Share this story

FOX NEWS

The New York Islanders are setting out to do

E NEWS

Watch: Why Playing Bessette Sisters Came Easily for Love

SPORTS ILLUSTRATED

Is Michael Wacha going to be traded by the

What Love Story Got Right About John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette

Watch: Why Playing Bessette Sisters Came Easily for Love Story’s Sydney Lemmon & Sarah Pidgeon (Exclusive)

It made sense for Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette to start with the end.

Because no matter what approach the now six-time-Emmy-nominated limited series took to tell the story of how John F. Kennedy Jr. met, courted and married Carolyn Bessette, the couple’s tragic fate was too well-known not to loom over the drama.

So, the telling began with John and Carolyn making their way to the airport in the hours before they and her sister Lauren Bessette died on July 16, 1999, when the Piper PA-32R-301 Saratoga II HP John was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on their way to Martha’s Vineyard.

And so Love Story arrived once again at the heavily foreshadowed inevitable during its finale. But that’s not where the story ended.

“We never wanted it to feel prurient, indulgent, exploitative, horrific,” executive producer Brad Simpson told Vanity Fair ahead of the March 26 series finale. “We knew what our guardrails were, how we wanted it to feel—and how we definitely wanted it not to feel.”

As in, they didn’t want it to feel gross or impossibly depressing.

read

Love Story‘s Sarah Pidgeon Addresses Misconceptions About John F. Kennedy Jr., Carolyn Bessette

Which, it is, but spending time with the loved ones John, Carolyn and Lauren left behind as their hope turns to grief and steely resolve does honor the very real epilogue of their story, as well as leaves viewers less nauseated by the particulars of the violent crash. (Which isn’t revisited in graphic detail, rather we witness John getting disoriented, Carolyn telling him to “breathe,” and then cut to the Coast Guard on Cape Cod getting a call about a missing aircraft.)

“We knew that we wanted it to be very restrained in terms of the accident itself,” executive producer Nina Jacobson told VF. “We knew what we didn’t want it to be from the beginning. We love these characters too much.”

And it was so nice, in the series premiere, when John and Carolyn (Paul Anthony Kelly and Sarah Pidgeon) were whisked back to 1992, before their worlds collided and the world watched with rapt fascination as one of the most eligible bachelors on the planet—the closest thing America had to a crown prince—was swept off his feet by an unknown yet impossibly glamorous PR exec.

As soon as he stopped breaking up and getting back together again with Daryl Hannah, that is.

Inspired by Elizabeth Beller’s 2024 book Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, Love Story was shrouded in controversy from conception. JFK Jr.’s nephew Jack Schlossberg called it a “grotesque” way to profit from his uncle’s story, then traded barbs with Ryan Murphy after the prolific producer suggested the 33-year-old didn’t even remember his late relative.

Carolyn’s colorist Brad Johns even slammed the hue of Pidgeon’s hair after early production photos made the rounds last June.

“If you show that on TV and fashion people see it,” Johns told Vogue, “they are going to think, ‘Why the f–k is she all ashed out with her hair only one color?'”

Since Carolyn didn’t give any on-camera interviews in her lifetime as a public figure, but left a lasting impression with her still-influential style, the concern that the series wasn’t going to get her look right was real.

Ultimately the production paid close attention to every aesthetic detail, from Carolyn and John’s clothes to the Manhattan-in-the-1990s milieu they moved about in. But what of the substance underneath the façade?

photos

Revelations From Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy

Pidgeon, who scored her first-ever Emmy nomination for the role while Kelly was snubbed of a nod, called Carolyn’s insistence on remaining as private as she could “badass.” But, the actress told E! News, her lack of on-the-record comments “made it easier for narratives and characterizations to be projected onto her and therefore onto them as a couple.”

And yet Carolyn and John’s comings and goings were as documented as was possible for two people who weren’t on a reality show, so there were countless public incidents and detailed accounts of their brief life together to go on.

