Original subtitles

♪

I never understood why he needed to take up flying.

I said to him like, "john, come on.

Look, I know you pretty damn well.

You know, it's like, it's not in your --

Not your sweet spot."

And he said to me, really interestingly,

"it's the only place where I can go

Where I'm left entirely alone.

♪

"I love the silence. I love the solitude."

It was a pure escape for him.

How do you argue with that?

♪

Gillon: One of the things I did not know about john

Was how difficult that last year of his life was.

The magazine is failing.

John is lying around trying to find investors.

His marriage was falling apart.

Reporter: Jfk jr. And new wife headed for splitsville

After just four months.

It seems to kind of be a typical tiff of things

That go on between the two of them.

Gillon: And his best friend and cousin,

Anthony radziwill, was dying.

Man: Anthony, you all set now?

The symbolism of flying, psychologically, is power.

It's control. It's navigation.

A time for john to be just with himself,

His own thoughts, his own feelings.

John will forever love flying because he felt free.

♪

♪

You don't call women [bleep] you don't call women [bleep]

Your mother ever tell you that?

Reporter: Dumping a bucket of water on a prying photographer

Probably wasn't what "john-john" had in mind

To get some r&r.

So why does john have such a short fuse lately?

Well, there have been reports of possible trouble in paradise.

Ginsberg: You know, it seemed like a storybook marriage.

It's just, you know, beneath the surface,

Every relationship is complicated.

Jfk jr. And bride...

Yeah?

Talking bust-up.

No way.

Yeah.

Oh, come on.

South: She loved john. I think john loved her.

They both knew what their life was going to be like.

But to take that on and succeed or fail when you're them

And surrounded by all that magnification,

I think it's an altogether different level of pressure.

Reporter: One reason carolyn is able to travel these days

Is that she recently quit her job

As a public-relations executive at calvin klein.

Radziwill: She had left calvin klein,

So she was at an inflection point in her own life

And trying to decide what she was going to do.

Ginsberg: It was hard for her to work.

In the business that she was in, you're dealing with people

Who your job is to kind of put them at the front and center

Of every single conversation.

And to have an employee working for you

Who overshadows you, no matter who you are,

Is antithetical to the job.

After the first year, I was down at their place,

And she must have given me 10 prada suits and

Coats and everything.

She's like, "I'm never going to wear this."

And I was like, "I'll wear all of this."

[ laughs ]

She had left everything she knew up until that point in fashion

And she was just married

And just not used to that level of scrutiny.

Ginsberg: Carolyn was young and smart and ambitious

And had a big brain and, I think,

Really wanted to do things and to kind of have a big life.

And it's tough when you go from that

To suddenly being overwhelmingly known for one thing.

Radziwill: It just felt sometimes unbearable.

I know it sounds weird,

Because it's like it seems glamorous, maybe.

But it's not. It's really intrusive.

This was a woman who had great confidence and self-esteem

And very grounded, and even I could see it wears on you.

You start feeling a little bit insecure

And you always have to look a certain way.

It was very intense.

Brown: She was very neurotic.

And as we've seen, you know, with meghan and harry,

There was quite a lot about carolyn bessette

That was a bit meghan-ish,

That she had sort of wanted in for all of these reasons

Of glamour and elegance.

But that came with so much pressure

In terms of placating the monster of the media,

That she sort of fell apart, really.

In the later part of their lives,

John and carolyn really begin to argue over this,

Because, yes, the celebrity is necessary,

It is valuable, but not at the risk of your life.

But last week, lee radziwill just made a statement

That the family didn't really like her.

And then, around two weeks ago,

There were reports that carolyn was in some paris bar,

Necking with a guy.

And I think that creates a kind of tension

That is unimaginable for most people

As they think about these kinds of situations.

Radziwill: John couldn't understand,

Being a very privileged male,

He had no sense of what the press would say about her.

I remember we came up with a plan

That every day, she would wear, like, the same levi jeans

With boots and a white button-down.

There's a lot of pictures of her with, like,

White button-down shirts and blue jeans.

And then she thought, because if she wears the same thing,

They would just tire of taking pictures.

But they never tired. Not once.

You know, she was a commodity.

This is john kennedy here, speaking from nbc news.

Oh, boy. Can you help me?

Anthony!

Ginsberg: All of this was against the backdrop

Of anthony having cancer.

And so while this was going on,

It was interspersed with a lot of time

Spent at columbia presbyterian hospital

While anthony got chemo.

And it was a very, very tough period.

Radziwill: I mean, it was heartbreaking.

They were really close.

They were best friends and cousins.

John couldn't believe it was going to happen.

And I think part of it was like

He had experienced a lot of tragedy,

And it becomes your memories.

And anthony was so handsome, so young, and strong,

And he just refused to believe that anthony was going to die.

It was so difficult for him,

And this was a physical embodiment of another death.

