Love Story: John F Kennedy Jr & Carolyn Bessette

One of the most iconic couples of the 90s, John F. Kennedy Jr and Carolyn Bessette get the Ryan Murphy treatment. The TV powerhouse’s latest venture, Love Story: John F Kennedy Jr & Carolyn Bessette, is a stylish, if at times superficial, look at a passionate, tragic romance.

Headed by Sarah Pidgeon and newcomer Paul Kelly, the series begins on that fateful day in the summer of 1999, as the couple prepares to board Kennedy’s private aircraft. The opening five minutes of the pilot are a microcosm of the pair’s relationship: bouts of sparring followed by lusty reconciliation.

The talented Pidgeon expertly channels the enigma of Bessette. She picks up her sultry mannerisms with a flick of her mermaid locks and a furtive, doe-eyed glance. It’s these subtle gestures that flesh out the character, taking a load off the burden of the script. Bearing a striking resemblance to Kennedy, Kelly is the latest addition to Murphy’s growing roster of chiselled leading men (once jokingly referred to as a modern incarnation of the Hitchcock blonde by the handsomest of handsome Murphy men, Matt Bomer). His portrayal is sensitive and understated, but he doesn’t quite capture the magnetism of the late heartthrob. Meanwhile, fresh off the widely panned All’s Fair, Naomi Watts returns to the Murphyverse, playing Jackie Kennedy-Onassis and doing her best to tackle the style icon’s tricky Mid-Atlantic accent.

Following familiar Murphyisms, it has a curated, cinematic aesthetic. In terms of narrative, however, it relies on a somewhat formulaic episodic structure, starting with the day of the crash and flashing back to 1992, when the lovers first locked eyes at a Calvin Klein fitting. And though punctuated by hit songs of the era, the show fails to evoke a sense of New York in the 90s, feeling too slick and sanitised.

However, it does a good job of depicting the general unease of the Kennedy-Bessette romance, leading to some genuinely poignant scenes. Kennedy is surrounded by the spectre and portent of death: his father was murdered, his mother died of cancer, and there’s even a subtle glimpse of his niece, Tatiana Schlossberg, then a child, who would go on to die of leukaemia at 35.

Following his more outlandish output, Love Story: John F Kennedy Jr & Carolyn Bessette is one of Murphy’s most sensitive works in recent memory. This doomed love story is ideal, weepy Valentine’s Day viewing.