But since no one can know certain things—only Caroline Kennedy and husband Ed Schlossberg can say whether matriarch Jacqueline Kennedy really advised John about his love life over dinner at the former first lady’s apartment, and they’re not talking—artistic license fills in the gaps.

In fact, the series starts with the disclaimer that the story is “inspired by actual events but includes fictional elements.”

Read on to see what Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. ripped from reality and what was dreamed up for effect:

John and Carolyn’s Final DaysEpisode 9, sporting the gut-wrenching title “Search and Recovery,” had a lot to tackle.Opting to cram in months, if not years, of their marital highs and lows into the Love Story finale, it begins with the couple’s therapist advising a trial separation.Instead, they day-drink at a dive bar and end up having sex at home, where John hasn’t been recently because he’s been staying at the Stanhope hotel. (Where he spent the last few nights of his life, IRL.)They intimately reminisce about which of their many kisses was the best, allowing for some lovely flashbacks. But the morning after, their issues are still there and then John asks, “So I assume Rory’s wedding is off the table?”By multiple accounts, they fought over Carolyn not wanting to attend the Hyannis Port wedding of John’s cousin Rory Kennedy days before they died en route to the nuptials.

Lauren Bessette Convinces Carolyn to Give a Little (and Go to the Wedding)While Carolyn’s older (by 14 months sister) was among those who encouraged her to go to the wedding, the couple’s many biographers place Carolyn, John and Lauren all having lunch together at the Stanhope.Whether there were good vibes or not, at one point Lauren was seen joining hands with both and they made their plan to drop her off on Martha’s Vineyard on July 16 on their way to Hyannis Port.But in Love Story, Lauren tells Carolyn she and John already came up with that idea—and she encourages to Carolyn “jettison this compulsion to be right and do what’s in the best interest of your relationship.”And Lauren separately advises John on the way to the airport to be patient, that “neither of you are going to change overnight.”

Carolyn Surprises John at the George GalaApparently inspired by Lauren’s pep talk, Carolyn shows up at the George gala on this night sometime before Rory’s wedding, after telling John she just couldn’t bring herself to attend.The show recreates Carolyn’s sculptured Yohji Yamamoto ensemble and slicked-back ponytail for the event, one of the handful of events she attended with her husband that year.But the “Newman’s Own” George Awards at U.S. Customs House took place on May 19, 1999, before John broke his ankle and ended up on crutches (and in a cast until the day before his death), and two months before the plane crash.

FX, NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images

Carolyn Is Haunted by the Death of Princess DianaCarolyn is becoming increasingly isolated in their Tribeca loft, exhausted by the paparazzi and demoralized by tabloid headlines speculating that she’s depressed, a drug addict, pregnant—you name it—when she hears the news that Princess Diana has been killed in a car crash. She’s horrified and sits glued to the TV, while John quibbles over whether the dishes in the dishwasher are clean, then goes for a run.”She posed for every photo, she did everything right, and they still killed her,” Carolyn says, referring to the paparazzi who gave chase to Diana’s car on the night of Aug. 31, 1997, in Paris.

John admits to his wife later that he’s both afraid she’ll never leave the house again and afraid that if he starts watching the coverage of Diana’s death, “I’ll never f–king stop.”IRL, John met with the royal to see if she’d pose for the cover of George (she politely declined), and Carolyn sat near Diana at the July 22, 1997, funeral for Gianni Versace in Milan. Biz Mitchell, then executive editor of George, recalled to The Hollywood Reporter that John was reluctant to run a story about her death. “In the end,” Biz said, “we did this incredible photo essay of the mourning going on in London.”And Carolyn really was upset by the death of the Princess of Wales, John telling his friend Billy Noonan, “I’m not sure what I’m going to do about Carolyn. She’s really spooked now.”Jacqueline Kennedy’s former assistant Kathy McKeon wrote in her 2017 memoir Jackie’s Girl, recallinga family dinner in Hyannis Port on the evening of Diana’s funeral, that Carolyn said she “hated those bastards,” referring to the photographers who followed her everywhere.”I’d rather scream and curse at them,” she continued, per McKeon, describing how they’d been “almost on top of” her as they trailed her into a building.To which John said, “You gotta just take it easy. Relax.”

