You’d never know it from the way FX withheld press assets from reporters, but the ending of this story has been written in stone for nearly 30 years.
But if anyone was going to coax the couple out of their conspiracy-theorized self-exile to escape the public eye, it might have been Ryan Murphy. Sadly, there was no epilogue with the older, happy couple, looking back on the craziness of their early relationship.
The only way out of Love Story Season 1 was through the tragic deaths of John, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren on July 16, 1999. John was 38 years old, and Carolyn was only 33.
Let me begin by apologizing that my coverage of Love Story Season 1 Episode 8 totally missed that we were mere days away from the tragedy by the end of the hour.
Even doing this professionally, I sometimes get so wrapped up in the story dynamics that I miss things like time cues. Or maybe I was just not willing to let go just yet.
It’s true that John and Carolyn had a significant argument shortly before their deaths, and John did sleep in a hotel during that time. And it breaks my heart to think about it.
Carolyn didn’t want to go to the wedding, and you can’t help but wonder what might have happened if she had decided to stay behind.
But that’s not reality, and even in a fictionalized take of the lives of actual people, some facts can’t be changed.
As much as I wish Q-Anon had been right, and JFK Jr. was going to come back to life as a great hope for the United States, you know how the old saying goes. “Wish in one hand, shit in the other. See which one gets filled first.”
But for the love story at the core of Love Story Season 1? We needn’t have worried.
I’d like to think that they how they were portrayed in therapy and their reactions to the idea of separation is who they were in their hearts. Together, they were stronger than they were apart, even if at times, it seemed like they were the very drug that would kill them if they stayed together.
And when John described how they can’t help but be together when they are together, it was the kind of gooey declaration every woman wants to hear.
Couples can be fiery and passionate and fight and love and stay together. My personal opinion is that the you need that friction to keep the spark. If you’re complacent and willing to give up on the magic, then you will lose it.
John and Carolyn were a lot of things together, but even when they were at their worst, giving up entirely wasn’t an option for either of them.
Would they have stayed together forever? We will never know. They sure had enough friction that it could go either way.
Even after a passionate night together, they were on separate pages with Carolyn wanting to fight in her own way for their marriage, and John wanting to follow the rules, not looking as self-destructive as their counselor probably thought they were.
John had so many disillusions about marriage, much of which came from his parent’s marriage. Jackie’s words haunted him. Whoever loved him would have to live in his orbit.
His big sister saw through that and knew that the very thing John wanted was someone who wouldn’t orbit him like the sun. He had countless women before Carolyn, and none of them intrigued him like she did.
His heart was hardened by trauma, but she rattled him and cracked it wide open. And that’s scary. The more you worry about losing someone, the harder it is to allow yourself to give everything to someone else.
Lauren’s advice for Carolyn, to let go of the past so she could move forward was a daily double in sibling support. Carolyn and John were getting advice from the people they trusted most, and it mattered.
And then Dido’s “Here With Me” swelled as Carolyn walked into the George event (another perfectly chosen song), and they met later at the magical Panna II Garden Indian Restaurant to lay their hearts on the table.
John knew he was destined for Carolyn; they knew their love was real. They wouldn’t change over night, but they would fight for each other, and they would win. Everything was right with the world.
Except it wasn’t. Because although their love didn’t end, their lives did, and that’s the tragedy, another among the many the Kennedy family had to bear. The heir to Camelot was only human, and he didn’t survive long enough to rule the kingdom.
I remember the day his plane went down. For me, it was tragic and sad and another cultural touchstone in a period rife with them. For the Kennedy family… I can’t even imagine.
Could what we watched even have done the reality of their loss justice?
And I understand how hard it must be for those remaining to see this unfold on TV, should they have dared to watch. The memories would still be visceral and impossible to bear.
Watching Carolyn break down, begging the universe not to do this to her again brought absolute chills. It’s unfathomable to have lost so much of your family to tragedy.
He spent his whole life bound to that little boy, desperate to free himself from a tragedy he couldn’t even remember. All he wanted was to simply be. And all he’ll be remembered for is what he could have become. — Caroline
Carolyn saw John’s life clearly for the tragedy it was, and I can’t help but feel culpable, merely by my interest, for bringing her fears to fruition.
And as much as I hate to admit it, with Love Story, Ryan Murphy helped show a side of him and Carolyn and even Lauren that pulled our attention away from what they could have been to what they were. Small victories.
But as much as the world was attuned to the Kennedys and their loss, Carolyn and Lauren’s mom, Ann, lost two daughters, and in the wake of it, had to watch the media yet again portray Carolyn as the problem. Even in death, the media chose to place blame on the woman John loved.
Constance Zimmer and Grace Gummer were powerhouses of emotion as Ann and Caroline sat across from each other in John and Carolyn’s kitchen, trying to connect with each other through grief.
Carolyn had all the unwelcome experience in such events, and her words may not have been the comfort that Ann needed, but they were honest and raw, and when someone could have offered platitudes, Ann got truth.
Like Caroline, Ann imagined history would be unkind to her daughter. And again, Love Story, in conjunction with Elizabeth Beller’s book, Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, have shown a different side to the fascinating woman behind the myth.
One of my favorite parts of the finale was when Caroline left the loft to find not reporters outside, but regular people, and those people in their shared grief parted to allow her to pass, giving her the space she needed to move on.
Like Carolyn, Caroline didn’t want to live in the eye of the public, but in that moment, she may have realized that it’s not the public that’s the problem but the median who crafts narratives to sell their wares.
I never realized they had a full church service for the funeral before the burial at sea. My heart was kind of broken and I wanted to be angry that the families robbed us of understanding the whys of it all.
But then, I was so young and inexperienced and easily swayed by the media. I appreciate that I have the benefit of aging that John and Carolyn weren’t afforded.
The wisdom that comes with it does many things, and we can hope that it would have brought John and Carolyn closer. But we can also take solace in the fact they were together, they were trying, and they were fighting for the love we look at so enviously now.
Their story is over, but we can continue to write ours.
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