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Carole Radziwill wasn’t a big part of John F. Kennedy Jr.’s love story.
The Real Housewives of New York City alum, 62, was married to Anthony Radziwill — a cousin of JFK Jr. and nephew of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — from 1994 until his death in 1999, but she is not included in Ryan Murphy’s new TV series Love Story.
However, sources told journalist Rob Shuter for a Tuesday, February 17, post on his Naughty But Nice Substack that creators didn’t plan to have her be a character in the new series, which features actor Erich Bergen as cousin Anthony, who was best man at JFK Jr.’s 1996 wedding.
Carole “was adjacent, not central,” said one of Shuter’s sources, adding: “This story is about John and Carolyn — their relationship, their world. Carole was never a primary player.”
The new series, which stars Sarah Pidgeon as Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy and Paul Anthony Kelly as JFK Jr., follows how the pair fell in love and were married before their tragic deaths in a 1999 plane crash.
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“You can’t include everyone who attended the dinners,” a producer told Shuter. “Audiences want the love story. That’s the engine.”
While Carole is the recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Humanitarian Award and has “built a lot around that association” with the Kennedys, “orbiting history isn’t the same as shaping it,” said a source.
Still, Carole’s omission from the series may not be sitting well. “For someone who values that Kennedy proximity, being left out of the definitive retelling? That’s a hard pill,” said a Hollywood insider.
In 2005, Carole released her memoir What Remains: A Memoir of Fate, Friendship, and Love, which looks back on her marriage to Anthony and the devastating deaths of JFK Jr. and his wife as well as the loss of her husband to cancer a month later.
New episodes of Love Story air Thursdays on FX and stream the next day on FX on Hulu.