John Checks Into a Hotel After a Devastating Fight With CarolynCarolyn is clearing the table after a dinner party—planned by John for “her friends,” a characterization she objects to, insisting they’re “our friends”—and the couple get into a huge fight.Barbs include John saying it’s lucky he never introduced Carolyn to his mother, as “she would have never encouraged this,” and Carolyn saying he only talks to her enough to “keep the peace.” Because, she added, “I imagine it’s tough seeing how unhappy you make me.”It’s an all-around devastating exchange—she also accuses him of not making any space for her, while he charges her with having “no identity outside of your own victimhood”—and it ends with John saying he’s going to check into the Stanhope Hotel because he’s tired of seeing in her eyes how he’s “failing at this marriage.”She begs him not to leave, and he promises he’ll be back.If this is, in fact, the notorious check-in to the Stanhope two days before their plane crashed on the night of July 16, 1999, then Love Story leaped almost two years into the future. While their final weeks were fraught, they also traveled, went to parties and experienced at least some happiness as a couple during their nearly three years of marriage.But, as Beller wrote, stories about them being on the rocks or otherwise unhappy sold more papers, as did photos of Carolyn looking upset, and that cycle continued for the rest of their lives.

JFK Jr. Is on CrutchesBefore the fight heats up, John suggests they go out and Carolyn reminds him that he’s supposed to take it easy, as he’s on crutches after crashing his Buckeye (a maker of powered parachutes).She adds, “Didn’t you promise Caroline you were done flying?”This is yet one more reference to planes and flying that have been littered throughout the series, as we’re never supposed to really forget where this love story is headed.When they took that fateful flight, John had been on crutches as he continued to heal from a broken right ankle he suffered in May 1999 when he crashed an ultralight powered parachute.Jacqueline had pleaded with her son to not tempt fate by getting his pilot’s license, according to Edward Klein‘s 2004 book The Kennedy Curse. “Please don’t do it,” she said. “There have been too many deaths in the family already.”

Paparazzi Swarm JFK Jr. and Carolyn as They Return From Their HoneymoonIn episode 7, “Obsession,” the newlyweds return from honeymooning in Turkey to find a horde of paparazzi waiting for them outside their Tribeca loft—and they just will not leave.In reality, it really was that bad. Photographers started following Carolyn everywhere, clamoring for her to flash a smile. When she wouldn’t answer the questions they threw at her—classy stuff like, “Are you pregnant?”—some resorted to calling her a b—h (or worse), hoping to evoke some reaction. “She had thought that the interest in her would wane once they were a married couple,” Carolyn’s friend MJ Bettenhausen said in Elizabeth Beller‘s Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy. “It was just one more way that what had been her free spirit was confined.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

Recreating Carolyn’s LookLove Story‘s costume designer Rudy Mance faithfully recreated the head-to-toe Prada ensemble Carolyn chose to face the paparazzi for the first time, the day after she and John got home.Her camel midi pencil skirt, black sweater, knee-high boots and black tote reflected the woman herself: sleek and chic, but muted.”That was an important one to nail,” Mance said on FX’s official Love Story podcast, hosted by Evan Ross Katz. “It took a long time and we got things from eBay and Japan and from, like, Etsy and Ukraine.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

John Tries to Reason With the PaparazziMuch to Carolyn’s trepidation, John attempts to mitigate the situation outside their front door, asking the photographers to treat his wife with respect and give her privacy while she adjusts to her new normal.He really did do that while Carolyn waited in the vestibule at 20 North Moore Street, saying, per Beller, “Getting married is a big adjustment. This is a big change for anyone, and for a private citizen even more so. I ask that you give Carolyn all the privacy and room you can.”John’s pal Steve Gillon wrote in his 2019 book American Prince, “But the truce lasted the length of John’s statement. As soon as John and Carolyn started walking toward their car, the cluster of photographers ‘broke rank’ as everyone scrambled to get the ‘money shot’—the one picture no one else could capture. The melee petrified Carolyn.”

