puts her in a category with another tragic figure, Princess Diana. It's sort of this s idea of American royalty, and an American princess who died before her time.

The idea at least is that a normal woman plucked from obscurity who ends up in this royal family and it ultimately, at least in the show's telling, is her undoing. Exactly. So I promise you. Our personal lives will be off limits to the public. Yeah, you can't promise that though. You've you've never been married before. You have no idea how this will escalate. Everything.

Any show that breaks through these days when our attention is so divided, there's so much competing for it, feels really noteworthy. Do we know how many people are actually watching Love Story? Hulu is saying this is the most streamed limited series they've ever had. I I think forty million um viewing hours. Not only is it streamed, people are interacting with it in real time. They are making their own content on Instagram and other online platforms.

You can see on retail websites that demand is up for vintage Calvin Klein, Vintage Prada, CO Bigelow, the famous apothecary in Manhattan's West Village has been stormed by women and probably some men seeking tortoiseshell headbands such as Carolyn Bissett wore. There've been JFK Junior lookalike contests in multiple cities. Ансо, йно, і цна часто шо, і це феномен.

You mentioned Calvin Klein. I saw that they had even done their own like 90s edit. Like they and others are really capitalizing on this moment to sell Carolyn Bassett-inspired fashion. Everybody is trying to sell me like. Here are the pieces that you could wear. Yeah. Yeah. It's quite extraordinary. It's it's the best thing that happened to Calvin Klein since Brooke Shields in the jeans.

And the jeans, the famous jeans. That's right. That's right, which also makes a cameo on the show. And speaking of the show, this is a series that is executive produced by Ryan Murphy. Tell us about the kinds of shows he is known for and where this fits into those. Ryan Murphy is one of the most successful producers in Hollywood. You know, I I g I I go back to Nip Tuck and Glee. Mm-hmm. Um Glee, by the way, another big cultural phenomenon.

That's right. However, I've you know, in recent years he's become known for these types of things like American crime story about the O. J. Simpson case and the Clinton impeachment and Monster, which Spotlighted Jeffrey Dahmer and wa love story, it's not true crime, but it's has an element of kind of From the headlines. Story. T V drama.

Yeah, and the Kennedys might say it's a crime. Right. Um, but right, it it has that feeling of like we're gonna reenact something you remember. I mean that's what I think is Extraordinary about it. It's not that far away. I see you got a new bike I did, yeah. I reported the last one stolen, but uh I think the case has gone cold. Still no luck. Well, you know, baby steps. Maybe we start with a helmet and work our way up from there. Over this set of hair? No, I don't think so.

Obviously the public has devoured the show. Can you just talk a little bit about how it's been received critically?

Well the reviews haven't been as positive as the audience reception. I think that the New Yorker called it a forgettable elegy for Gen X. Yikes. I think that that look, Ryan Murphy shows are cartoonish. It's a courto it's a cartoonish portrayal of something that lives in collective memory, I think for anyone who lived through that time of the media or even just used it for research, it's gonna not be entirely satisfying.

And just to explain why, perhaps they found it cartoonish, a lot of people have pointed to something that I personally found sort of hard to watch, which was the depiction of Jacqueline Onassis. There's a scene where she's dancing to what is she dancing to? Hehehe She's dancing to the a song from the musical Camelot. From December. She's dying of lymphoma and there's a the the official portrait of Jack Kennedy is hanging somehow in her living room on Fifth Avenue and she is dancing.

I kept thinking of, you know, black swan. I don't know why or you know, d a dying swan on a It was cringe. There was a flip. So now that we have both established that we found that scene of her dancing both cringy and campy, this feels like a good moment to ask you overall, did you like the series? I hated it and I watched it. I watched it for the same reason. I watched not only Dynasty when it first came out in the eighties, but I watched the remake.

of dynasty, you know, even though I found it far inferior. I mean, there's certainly something escapist about watching depictions of rich people. Mm-hmm. You know, I was intrigued to see how these real life characters were portrayed and some of them are portrayed very well. But I I I think also it's it's that kind of thing where I'm as I'm as fascinated with the discourse around the show as I am with the show itself.

