Carole Radziwill has reaffirmed a claim she first made seven years ago: her late best friend Carolyn Bessette Kennedy would have enjoyed watching her on “The Real Housewives of New York City.”
The exchange happened Tuesday night on “Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen,” taped after the Season 16 premiere of “RHONY.” A viewer asked Radziwill whether she still stood by remarks she gave the Daily Mail in 2019, when she suggested Bessette Kennedy would have gotten a kick out of her run on the Bravo series, and may have even shown up for a cameo. “Yes, I do,” Radziwill said. “I think she would have gotten a kick out of my RHONY career. For sure.” She added, though, that she doesn’t believe the former Calvin Klein publicist and wife of John F. Kennedy Jr. would ever have appeared on the show herself.
Cohen offered his own read on the hypothetical, telling Radziwill her Bravo career only happened because of the circumstances of her life, and that had her husband lived, she likely never would have joined the cast.
Radziwill was married for five years to Anthony Radziwill, a first cousin and close friend of Kennedy Jr., until his death from cancer in 1999 — just three weeks after Kennedy Jr., Bessette Kennedy and her sister Lauren Bessette were killed in a plane crash.
Interest in that story has spiked this year following Ryan Murphy’s limited series about the Kennedy-Bessette romance, which included Anthony as a character but left Carole out entirely. That series carries seven Emmy nominations, including outstanding limited or anthology series.
Radziwill has said the renewed attention weighed on her during filming of the new “RHONY” season, which began around the same time the drama premiered in February. Castmates repeatedly pressed her with questions about Kennedy Jr. and Bessette Kennedy, and she has described reliving a measure of grief throughout production, with the emotional arc surfacing early in the season and again near its close.
Season 16 also brings back Sai De Silva, Erin Lichy and Jessel Taank, alongside new full-time additions Erika Hammond, Daisy Toye and Hailey Glassman.