Carolyn Almost Goes to Work for Ralph LaurenEager to get back to work, Carolyn goes for a slam-dunk interview with Ralph Lauren execs and is sharing how excited she is to join the label, only to find that photographers are creating a scene outside the building. She mournfully turns down the opportunity, embarrassed by the fanatical attention.There’s no record of Carolyn almost working for the iconic designer. But Ralph Lauren himself is said to have been so taken with her style that he told his team at one point, per Harper’s Bazaar, “Every time you design something, think of Carolyn Bessette.”

Courtesy of FX

Ethel Kennedy Summons Carolyn Bessette for a ChatAfter Carolyn and John’s fight in the park makes headlines, Ethel invites her nephew’s fiancée to her Hickory Hill estate in Virginia.Robert F. Kennedy‘s widow compassionately levels with Carolyn, telling her, “You’ll never be given the benefit of the doubt again, as ugly and unfair as that is…These men, they will break your heart, they’ll drive you crazy, they’ll make you want to scream. Don’t.”Ethel really did have Carolyn flown out to the house where, per J. Randy Taraborelli‘s 2019 book The Kennedy Heirs, she advised Carolyn that she’d simply have to rise above, period.A friend who accompanied Carolyn told the author that Ethel said being a Kennedy wasn’t easy. But, the mother of 11 continued, “Then I finally got it that the only way to survive in this family is to look in the mirror in the morning every single day and say, ‘You know what? I am enough.’ Plain and simple. That’s it. ‘I am enough.’ Eventually it sinks in that, yes, you are enough, and that no one can ever take that away from you. Not even the Kennedys.”Carolyn also could never lose her temper like that again in public, Ethel said, per the book. “These men are hotheads,” she warned. “Don’t let them goad you into acting improperly in front of the whole world.”

Courtesy of FX

Why Carolyn Asked Caroline Kennedy to Be Her Maid of HonorIn the show, Carolyn tells her sister Lauren Bessette (Sydney Lemmon) that she’s thinking of asking Caroline to be her maid of honor, explaining that her future sister-in-law seemed “so hurt” by not being involved at all in the wedding planning.”I think she feels really excluded,” Carolyn explains. “I just think it would go a really long way with her…I can’t go into my wedding, my marriage, with her resenting me.”Lauren says, “This will mean nothing to her. And it would have meant everything to me.”Per Taraborelli, Carolyn asked Caroline to be maid of honor at John’s request after his sister not only blamed Carolyn for the spectacle in the park, but also saw it as a sign they shouldn’t get married. He felt “the only way to smooth things over” was to have Carolyn extend that invitation.

Did Calvin Klein Expect to Design Carolyn Bessette’s Wedding Dress?When Carolyn goes to Calvin to resign two weeks after the park fight, telling him she feared her personal life had become too much of a distraction, he admits he feels “a bit blindsided.”But, calling her “a bright light,” he also tells her she’ll “be in good hands” with Narciso Rodriguez—who previously worked for him—designing her wedding dress. After she leaves, he puts away his look book and we get a glimpse of a dress sketch in a drawer.”Calvin was very upset” when Carolyn quit, a colleague told Beller. “He felt left behind.”But while in Love Story Calvin is tipped off about the dress because Carolyn had been photographed with Narciso (Tonatiuh) and Caroline, IRL Carolyn left her job before leaning into wedding planning.