Well, then let us discourse. We're gonna take a quick break and when we come back, we are going to take a deep dive into some of the reasons that the show is as big of a hit as it is. We might be in a new era of it it's so bad it's bingeable, right? My name's Hannah Dreyer. I'm an investigative reporter at the New York Times. So much of my process is challenging my own assumptions and trying to uncover new information that often goes against what I thought I would find.

All of my reporting comes from going out, seeing something, and realizing, oh, that's actually the story. And that reporting helps readers challenge their assumptions and come to new conclusions for themselves. This kind of journalism takes resources, it takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of reporting trips. If you believe that that kind of work is important, you can support it by subscribing to the New York Times.

Alexander Jacobs, why do you think the show has been so popular? Well, one thing is it's a classic Cinderella story and those always resonate. Yeah. I'm a 33 waist, I know that. Carolyn Bassett was not sweeping out the garret, you know. She was not from a poor family, but she wasn't a Kennedy or a celebrity. Famous. Yeah, she was not famous. How can I make it up to you? By swiping your credit card. You g let me take you to dinner?

And and when he chose her, the question was well why her? No why not Why not me? That's what every woman in America's probably like, why not me? Yeah, yeah. I think the feeling was if if he could choose her, then someone like him could choose me. What did she do to get a guy like him so entranced? Right. With her. It's also by the way, the Cinderella story is in some ways why I think perhaps people in the UK are ups really interested in the story of Prince William and Kate Middleton, right?

Or perhaps go back farther to the now King Charles, uh the then Prince Charles and Princess Diana, which also of course ended very tragically. I think that's even more of a parallel. And like Princess Diana, people are still really interested in the Kennedy story, including people who are too young to remember any of the people that we are talking about in the show. I wonder why you think the public fascination with the Kennedys has endured.

Well, I think that's partly because of the continued participation of the Kennedys in public life. They carry themselves as standard bearers for certain American values. seem to embody a time of America, you know, rightly or wrongly, that w where there was sort of a sense of promise and expansion and dream, American dream. I think they it for for years they embodied a realization of the American dream, which is that you could come from a an ethnic group that was frowned upon Marginalized.

Yeah, marginalized, exactly, and achieve the highest office of the land and sort of like the ultimate glamour and success, business success. Romantic success. Well yes, also having tragic elements that give it that Shakespearean quality. I can't help but Sometimes wonder how I'd be If I wasn't America's widow. Right. The family's tragedies have very much become part of their public story.

Well also don't forget the they they were running in parallel with the development of the media, of which this show is only the latest iteration. So you have you know, Joe Kennedy's exploits were covered in newspapers and Jacqueline Boulevier met John Kennedy when she was a photographer, and then when he's Shot when John Kennedy is shot, uh, there's the Zapruder film and it's it's covered on television.

you know, then you get to this generation we're talking about, and you have magazine print magazines and tabloid television and tabloid newspapers, and now you've got the internet. So You know, the the Kennedys of today are creatures of inner of the internet and of social media, like RFK Jr., Jack Schlossberg. When we're watching the Ryan Murphy show, we are looking at uh a couple that was very much a a creature of they were creatures of glossy magazines.

Okay, so that's the Kennedys. I want to turn to Carolyn Bissett. There's a lot of big stuff we have to talk about. Before we can get married. Right. Like how our lives really fit together. You know. Something I found really interesting as I was doing some research for this episode is just how little there is out there about Carolyn Bissett. She was photographed a lot, but she very rarely gave interviews. In fact, I think she quite

famously declined a couple of major interviews. And I wonder how you think that vacuum of information about the real life Carolyn Bassett contributed to her portrayal on the show. I I think it gave the show's creators Or feeling of license. to create a character. And this character is elusive, ambivalent. Private She doesn't like the spotlight either. Yeah. On the show.

What a novelty. You know, it's so rare to to find everyone's oversharing now. You have to conscientiously object uh to not uh give of yourself online and photograph yourself, be photographed. So what exists of her is i is really not very much. And in the absence of that I guess people have to or get to project their own images onto her. I mean she seems glamorous and what is glamour? You know, it's mysterious. She seems glamorous and mysterious and unknowable. Let it ring.

