When the series Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette debuted in February, audiences quickly caught onto the “hair acting” prowess of Sarah Pidgeon, who portrays Bessette on screen nearly three decades after her tragic demise. Social media platforms buzzed with viral videos, and the media buzzed with articles. Pidgeon even found herself addressing the buzz in interviews and on red carpets, diving into discussions about how she captured the essence of the ’90s style icon for her role.
While it might seem like a minor detail in a show capturing the spirit of its time, Pidgeon’s captivating portrayal stuck with me since early spring. Pidgeon, heralded as one of the standout rising stars of 2026, approached her role as the former Calvin Klein publicist with remarkable intentionality. Her nuanced physicality—from iconic hair flips to the gradual lowering of her shoulders across episodes—brought her performance into Emmy-worthy territory.
Paul Anthony Kelly, who plays the part of the Kennedy heir with his own reservoir of interviews and clips, crafted a distinct interpretation. In contrast, Pidgeon relied heavily on photographs and firsthand accounts to bring Carolyn Bessette to life. Although a project like this—prone to public scrutiny—sailed past controversy, it remained highly reviewed, underscoring Pidgeon’s awareness and intention with each scene.
“The biggest challenge was portraying Carolyn accurately, given that she was a real figure who was not extensively documented beyond paparazzi snapshots,” Pidgeon revealed in a DECIDER FYC interview. “I yearned for a simple recording of her discussing everyday matters… it would have been golden to capture her unique mannerisms, like whether she habitually kept her fingers slightly bent. Without such insights, I watched myself closely in the early takes to ensure I was deliberate in my portrayal.”
Pidgeon’s main goal was not just to recreate familiar scenes but to uncover and present the vulnerable, authentic Carolyn Bessette known to her loved ones. Although she couldn’t imitate every subtle gesture, like the way Carolyn smoked or embraced someone, she sought a deeper understanding of her essence. Approaching this with care, respect, and an instinct to protect, Pidgeon aimed to convey authenticity and emotional depth across her portrayal.
“Working with my movement coach really helped me get to a place where that physical transformation started feeling a bit more natural and less like I was putting something on, so that I could spend that energy thinking about what I wanted to focus on in the scene and what the script was calling for,” she adds, sharing that what resulted is a focus on bringing Carolyn to life in the face as much as she could through her body.
“Her eyes were a really important center. There was so much energy because she was so connected with people. I also wanted those to be her focus, to focus my energy through that,” Pidgeon explains. It happens frequently throughout the series that Pidgeon’s eyes are the only thing doing the talking; Love Story often lends itself to quiet pauses and longing looks, first of lust and hopeful adoration in early episodes and then of sickly desperation as the fairy tale turns into a nightmare. Through each moment, Pidgeon carries the entire narrative in glances both brief and extended, telling the audience everything and making Bessette feel like a woman we know or are.
No conversation about Pidgeon’s well-rounded and groundbreaking performance can be complete without talking about her work in Episode 7, “Obsession,” as the intense scrutiny and vitriol from the tabloids seeps into her marriage and leaves Carolyn feeling isolated and genuinely fearful. Toward the end of the episode, things finally come to a head as she breaks down in John’s arms and sobs uncontrollably over the insistent nature of the paparazzi and the toll it is taking on her mental and physical health. There are actors out there who surely would swing for the fences with a scene like this and make it feel big from start to finish, but what Pidgeon opts for is what makes her performance magnificent. Quietly, she plays the rage and sadness of a person who feels both in love and trapped beyond belief until the final minute when the floodgates open.
It should be regarded widely as one of TV’s best-performed moments of 2026.
“For that particular scene — something I struggled with a bit in the last couple of episodes was how it incenses me to think about how she was treated. And I think, especially towards the end of our season, public scrutiny is a theme that we really were exploring and feeling,” Pidgeon explains. “I felt like Carolyn, being essentially an advocate for her and recognizing that she never went on the record and so many assumptions were made about her, so many insanely misogynistic headlines were written about her, it really fueled me in a way. There were many takes and many tries of that scene where I think she had a lot more vitriol. And sometimes that would be focused at John… I was proud of that moment because I think it hit the right levels of frustration and like exasperation and fear and tiredness.”
For The Wilds alum, it wasn’t all heartbreak and desperation, however, as the task of bringing Carolyn’s joy weighed just as heavily on her mind. Outside of playing the moment that she pictured Carolyn at her smallest (the scene in Episode 7 where she and John emerge from a car after their honeymoon to invasive questions, prompting her to retreat in on herself and clutch her purse for dear life, Pidgeon says), there is also the excitement of bringing a lighter, happier version of someone whose story has a tragic ending.
“I think when she was in Calvin Klein, she felt that confidence of being 26 years old and sort of not really caring what your boss thinks,” the actress says of when she was playing Carolyn at her most untethered. “I found her to have so much swagger and confidence and almost like when your frontal lobe hasn’t totally developed yet, like her risk assessment was just like slightly less.”
It’s a testament to Pidgeon’s performance that you can also see that relief and zeal in the scenes where she gets to play, at the core of the role, a woman who is young, in New York, working a cool job, and dating a man she loves. It’s what endears the audience to her in the moments where she gets to be as big and free as she can be, countered only by the moments where she experiences the lowest lows. Pidgeon hopes fans (and Emmy voters) don’t only remember the sadness and scenes of anguish, though, as there is still so much light to be found in the lighter moments that she feels honored to have been given.
“When Carolyn and John are at home, and they’re planning their wedding, that felt very big,” Pidgeon says of one of her favorite scenes of pure joy. “When they’re planning their wedding is one of the last moments before the rest of the world comes in, which really takes over the last like third of our series.”
She adds, “Having that abandon and silliness with the person that she loves the most, that felt very free.”
Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette is now streaming. The Emmy Awards will air live on NBC on Monday, September 14, at 8 p.m. EST.