Courtesy of FX

Carolyn Bessette’s Mom Shares Concerns About JFK Jr. Marriage in Rehearsal Dinner SpeechAnn Freeman (Constance Zimmer) is worried Carolyn is going to lose herself in this marriage. She tells her daughter that in private—and shares her concerns with everyone else during her toast at the rehearsal dinner.”John’s love is just so big,” Ann says, “and I worried. How could Carolyn, how could anyone, manage to maintain their center of gravity around something that massive, that shiny?” She concludes saying she prays that Carolyn will be able to count on John to be where he’s needed.In a private moment, John tries to assure his future mother-in-law that her daughter is the center of his world.While what exactly she said that night is unknown, John’s friend Robert Littell wrote in his memoir The Men We Became that Ann “expressed reservations over the union, implying that it might not be in the best interest of her daughter.”And John, he wrote, was “visibly stung by his mother-in-law’s remarks.”Littell also noted that, while he and some other guests headed to the beach to keep the party going, Carolyn, “wise woman, had gone to sleep hours ago.” Meaning, Love Story‘s version of events—John and Carolyn falling asleep on the sand in each other’s arms and going skinny-dipping the morning of their wedding—was dreamed up for romantic effect.

Courtesy of FX

Carolyn Bessette’s Wedding Dress DramaCarolyn really did have a last-minute dress crisis when she realized Narciso’s zipper-less creation would have to go over her head after her makeup had already been done.Gogo Ferguson, who designed the couple’s rattlesnake rib wedding bands, recalled in An Intimate Oral History that it was “like pouring cream over her body,” and Narciso “was trying to sew her into the dress.” Terenzio wrote that Narciso had to open and then re-close the neckline, after which they put a scarf over Carolyn’s head to not muss her hair and makeup. The bride’s friend Gordon Henderson, who designed John’s wedding tux as well as the groomsmen’s suits, told Town & Country he provided a face-saving handkerchief, recalling, “When a friend is getting married, you do all that you can to make sure the couple feels satisfied and happy.”Alternately, Beller’s Once Upon a Time has Carolyn having to redo her hair and makeup after putting the dress on.

Eric Liebowitz/FX

Either way, the ceremony started at 7 p.m. rather than 5—John was also late, having misplaced his shirt—which necessitated the use of candles because the 19th-century wood-frame First African Baptist Church had no electric lights.

Courtesy of FX

Carolyn Says She Needs to Think About It When John ProposesIn episode 5, John proposes to Carolyn in a row boat after a trip to Hyannis Port, where she has just met his extended family—including his aunt, “undisputed matriarch” Ethel Kennedy (Jessica Harper)—for the first time.But Carolyn says she needs to think about it, that there’s “a lot of big stuff” they have to discuss first.Per Beller, John first took Carolyn to the family compound (where he did sign up for a breakfast shift without her) for Labor Day weekend in 1994.According to Terenzio, John popped the question on a boat during a jaunt to Martha’s Vineyard over Fourth of July weekend in 1995, telling Carolyn, “Fishing is so much better with a partner.”And he did offer up a diamond and sapphire eternity band, but while in the show JFK Jr. says it used to belong to his mother, in real life John commissioned Jackie’s longtime partner Maurice Tempelsman to design a ring that looked like his late mom’s emerald and sapphire “swimming ring.” (IRL he gave Carolyn both rings, per Terenzio.)A close friend of JFK Jr. told People in 2017 that Carolyn made John wait about three weeks for an answer. Gillon wrote in his 2019 book American Prince that Carolyn didn’t say yes but wore the ring and told friends they planned to marry. But Terenzio recounted in her oral history that Carolyn called afterward and told her they got engaged during the holiday weekend.In either case, the couple were engaged for months before their infamous 1996 fight in Washington Square Park.