Her character reminds me of an embodiment of this book that came out in the nineties that was called The Rules. Oh, you are unreal. Screening him. What did you read that in the rules or something? Yeah, as it should be. Was a huge best seller. We all made fun of it. That book was sort of a dating guide for women that was instructing them to let men chase them, which in the nineties was a very r retrograde concept. It seems to be, you know, uh coming back again.

But uh there was a phrase in that book, uh, be a creature like no other. And I think that Carolyn Bassett seems to have embodied the idea of being a creature like no other. Whether I have no idea if she ever read the rules or this was just who she was. I think it it probably was just who she was, but she seems very self-assured and

you know, John Kennedy Jr. was besieged not only I mean he had women throwing themselves at him all the time. W you know, what we know about her and and as depicted on the show, she did not seem particularly Wowed by him. No, you had to deny the engagement because you couldn't handle the world knowing there was a woman on planet Earth who might not want to marry you. He's looking for the escape hatch now, huh?

Right. So the fact that we know relatively little about her might have given the show's creators this feeling of license to kind of fill in the gaps in the way that was the most dramatic, would make the most entertainment, would make it the most watchable. And the character that they created is glamorous and mysterious, and most importantly perhaps

Seemingly immune and maybe even put off by JFK Jr.'s fame and spotlight. She's basically portrayed in opposition to all the other women in the universe of this show as being the only woman perhaps who is able to resist. the sexiest man alive, which almost certainly flattens the real world experience of these two people, but nevertheless makes for extremely watchable television. Right.

Okay, let's talk about another major element of the show here, and this has been talked about a lot, which is the style and fashion of the nineties, and specifically also Carolyn Bissett's style and fashion. Hey, what is that that you're wearing? It's really kind of terrific. Oh, I just threw it on this morning.

It feels like, as I mentioned, every clothing retailer, everything on Instagram is trying to sell me some version of her style. How would you describe the way that she dresses in the series? Carolyn Bissett's style, I think of it as a sort of very high-end version of, frankly, the gap. Uh which I don't mean as an insult. I mean Carolyn Bassett Kennedy was wearing really sort of basic, minimalist items, um which is really kind of a palette cleanser after the Rococo

fancy over-the-top style of the eighties that it was perhaps embodied more by the Trumps. Um, this was like a kind of broom and and you know, the the labels she preferred like Prada or Yoji Yamamoto, these were very kind of stark lines and classic silhouettes. And but I think part of the appeal is that yeah, they're refreshing to the eye. But we can can I just say though that like

I I feel like Carolyn Bassett's style on this show is a Rorschach test because either you look at her and you think as you do, this this is this looks like the gap. It's just like simple jeans, long sleeve white shirts, suede skirts with knee-high boots and a black top. Like what is so special about this?

Or your reaction is this is the chicest thing I've ever seen. All I want is a bias cut slip dress that's black and like simple heels, no jewelry. I'll she was famously never worn any jewelry. Apparently that's a resurgence not wearing jewelry. So like It it the show has created these two poles. I've seen articles saying what is so special about this is the gap and how can we all dress like her?

That's right. And and I really do think there's for younger people there's probably some level of exhaustion with how much you are all marketed to and how much trends change now. So to see these sort of clean, simple lines must be very appealing.

The other sort of visual element of this show that I think is appealing to people is just the portrayal of the 90s. Of the nineties in New York City. I never expected to see this era romanticized in the way that it has been. I think that there is tremendous nostalgia for a time before iPhones. Right. Uh, certainly a time before nine eleven.

A time when creative people could afford to live in Manhattan, perhaps with roommates, but you know, still still knock out a living there. A time when creative industries were unthreatened by artificial intelligence. Um and you know, writing for magazines or or um working for a fashion designer seemed like a viable career path. You had a phone on your desk.

You might have had a cell phone, but it didn't contain you weren't ordering your lunch, you know, you weren't like ordering your lunch from an app. Mm-hmm. Um, you were maybe wandering down the street. You were anonymous. You were anonymous. Yes. Of your life was under the microscope. There were no location services, not that I was aware of anyway. So you think people are looking at this and feeling either nostalgic for it or pining for it if they never got to experience it?

