The romance and marriage of America’s most tragic high profile couple, Carolyn Bessette and John Kennedy Jr., take center stage in the new miniseries Love Story, now streaming on Disney+. I was eager to see it, but it’s ultimately a disappointing affair. This one is strictly for those who worship the couple.
Love Story makes Mr. and Mrs. John Kennedy Jr. seem so ordinary and mundane. The way the story is told, it’s the people who surrounded them who looked more interesting or larger than life. Carolyn Bessette worked for Calvin Klein. JFK’s mother was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, perhaps the most glamorous First Lady to have inhabited the White House. When he met Carolyn, JFK Jr.’s girlfriend was gorgeous Hollywood movie star Darryl Hannah.
Daryl Hannah was among the leading female stars of the 1980s. She had made a splash when she played a mermaid in the movie Splash. Prolific producers and directors wanted her in their films. Hebert Ross, director of Funny Lady, The Turning Point, and Footloose, cast her in the film version of Steel Magnolias. Filming began in September 1988. That same month, Herbert Ross married Lee Radziwill, sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and aunt to JFK Jr. Hannah was invited to the wedding, and there she met the man heralded for his illustrious name and handsome looks. He was, at that point, the world’s most eligible bachelor.
This interesting tidbit is mentioned in passing in the miniseries. It’s a shame, because this part of JFK Jr.’s life could have enhanced the show’s glamour. Instead, Daryl Hannah is depicted as a clingy girlfriend with stalker-like tendencies and prone to serving cocaine in the parties she hosted. This so incensed her she was compelled to write an essay attacking the miniseries. It was published in The New York Times.
Love Story was produced by Ryan Murphy, whose previous productions dealt with the lives of controversial figures like the Menendez brothers (the two siblings convicted for the murder of their wealthy parents). Fashion designer Halston and esteemed writer Truman Capote also got the Ryan Murphy treatment. He also gave us an inside look into the OJ Simpson trial, which also showed a bit of how the Kardashian girls were initially seduced by fame and celebrity.
Yet it when it comes to high society, Ryan Murphy misses the mark. His take on Truman Capote’s stylish “swans” was disappointing. None of the actresses cast as the swans could capture the innate elegance of the New York socialites. Like Love Story, the Capote series wasted many storyline opportunities. The very public feud between Capote and Gore Vidal was mentioned in just one sentence or two. Instead, Murphy concocted a dream meeting between Capote and activist James Baldwin, which never happened in real life.
Accuracy was never a strong suit of Murphy’s shows. Thus, Daryl Hannah’s anger is understandable. Sadly for her, there’s nothing much she could do—unless she does the same public confrontation that gave the movie Quezon a boost at the box office.
Embellishments can be tolerated if the final product is well-mounted and brilliantly acted. Unfortunately, Love Story is so far Murphy’s weakest work. I’ve never been an avid follower of the Kennedys, but I have seen films about them. I learned much about the patriarch Joseph Kennedy, from the autobiography of the silent film star Gloria Swanson. He wanted to be a Hollywood producer and to make films starring Swanson. They had an affair, and the business arrangement with him ruined her career.
Embellishments can be tolerated if the final product is well-mounted and brilliantly acted. Unfortunately, ‘Love Story’ is so far Murphy’s weakest work
Swanson’s account of her Kennedy connection is far more intriguing than Love Story. I can’t really say whether it’s historically accurate, or if the actors playing Carolyn Bessette and JFK Jr. have successfully brought them to life on screen. Sarah Pidgeon (Carolyn) and Paul Anthony Kelly (JFK Jr.) do have a resemblance to the real people. Paparazzi shots of the real Carolyn often showed her looking fragile and forlorn. But as written and played in Love Story, Carolyn is hardly amiable. She’s a go-getter, a 1990s version of Eve Harrington who’d steal a friend’s job. She is confident, manipulative, and seldom endearing.
And according to the script, she’s a woman with a healthy sexual appetite. She’s shown engaging in casual sex with the famous male model she discovered, Michael Bergin (played by Noah Fearnley). She also wears a permanent snarl on her face even when she’s smiling Never could we believe she has the charm to make a man drop his hot movie star girlfriend for her. Dropping his pants for a one-night stand, perhaps.
Paul Anthony Kelly as JFK Jr. fares slightly better, but he never comes across as America’s own crown prince.
At their best, the two leads act like they’re in a daytime soap opera like The Young and the Restless. At their worst, they seem to be starring in a soft-core porn movie.
As Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Noami Watts gives the weakest performance of her career. Watts is a talented actress but she’s miscast. Not for a moment is she convincing as the most enchanting First Lady of all time. Her Jackie is more a well-to-do desperate housewife, and less a trophy wife coveted by shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis. Watts simply doesn’t have the gravitas to play such a beloved and sometimes controversial lady. Watts has shown more range than actresses like Jacqueline Bisset and Jaclyn Smith in her other roles. Bisset and Smith have portrayed either Mrs. Onassis or a fictional version of her. Yet, they have that X-factor that helped persuade us to believe they were that First Lady.
It’s best for Ryan Murphy to leave the pedigreed personalities to British colleagues Julian Fellows (Downton Abbey) and Peter Morgan (The Crown). Or could they have done a better job with Love Story?
As the miniseries showed, JFK Kr. never aimed for the same level of greatness the older Kennedys achieved. He wanted to be his own man, and his ambition was to be an actor. He quit practicing law and went on to publish a magazine that had little potential for success. He seemed to coast by with his family name and good looks. And knowing how his family has been beset with tragedies, he should have stayed away from small airplanes. I don’t think any great filmmaker could have done a memorable film about JFK Jr., who at most was a paparazzi star.