Ron Galella/Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images

Calvin Klein’s Marriage to Kelly Klein Is in DeclineCarolyn had the ear of her boss Calvin Klein, but she was also close friends with his second wife, photographer Kelly Klein.In Love Story, Kelly (Leila George) pushes back when Calvin says—in the wake of a (real) New York Post cover blaring, “JFK JR. POPS THE QUESTION”—that Carolyn can’t work for him anymore “if her personal life is going to become a distraction.”Kelly fires back, “All due respect, you’re the last person to be lecturing anyone on discretion,” to which Calvin says, “From the beginning you knew what you were signing up for.”The designer then asks Kelly to accompany her to a gala that night, “one last time,” indicating they’re splitting up.IRL, Calvin and Kelly announced their separation in August 1996, saying in a statement at the time, per columnist Liz Smith, “We are still the best of friends. We have made a decision to live apart. We are respectful of one another. We hope to work out any issues between ourselves.” They finalized their divorce in 2006.Now 83, Calvin has been in a relationship with model Kevin Baker, who’s 46 years his junior, for 10 years.

Steve Allen/Liaison

Carolyn Does Not Attend the 1995 Launch of GeorgeIn Love Story, Carolyn doesn’t attend John’s press conference announcing the launch of George magazine, at which he unveils the publication’s first cover featuring Cindy Crawford dressed as sexy George Washington.She watches on TV from home, having reluctantly agreed that John didn’t have a choice other than to issue a denial that he proposed, lest the rumors that she had left him hanging overshadow the George news.Carolyn really did steer clear of the Sept. 7, 1995, launch. Terenzio—tasked with issuing a statement denying John was engaged, after a pic of Carolyn’s ring sparked speculation—wrote that John and his partner Michael Berman thought her presence would be “too distracting” and “she wasn’t that upset about that.”But John’s longtime friend Sasha Chermayeff noted in the oral history that she thought at the time “the public denial of the engagement bothered [Carolyn] so much…That was the first sign of Okay, this is what life with him is going to be about.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

The Truth About JFK Jr. and Carolyn’s Fight in the ParkEpisode five ends with Carolyn tearfully accepting John’s proposal after they have an explosive argument while they’re out with their dog.Thanks to copious coverage of the couple’s Feb. 25, 1996, blow-up, many aspects of the Love Story fight—John seeming to wrest Carolyn’s engagement ring off her finger, John in tears as he sits on a curb, John yelling at Carolyn as she grabs the dog’s leash, “You’ve got my ring, you’re not getting my dog!”—are ripped right from the headlines.But the series features them fighting over John’s proposal denial—”None of this would have happened,” he shouts, “if you’d accepted my proposal in the first place like a normal f–king person!”—when in reality they’d been engaged for about five months. (In the show, Carolyn tries on the ring and agrees to wear it when they’re alone, but has not yet said yes to marrying him before the fight.)In her oral history, Terenzio recalled that the couple fought over John “being taken advantage of by his friends.”They had gone to a wedding where they were seated next to a New York Times reporter covering the event for the “Vows” column, and “Carolyn thought it was a bulls–t thing to do to your friend,” Terenzio wrote. She noted that Carolyn felt bad about the fight afterward, “but she was also angry at John because she felt she was trying to protect him, not wanting him to be taken advantage of.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

JFK Jr. Forgets His KeysWhen he brings Carolyn home to his loft for the first time, John realizes he forgot his keys.While that’s a made-for-TV moment, John IRL could be careless and was prone to losing his keys and wallet—an attribute that later made Carolyn reluctant to fly with him alone when he got his pilot’s license.In addition to that bit of foreshadowing, when John invites Carolyn to a party at his sister Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg’s house, he doesn’t tell his date it’s actually a sit-down dinner for Caroline’s birthday.When she tells Carolyn not to worry, that John does stuff like that all the time, Caroline (Grace Gummer) clarifies, “I just mean that he’s forgetful, not that he’s bringing women unannounced.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

