Daryl Hannah is not a fan of FX's “Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette.” She made this very clear in an op-ed for the New York Times that also criticized the series for what she claims is a misogynistic depiction of her younger self.
“I find it appalling to even have to defend myself against a television show,” Hannah, 65, wrote in the op-ed published Friday. “These are not creative embellishments of personality. They are statements about behavior, and they are false.”
An FX representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday.
“Splash” and “Kill Bill” star Hannah, whose romance with Kennedy in the 1990s was the subject of tabloids before her marriage to Bessette, wrote that the Ryan Murphy-produced project described her as “irritating, self-absorbed, whiny and inappropriate.” She wrote that the show also depicted her as a selfish, cocaine-loving obstacle in the path of the series' latest lovers. Kennedy and Bessette Kennedy died in a plane crash in 1999.
These creative choices, he said, “were not an accident.”
Hannah charged that her story was used as a “narrative device” to generate tension in the series and, as a result, the series descended into “textbook misogyny” by pitting two women, in this case, actor Dree Hemingway's Daryl Hannah and Sarah Pidgeon's Carolyn Bessette, against each other.
The actress, also a filmmaker and advocate for environmental and senior health causes, also distanced herself from the series' “false” representations of her life, behavior, actions and relationship with Kennedy.
“I have never desecrated any family heirloom or intruded on anyone's private monument,” he wrote. “I never planted any stories in the press. I never compared the death of Jacqueline Onassis to that of a dog.”
“Love Story,” created by Connor Hines, premiered in February with Paul Anthony Kelly playing Kennedy. Hannah wrote that since the show's debut, she has received many “hostile and even threatening” messages from viewers who believe the series' depictions.
Before Hannah's op-ed, Murphy received criticism from Jack Schlossberg, grandson of John F. Kennedy and nephew of John F. Kennedy Jr. In an interview with “CBS News Sunday Morning,” the 33-year-old political commentator said that Murphy “knows nothing” about his family and that the prolific television creator is making “a ton of money from a grotesque display of someone else's life.”
While she has often chosen not to address “scandalous lies, bullshit stories and unflattering characterizations,” Hannah wrote that “silence should not be confused with agreeing with lies.” She said she felt compelled to speak out against the series' depiction of her because continuing her “good work,” including her philanthropic efforts, “requires an intact reputation.”
Hannah said she has respected the Kennedy family's privacy and, like Schlossberg, condemned “selfish sensationalists who trade in gossip, innuendo and speculation.”
“In a digital age, entertainment often becomes collective memory,” he wrote. “Real names are not fictional tools. They belong to real lives.”