♪

♪

I came at this as somewhat of a novice,

So I didn't really -- I hadn't -- we had --

My partner and I, michael berman,

We had an idea, and --

But we didn't know quite how it would show in the real world.

So, yeah -- and I mean, I still, you know, every month, it's --

I haven't really gotten rid of the jitters.

Radziwill: He was right at a crossroads

Of saving his magazine.

I think because it was new

And like anything that's new and different,

People are a little skeptical.

And it's a start-up business, right?

I think people understand what that is more now.

There's, like -- he was an entrepreneur,

And it was a startup business.

And I think it was at an inflection point

Where people weren't quite sure, "is this going to be something?"

He definitely had the right concept,

That politics and entertainment were fusing,

But he was also editing in the era of bill clinton,

And the biggest story around bill clinton was monica.

I did not have sexual relations

With that woman, miss lewinsky.

Thank you.

And he didn't want to go there,

Because he was too much of a gentleman.

So, the shock here at the white house this morning,

The independent-counsel investigation now expanded

To include allegations of sexual misconduct

By the president in the white house.

She is somebody who the media treated terribly.

Did you see monica's new hairdo,

All slicked down with that hair gel?

At least I think it was hair gel.

Larry king: Why is this funny?

Jon stewart: Why is it funny?

Larry: Why is it funny? I mean, it's tragic.

Jon: No one gets hurt.

Soren: Her whole life was turned upside down.

And who was the person in a position of power

In that relationship?

It was not her.

I wonder if we aren't going too far in terms

Of excavating the sexual history of monica lewinsky.

We've seen stories quoting ex-boyfriends

About what she did as a teenager.

♪

John kennedy sr. Had all kinds of

Lurid affairs in and out of his marriage,

But none had been in the white house,

While president, covered with such,

At that moment, seemingly ghastly graphic specificity

As what had happened with monica lewinsky.

Ginsberg: You know, having to grow up with all the suggestions

About his father and fidelity,

I don't think john wanted to re-examine it.

And I think that infused how he approached covering clinton

And a story that otherwise would have been

Kind of tailor-made for george.

Carter: It was simple. The country was obsessed with it.

And, as we discovered, it had legs.

It had, you know, 20 years of legs to it.

But that's the part of the issue is, if your named kennedy,

You're not going to go after the sitting democratic president.

Can you talk to us further about the mentality

At the white house tonight?

They're very worried about all of this,

The accumulation of events.

They're worried that the charge,

Obstruction of justice, a cover-up.

That should have been, like, the story

For george magazine in 1998.

It just should have been.

But, god almighty, what a mistake.

I mean, was it like, "oh, no, that's too undignified"?

Well, dude, you started this magazine

That is about the undignified nature of stars and starlets

And celebrity

That have nothing to do with the substance of politics.

Why is this the line you draw now?

"are politicians celebrities?

These days, politicians, like celebrities,

Are as newsworthy for their private conduct

As they are for their public duties."

"so why do we hold them to a higher standard

Than the other glitterati who are famous for being famous?

And don't tell me it's because politicians are role models.

That solemn fraud is obsolete."

What mother wants her child to grow up and become a politician?

It might still be an honorable profession, but it is combat."

You know, when you are in this family of political celebrities,

It seems to me you're in a pickle from the get-go,

And you better have figured out what you think about it

And what you're going to say about it.

And if that had been a republican president

With a 22-year-old intern,

I'm sure they would have covered it like crazy.

But that's where, like, not having worked in a magazine

Might have hindered him.

He should have had, like, a great number two who would say,

"no, this is not the best idea" or "this is a good idea,"

Because he was probably just too much in charge,

And you want a lot of people around you.

You want people around you

Who fold their arms and come into your office

And say, "this is a terrible idea."

And then you realize, "okay, it's a bad idea."

Imus: Well, did you notice any --

Has it had any impact on your magazine?

Kennedy: I'm not sure if the majority

Of the people in the country --

I mean, certainly, there are those who care,

And I'm not saying it's not something not to care about,

But, clearly, if you're in the journalism business,

It is a much more riveting story

Than if you have kids in college

And you're trying to make payments on your house.

Ginsberg: We didn't cover it in any kind of

Provocative, colorful way.

You know, I think people started --

They were expecting to see it, they didn't see it,

And I think it was a disappointment.

Leno: Thanks so much for coming.

Kennedy: Thank you so much.

Leno: A pleasure to meet you, finally.

Brown: I think it was a big problem for him.

Clinton began the absolute sort of cultural change in which,

You know, sex and scandal and the melding of those things

Became so much a part of the reporting that we were doing.

That didn't really fit with the jfk jr., you know,

Ethos, in that sense.

He was too much of a kennedy.

So, in the end, it wasn't going to work for him,

I think, as a magazine editor.

♪

♪

I mean, sometimes, I look back, especially that summer,

And it feels like a film almost.