Carolyn Meets Caroline for the First Time on Her BirthdayJohn really did bring Carolyn to meet his sister on her 37th birthday on Nov. 27, 1994, though the gathering at Caroline’s Park Avenue apartment is described as a party, rather than a dinner, in Carole Radziwill‘s memoir What Remains.And the Real Housewives alum, who was there with Anthony and thrilled to see Carolyn, wrote that her friend walked “into this guarded room radiant and stubbornly original. Impulsively affectionate.”Caroline hugged John and told Carolyn, “So nice to meet you,” Carole recalled. “Her friends smile politely and then shift their focus to John.”According to Beller’s Once Upon a Time, those who thought Carolyn and Caroline disliked each other at first sight had the wrong idea. An acquaintance who saw them lunching said, “The two women seemed to really enjoy each other, and the conversation flowed, peppered with laughter here and there.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

John Gets an Anonymous Note Claiming Carolyn Is Bad NewsAfter a game of touch football in the park with his buddies, John finds a handwritten letter in his gym bag claiming that Carolyn, among other things, finagled a meeting with him through her boss Calvin Klein because she was trying to “land” him. When she comes over later, John’s fuming. Appalled that he was willing to believe any of it, she walks out.Seemingly days later, he shows up at her apartment and declares himself “an idiot.” Their heart-to-heart leads to him telling her he loves her for the first time.John really did get such a letter detailing Carolyn’s alleged hard-partying ways and busy personal life, per Beller, but it was earlier in their relationship. According to her book, after they dated in the summer of 1992, John unceremoniously broke it off after getting the letter, after which Carolyn resisted his efforts to apologize for more than a year.

Kurt Iswarienko/FX

Carolyn Bessette Impresses Calvin Klein With Her Style Suggestions for Annette BeningIn the premiere of Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette, Carolyn (Sarah Pidgeon) suggests that Annette Bening (Megan Channell) wear a Calvin Klein suit to the Bugsy premiere, rather than the dress the designer himself selected for the actress.While it’s unclear whether she styled that particular look for the future Mrs. Warren Beatty, according to a 1996 New York Times article, Carolyn was the go-to saleswoman for Calvin Klein’s celebrity clientele, including Annette, Diane Sawyer and Blaire Trump.”She would guide them through the collection, tell them what looked good on them, and advise them on how to put it all together,” Paul Wilmott, then Calvin Klein’s VP of public relations, told the paper. “It was a wonderful thing. She sold millions of dollars of clothes over a period of time.”Another Love Story scene illustrating Carolyn’s savvy has the eventual PR director encouraging Calvin (Alessandro Nivola) to hire Kate Moss for a campaign.And Carolyn really was an early champion of Moss, who helped define the Calvin Klein brand in the 1990s.

Eric Liebowitz/FX

Carolyn and John First Lay Eyes on Each Other at a Gala As it unfolds in Love Story, Calvin introduces Carolyn and John at a charity gala in 1992 and sparks fly, though Carolyn refuses to give him her phone number, pointing out he knows where he works.”He was just bored,” Carolyn tells her friends at a nightclub afterward as her sometimes-lover Michael Bergin (Noah Fearnley)—dubbed “sexy doorman” by her pals—walks in.Soon enough, John shows up unexpectedly at Calvin Klein and asks for a private fitting with Carolyn. He asks her to dinner and, once he leaves, her colleagues go nuts.In reality, according to Elizabeth Beller‘s 2024 book Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, they first met in the spring of 1992 when John came into Calvin Klein for a VIP fitting (where her colleagues probably did go nuts). He then invited her to sit at his table at a gala, Carolyn’s friend MJ Bettenhausen told Beller. But when Carolyn thought that another woman at the table was John’s date, she got annoyed and declined his invitation to join him at an after-party.

Was Carolyn Seeing Someone Else When She Met John?Carolyn did casually date Michael, a model who once worked as a hotel doorman, but not until the fall of 1992 and they were “much more off than on,” per Beller’s book.And Bergin’s claim in his 2004 book The Other Man that he continued having a sexual relationship with Carolyn, not just after she met John but until she died, was, Beller wrote, “considered questionable by many of Carolyn’s friends.”