Honestly, as someone who lived through it, I'm not nostalgic for it, but but I think there's a great curiosity about it. But you can understand why actually you're bringing up a good point, because if you didn't live through it, it's this idealized version of the nineties that maybe you're fascinated by and like

It makes sense the same way I was nostalgic for the seventies in the nineties. And I I looked at those seventies fashions, which by the way, the nineties recycled. I mean, every twenty years it it all gets recycled. And yeah, I mean, I just think young people can't digital natives can't imagine a time when their phones didn't dictate every aspect of their life. So I feel like The appeal of love story is.

in terms of the the era that it portrays and how it could appeal to an entirely new generation, is so similar to Sex in the City. Sex in the City The city was a character, the fashion was a character. And even if you didn't live through that time, you look at that and I think that brought an entire generation of women to New York City.

Sure. And and you know, aga and it there's also analogy and you see these places like Sex in the City had Magnolia Bakery and Yes, or CO Bigelow or whi whatever, to get her headband. You went a little rogue with the order, but I was pleasantly surprised. Well I went backpacking through India after I graduated and I learned very quickly that Ordering chicken tika masala as a surefire way to get made fun of. You bad bagged?

I mean I think people wanna r revisit the rhythms of dating life before apps, before the you know, Tinder and Hinge and all that and grinder and bumble and all those Just keep listening. Just keep going. Keep going because the fact is, you know, I mean dating has always been difficult. But it it's funny, yeah. To my surprise or to my i i inevitably, that this is now seems like something romantic and exotic and interesting and

No, I feel like this is you've kind of summed up why the show has become so popular. It's got some really key ingredients. It is a it is a Cinderella story. set in an idealized nineties New York that everybody wants to be in and it involves America's royal family. Like like i it is a perfect cocktail. It is a perfect it is a perfect world building show that people are fascinated by and want to be in.

And on top of that, I think one other thing that is driving people to this show is the controversy around it. And when we come back, we're gonna talk about the backlash and the controversy to love story and whether ultimately it has been good or bad for the show. We'll be right back. Alexandra, we have talked a lot so far about the appeal of this show, the reception of the show. We have not yet talked about the criticism, not the reviews, but the actual criticism and controversy of this show.

Specifically, that it has faced some very withering criticism from two people in particular. Jack Schlossberg, JFK Jr.'s nephew, and Daryl Hanna, the actress that JFK Jr. was in an off again, on again relationship with in real life. One of the central complaints that they both had was essentially that the show took a lot of liberties that were not necessarily based on real life.

Right. Well well Jack Schlossberg who's running for Congress is making the point that Ryan Murphy is making a tremendous amount of money off his family and this portrayal of his family, uh, without actually talking to them or getting any kind of authorization or participation. The guy knows nothing about what he's talking about, and he's making a ton of money on I would uh I would hope

Ryan Murphy actually responded to this criticism when he was on Gavin Newsom's podcast. He was he was asked about Schlossberg's critique and he said it was quote I thought it was an odd choice to be mad about your your um relative that you really don't remember Which, you know Is that for him to say that, you know Like it it seems like it would have been

So easy for him to say, I don't know, literally anything else, like, I'm sorry he feels that way, or we tried to respect the legacy of the Kennedy family, but the fact that he was like, well, he didn't know him anyway, I don't know why he feels like that. Like what what do we make of that? Well what else do you expect from a producer who ran y had a whole show called Feud? I think it's quite audacious. It shows his irreverence.

That's a polite way of putting it. I'm not grotesquely disrespectful. I think Ryan Murphy is starting from a d out of a different gate. He's just not even engaging on the same level. Uh he's saying something that will stir up. Intentionally or not, he's saying something that will stir up the dialogue. And even though I side with Jack Schlossberg on this, I'm also Team Murphy in the sense that I believe he ha you know, he should have the freedom to do this, which might bring us to Daryl Hannah's

Opinion piece. Yes, the other major public criticism of the show came from the actress Daryl Hannah, who dated JFK Jr. before he met Carolyn Bassett. They were on again, off again in real life. They were on again, off again on the show. She is portrayed on the show. As clingy and desperate and whiny and above all rejected. He doesn't want her. Why did you wanna get back together again if you're just gonna ask? like this. You came back to me. On the condition of a clean slate which you agreed to.

