A brand new documentary about John F. Kennedy Jr. explored comparisons between his late spouse, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and Princess Diana.
A number of of John's shut associates — together with his George Journal colleague Gary Ginsberg and RHONY alum Carole Radziwill — addressed the near-constant intrusion in his and Carolyn's life from the paparazzi within the three-episode CNN docuseries American Prince. The documentary matched up archival footage of John and Carolyn making an attempt to keep away from photographers with comparable paparazzi confrontations that Princess Diana endured in the identical interval.
“Princess Diana was dwelling that wrestle [with the paparazzi] so publicly, her fights with the paparazzi throughout that interval [were notorious],” Ginsberg, 62, recalled. “I'm certain Carolyn was watching it and feeling like she was the American model of it. It in all probability simply elevated her sense of isolation and frustration.”
Royal biographer Tina Brown instructed that Princess Diana and Carolyn lived “very, very comparable lives” as a result of they primarily had no privateness.
“The precise actuality of dwelling [with the media firestorm] was one thing that got here with a lot stress and a lot ugliness,” Brown, 71, acknowledged.
As Brown revealed in American Prince, the connection between Britain's precise royal household and America's unofficial royals, the Kennedys, had been acknowledged by each side.
“[John] was just like the primary pinup of the world and, I suppose, solely Princess Diana comes shut when it comes to the star energy that he carried round,” Brown argued. “I keep in mind once I had lunch with Princess Diana, and he or she mentioned, ‘I'm hoping that [Prince] William can change into as good concerning the press as John Kennedy Jr.'”
The journalist continued, “Diana understood that there was no shucking off of the duty. They had been essentially the most well-known folks on the planet, so there was very a lot a parallel.”
Princess Diana and her boyfriend, Dodi Fayed, had been killed in August 1997 when their driver crashed whereas making an attempt to flee the paparazzi by means of the streets of Paris. In American Prince, Carole Radziwill — who was married to John's first cousin Anthony Radziwill — remembered how her shut pal Caroline responded to Princess Diana's demise.
Princess Diana in June 1996. Steve Kagan/Getty Pictures
“It was very profound,” Carole mentioned. “I imply, Princess Diana, she was our age, just about. The underlying approach wherein she died, which was being actually hounded to demise by paparazzi. That lesson was positively not misplaced on Carolyn.”
The 2024 ebook As soon as Upon a Time: The Charming Lifetime of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy included the revelation that Carolyn needed John to succeed in out to Princes William and Harry after their mom's 1997 demise, however he was hesitant to take action. Writer Elizabeth Beller claimed that John was reluctant to make contact as a result of “he didn't know them and thought that their conditions tremendously differed,” which induced a short lived rift in his and Carolyn's marriage.
Very similar to Princess Diana, John and Carolyn met a tragic finish that despatched your complete world into mourning. John was piloting a non-public aircraft, with Carolyn and her sister Lauren Bessette on board, en path to Martha's Winery in July 1999 to attend his cousin Rory Kennedy's marriage ceremony when the plane crashed shortly earlier than its scheduled touchdown. John and each Bessette sisters had been pronounced lifeless by crash investigators the next day.
STARTRAKSPHOTO.COM John F. Kennedy Jr. and spouse Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy had a high-profile romance proper up till their tragic deaths. When the couple started courting in 1994, the world was fascinated by their relationship. Thought of to be one of the eligible bachelors on the time, Kennedy Jr. determined to quiet down with Bessette-Kennedy. As he […]
The CNN documentary sequence supplied unprecedented entry into John's life and his struggles with the Kennedy household's indelible legacy in American politics. Robert De Niro, Cindy Crawford and former MTV Information anchor Tabitha Soren had been among the many contributors who supplied private recollections of John in American Prince.
American Prince premieres on CNN Saturday, August 9, at 9 p.m. ET, with new episodes persevering with every Saturday by means of August 23.