Was JFK Jr. Super Late to His First Dinner Date With Carolyn?In Love Story, Carolyn waits 20 minutes at an Indian restaurant for John and is leaving when he shows up on his bicycle.Which he leaves unlocked, only to come out of their hours-long date to find it’s been stolen. So, he gets to walk Carolyn home.”I thought I had more time,” he said as they arrive at her building’s front door. She asks, “More time for what?” and they kiss. He asks if he’ll see her again and she assures him, “I had a nice time tonight” before calling it an evening.IRL, these two had a first date somewhere, and it’s perfectly conceivable that John rode his bike and was late, but otherwise this two-kindred-spirits-bonding-over-beers tableau was created for the series.

Eric Liebowitz/FX

Daryl Hannah Shows Up at John’s Loft After His First Date With CarolynDaryl Hannah (Dree Hemingway), John’s on-again-off-again girlfriend, is at his loft when he comes home after he was just rhapsodizing to his cousin and best friend Anthony Radziwill (Erich Bergen) about how all he wants to do is call Carolyn.Soon, he’s bringing Daryl to cousin Edward Kennedy Jr.‘s wedding in October 1993, much to his mother Jacqueline Kennedy‘s disapproval (poured on here for effect, but based in reality), and Carolyn finds out from a tabloid cover that her seemingly eager suitor is back on with his movie star ex.Meanwhile, John has been sending Carolyn flowers, eventually telling her when they bump into each other at another event that he “can’t seem to function” knowing that she hated him. To which she replies, “I don’t know you well enough to hate you.”The surprise rendezvous was a dramatic way for Love Story to introduce the Splash star, but producers didn’t seek input from Daryl, who’s been married to Neil Young since 2018.”We want to find these characters from the inside out,” producer Nina Jacobson told Gold Derby, “and it’s hard to serve a bunch of agendas when you [go] to the real people. So we tend not to do that except in rare cases.”In Daryl’s case, she’s “an adversary to what you want narratively in the story,” Jacobson explained, but “we still try to really show respect to the fact that she does have a fluency with this [celebrity] world that Carolyn doesn’t have.”

Eric Liebowitz/FX

What Really Happened to Dary Hannah’s Dog?In the series, John coming home to find Daryl entertaining a bunch of her kooky friends is a sign that the end is nigh. She finally leaves him, challenging him to figure out what he really wants.Daryl says she’ll be back for her dog Hank. Instead, John is asked for an autograph while walking him, and he loses the leash and Hank is fatally hit by a cab. John then flies to L.A. to bring Daryl her beloved pet’s ashes.True story: John’s friend Sasha Chermayeff said his pal was walking Hank in Central Park when the dog got off leash and was hit by a car in May 1994, per RoseMarie Terenzio and Liz McNeil‘s 2024 book, JFK Jr.: An Intimate Oral Biography.”So, he goes out there [to L.A.] to bury the dog,” friend Steven Gillon said in the book. “And while he’s out there, his mom has a dramatic turn for the worse. He was deeply resentful that Daryl dragged him out there to attend a funeral for her dog when his mother was dying of cancer.”In Love Story, mom Jackie (Naomi Watts) leaves a message for John, seemingly while he’s on the plane, before collapsing in her apartment. That was conceived for effect, but it’s meant to hammer home how sick the former first lady was after being diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma in December 1993. She died on May 19, 1994.

photos

View More Photos From Love Story: John F. Kennedy & Carolyn Bessette Fact vs. Fiction

(Originally published Feb. 12, 2026, 9:25 a.m. PT)

For the latest breaking news updates, click here to download the E! News App

THE BLAZE

For most Americans, the Fourth of July is a

NINTENDO LIFE

Available digitally and on a Game Key Car-d Image:

NASA NEWS

This image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope shows Messier