And yet every time I look at you your mind is clearly someplace else. The real Daryl Hannah wrote an op-ed in the New York Times titled How Can Love Story Get Away with This? And she says in this piece, quote, The character Daryl Hannah portrayed in the series is not even a remotely accurate representation of my life, my conduct, or my relationship with John. The actions and behaviors attributed to me are untrue, and she goes on to say

Quote In the weeks since the series aired, I have received many hostile and even threatening messages from viewers who seem to believe the portrayal is factual. When entertainment borrows a real person's name, it can permanently impact her reputation. Alexander, what do you make of that critique?

I mean, I think it's a valid critique. Legally, Ryan Murphy's absolutely fine. Cre creators, producers, directors, writers have tremendous latitude with public figures. But so she wrote an article about it. This is one of the most popular articles, I think, on the New York Times site for a couple of days. Um and and the comments sh reflect readers agree.

Uh many readers say we're r refusing to watch. You know, I can't account for the many, many, many others who are gobbling up the performance. Some people think this is the price you pay for being famous. But also, I mean, if I was Daryl Hannah and I you know, nobody can get inside of a relationship who knows how she actually who how she actually was.

Nonetheless, I mean I can un understand being really upset by having a such a negative, unflattering portrayal of me out there that some people might think was true. That's what entertainment does. It takes real stories and warps them all the time. This is not necessarily a new complaint. And I just don't know while I can understand why she'd be upset about this, I I can't figure out Where do we think the ethical boundaries are when it comes from taking true stories and fictionalizing them?

You know, my I had this old boss, this old this editor than your observer, he he'd say, if you run into a celebrity on the street, just interview them, interview them, just go right up to them. Yeah, he said they chose this life. Well I'll never forget him saying that. And you know, he wasn't wrong. I I mean I get his point. But you know but okay, but in Darryl Hannah's case. If she had been interviewed, if she had been consulted, I mean I think that's right.

Where it would have inoculated Ryan exactly if Ryan Murphy and his staff had uh had been able to get the buy in of now I think on the other hand they're portraying a a whole family. So I think buy-in would have been difficult because we as we know there are disagreements within the family and that's part of what he's portraying. So I think to get buy-in would have been very complicated.

What he does have, going back to the idea that we're sitting here and talking about this, is attention from all of this. And attention. Have you ever heard of the Streisand effect? Yes. R uh reiterate for me what it is. So the Streisand effect, so Barbara Streisand once sued a photographer for taking a photo of her house in Malibu. And what do you guess the result of the photo? No everyone.

Everybody knows the house. Everybody knows more people probably want to go to the house to see the famous Barbara Streisand lawsuit house.

I I would gu and I have no data. I'm t I'm about to say something that I have absolutely zero data for, but I'm going to guess that the number of people who have refused to watch the show because they side with Jack Schlossberg or Daryl Hannah is less than the number of people who are watching it because they want to be in the conversation and know what all the fuss is about. I mean, listen, if you are using publicity and the press in any way in your career, in your life, that

changes the equation a little bit, right? Like if you want the press when it's time to get your side of the story out there or your pictures out there or whatever, but then you don't like it if other creative entities You know, you want to make the rules for every portrayal of yourself, that's challenging. Um so The same fame that makes her vulnerable to what Ryan Murphy has done is the fame that enables her to place a highly read op-ed piece in the New York Times about what's happened.

You have to factor that into the math about how to feel about the situation. It's interesting because in some ways The op-ed, like the show, asks the audience to make a choice. And the choice is how much sympathy do you have? How much empathy do you have? For somebody real or not, born into it or not, that has that kind of fame and privilege. Exactly. Alexandra Jacobs, always a pleasure to talk to you.

I I'm always available, all too available. I'm not a rules girl when it comes to coming on the daily. Today's episode was produced by Alex Barron with help from Luke Vanderplug and Tina A. It was edited by Wendy Dore with help from Michael Benoit. Contains music by Marianne Lozano, Dan Powell, Diane Wong, and Alicia BaeTube. And was engineered by Rowan DeMisto. Our production manager is Frenny Karthof. That's it for the daily. I'm Rachel Abrams.