Long before joining The Real Housewives of New York City, Carole Radziwill shared a close friendship with Carolyn Bessette Kennedy. Interest in Bessette and John F. Kennedy Jr. has surged again following the release of Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette, prompting Radziwill’s fellow Housewives to ask about the couple. But when the conversation turned toward a blunt characterization of her late friend, Radziwill made clear where she stood.
Carole Radziwill said Carolyn Bessette was a ‘girl’s girl’
At a cast brunch during the newest season of RHONY, Daisy Toye said she was “dying” to talk to Radziwill about Love Story.
“I want to know all about Carolyn Bessette,” Toye said.
Jessel Taank then cut in with a more pointed question: “Just ask the question: Was she a b****?”
Toye immediately clarified that Taank’s remark was not what she had intended to ask about Bessette.
“No. That’s not my question. Was she fun?” Toye asked. “Like, would she vibe with that?”
Radziwill, who appeared uneasy with the exchange, said Bessette — who was killed in a 1999 plane crash — was both lively and deeply supportive of women around her.
“Yeah, she was very fun. She’s a girl’s girl, like before there was a thing called a girl’s girl,” Radziwill said. “I don’t know what she’s like on the show, ‘cause I don’t want to watch the show.”
She said she couldn’t watch ‘Love Story’
Taank was surprised that Radziwill had not watched the program centered on her former friend, but Radziwill explained that revisiting the story was simply too difficult for her.
“No, I’m not watching the show,” Radziwill said. “I watched about four minutes of it the other night with my best friend ‘cause she’s like, ‘Well, let’s just watch it together,’ and it’s too much.”
She also said that she didn’t like the emergence of the fashion trends inspired by Bessette after the show aired.
Taank continued to ask Radziwill about her late friend and her relationship with John Kennedy Jr.
“Do you not think the family is, like, cursed? Right?” she asked. “The dad gets assassinated, then the mother has cancer, and then they both die…”
Erika Hammond then told Taank to stop this line of questioning, and Radziwill agreed.
“Read the frickin’ room, Jessel,” cast member Erin Lichy said in a confessional. “Dude, do you not see that this is her best friend, and she’s still grieving?”
Radziwill later admitted that Taank’s remarks infuriated her.
“It doesn’t register to her that the tragic death of my cousins and best friend might be very upsetting to me?” she said in a confessional. “I want to strangle her.”
Taank recently defended her questions.
“It’s only because, from fashion girl to fashion girl, we are a little bit b****y and cold,” she told Page Six, adding, “I don’t know Carolyn Bessette personally, so I was just curious, did she have a demeanor where she was sort of cold and maybe a little bit of a fashion diva?”
Still, she admitted that she probably should have used “the b-word” while talking to Radziwill.