4 People Who Have Spoken Out Against 'Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette'

The FX series Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette has made a major splash, sparking renewed interest in the Kennedy family, 1990s New York City, and Calvin Klein, among other topics. The show follows the romance between John F. Kennedy Jr.—the son of former President John F. Kennedy—and Carolyn Bessette, a fashion publicist who helped the brand Calvin Klein reach new levels of fame.

The duo met in 1992, tied the knot in 1996, and died in a plane crash in 1999, and their highly scrutinized relationship is the subject of the show. Though the series has led to widespread fascination with JFK Jr. and Bessette, not everyone has been pleased with its interpretation of events.

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1. Daryl Hannah
2. Douglas Kennedy
3. Jack Schlossberg
4. Sasha Chermayeff

Daryl Hannah

In 1992, JFK Jr. was dating actress Daryl Hannah when he met Carolyn Bessette. The show depicts Hannah as a stuck-up, drug-addicted drama queen who, at one point, compares losing her pet dog to JFK Jr. losing his mother, Jacqueline Onassis Kennedy, while at her wake. 

The real-life Hannah, however, took major issue with the portrayal, and in March 2026, she published a scathing op-ed in The New York Times criticizing the show’s version of her. “The character ‘Daryl Hannah’ portrayed in the series is not even a remotely accurate representation of my life, my conduct or my relationship with John,” she wrote in the piece.

“The actions and behaviors attributed to me are untrue. I have never used cocaine in my life or hosted cocaine-fueled parties. I have never pressured anyone into marriage. I have never desecrated any family heirloom or intruded upon anyone’s private memorial,” she continued. “I have never planted any story in the press. I never compared Jacqueline Onassis’ death to a dog’s. It’s appalling to me that I even have to defend myself against a television show. These are not creative embellishments of personality. They are assertions about conduct — and they are false.”

Douglas Kennedy

Douglas Kennedy, who is the son of Robert “Bobby” Kennedy and the cousin of JFK Jr., shared some messages of support for Hannah after her op-ed was published. “Daryl Hannah was great,” he said to Page Six. “Whenever I saw her, she was very sweet and had [John’s] best interests at heart. I think that’s a misrepresentation,” he said of her portrayal on the show. 

He also fondly recalled Bessette and JFK Jr. in the interview, saying that “everybody around Carolyn loved Carolyn” and calling JFK Jr. a “leader of my generation” and “irreplaceable.” Additionally, he pointed out the challenges television shows face when attempting to adequately portray the nuances of real people and real lives. “It’s difficult to capture the intricacies of people’s lives in movies or television,” he said. “If you know people, these types of things often fail in capturing the essence of who people were.”

Jack Schlossberg

Jack Schlossberg is the son of Edwin Schlossberg and Caroline Kennedy, John F. Kennedy Jr.’s sister. A political commentator running for the U.S. House of Representatives at the time of Love Story’s premiere, Schlossberg spoke out against the show in a March 2026 interview on CBS’s Sunday Morning, in which he advised fans not to get too caught up in all the hype.

"I would just want people who do watch the show to watch it with one letter in mind and that's a capital 'F' for fiction," he said in the interview. He went on to criticize the show’s portrayal of his family, and had some choice words for executive producer Ryan Murphy.

“If you want to know someone who’s never met anyone in my family, knows nothing about us, talk to Ryan Murphy,” he said. “The guy knows nothing about what he’s talking about, and he’s making a ton of money on a grotesque display of someone else’s life. I would hope that Mr. Murphy would donate some of the millions of dollars of profits that he’s making to maybe some of the causes that John championed throughout his life,” he continued. “Maybe he would donate some of that money to the JFK library to help keep President Kennedy’s memory alive, but he’s not. He’s making money. This is not a documentary.”

Schlossberg had previously shared similar criticisms in 2025, and Murphy responded to them in an interview on Gavin Newsom's podcast This Is Gavin Newsome. “I thought it was an odd choice to be mad about your relative that you really don’t remember. The days of civil discourse are over, and it’s very hard. And you kind of either get into the muck or you try and rise above it,” Murphy said at the time.

Schlossberg replied with a sharply worded Instagram caption. "Hey @ryanmurphyproductions: My earliest memories are of John calling me Jackolatern and 'the nudist,' picking me up from school, his Pontiac convertible," he wrote. “I remember being the ring bearer at his wedding and the day he died. I remember Wyclef singing at his funeral. More memories are passed down from stories—like the time he locked himself out of a car in an intersection and asked the guy screaming at him if he could borrow a golf club to smash the window to get the keys, and then did it...You’re making millions off John, making a public spectacle of it but won’t contribute any of your riches to the causes he championed, or the legacy of public service he represented.”

Sasha Chermayeff

Sasha Chermayeff, a childhood friend of JFK Jr.’s, told Page Six that she felt the show’s portrayal of the characters was not entirely accurate in a March 2026 interview. “The way I look at it, [Love Story] is just being made by a group of people that never met them, didn’t know them, and are just making it up as they go along,” she told the outlet.

She also disputed the show’s portrayal of tensions between its central duo and Caroline Kennedy and her husband Edwin Schlossberg, saying that the show’s depiction of visible strain at JFK Jr. and Bessette’s wedding wasn’t accurate.  “People knew that there was some tensions between them as the two couples,” Chermayeff said. “That was something that people did know, but it wasn’t really apparent at the wedding,” she continued, saying that everyone was “on their best behavior” and “at that point, there wasn’t a feeling of tension at all. It was just not there.”

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