It feels like a story that happened to somebody else

Or, like, some weird fever dream that I'm going to wake up

And be like, "that was intense," but I never did.

One of the great lucky things about being in my family,

Which I'm -- which has stayed.

That gathering concept, right?

Yeah. Yeah.

It is familial, right?

Mm-hmm. Yes, it is.

It's a touching family too, right?

Very much so.

The family and the cousins and making a kind of a

Sense of community, especially in the summertime.

Radziwill: Anthony had had cancer for over five years

At that point.

He had started chemotherapy and radiation

And all these experimental drugs.

But by the summer of '99, it was very clear

That he was probably not going to make it through the summer.

And that's why we moved up to the vineyard.

John was, like, resigning to the fact

That anthony was likely not going to make it back

To the city at the end of the summer.

And then john broke his foot, and that was just a disaster.

It was memorial day weekend, I think.

He would get on this contraption.

Man: It doesn't take off real easy,

Unless you get too much gas in it.

Radziwill: I used to call it a flying lawnmower.

It looked like a lawnmower.

Man: Good. Good job.

But I'll tell you,

The damn thing could fly 10,000 feet in the air.

Man: That's good.

Forget how powerful that motor is.

It wants to go up.

I remember him trying one weekend to get me to go on it,

And I'm like, "fuck that."

Like, "I'm not going on that thing."

And he landed awkwardly and he just broke his ankle.

It was, like, a fluke.

Like, a stupid, stupid thing.

I feel like that was, like, a turning point.

Like, I remember carolyn calling from the hospital,

And she was crying because she knew the implications

Of john having to be in a cast for two months.

Yeah, I'm in a cast. I broke my ankle.

I was playing sports first weekend of the summer,

And I'm laid up for a couple weeks.

John getting hurt was a big deal,

Because john was such an active guy.

He loved to play.

♪

I didn't have a hint

That any of the other stuff was going on.

John was one of these guys who --

Just always optimistic, always hopeful.

Despite all this enormous pain that was going on in his life

And the pressure that was on him,

You know, he never revealed it, I never saw it.

Larry king: Are there ever days you say,

"I wish my name were david?"

No. I'm pretty happy with what it is.

I mean, if you're asking if it's hard being me --

Well, it's brought you a unique life.

Yeah, absolutely.

And great opportunities and some challenges.

But all in all, I feel very fortunate.

So it's not so -- it's not so bad.

I only saw john cry one time, and it was that summer.

Like, really cry.

We were at the beach, and anthony took his shirt off.

And you could see his chest was all marked up with scars

From so many operations.

And he was pretty thin at that point.

And I don't know. I think the visual, for john,

He just, like, fell to the sand

And just put his head in his hands and was really crying.

And thank god anthony was a little ahead of him

And the sound of the waves were covering up the cries,

But I could see what was happening.

Anthony -- he was really the brother he never had.

And I think carole was a real part of john and carolyn's life

Because they were preparing to basically take on

Carole as some extension of their life.

That whole month of June was really brutal for him.

John was also trying to save his magazine,

And carolyn was trying to help,

But then, like, being frustrated at him

Because he wasn't acknowledging, at that point

In the beginning of the summer, that anthony was dying

And that he needed to focus and spend time with anthony.

He was really focused on the magazine,

And she was really focused on the magazine.

I feel like it was just as much her baby as it was his.

Ginsberg: John wanted her to be a part of the magazine,

Liked her being around.

So it just naturally happened.

She took a particular interest in the look

And the feel of the magazine,

Spent a lot of time in the art department.

South: George was meant to be this collision

Of politics and pop culture.

I think carolyn knew it in a way that was very immediate

And loved that part of it.

And I'm sure it was a source of irritation for people

That worked at george as it is in any situation,

When the kind of boss' wife has a strong point of view

About things.

And she had a strong point of view about things.

She was good, I mean, but sometimes a little

Brutal in her assessments.

Depaulo: Carolyn was in and out of the office,

But I knew her more from parties like the correspondents' dinner.

He'd say, "I'm sitting you next to my wife,

Because she'll have fun with you."

And we did have fun. We'd, like, go out and sneak cigarettes.

She was great.

I mean, look, was she a total

Pain in the ass to certain people in there?

Yeah.

It was a problem for michael.

Welcome. My name is michael berman,

And I am the co-founder and executive publisher of george.

Gillon: The two of them together created george.

When john and I first began to talk about the magazine,

The experts, early on, advised us,

"never go into business with a friend."

There would have been no george magazine

Without michael berman,

And there would have been no george magazine

Without john kennedy.

They hadn't worked a lot of things out,

And there are very different expectations

About how you do that.

It's a constant source of tension in the magazine,

And michael berman

Wanted john as the editor to commission stories

And to write stories that would reflect the uniqueness

Of his life growing up.

And john just had no interest in doing that.

But there was always this pressure on john

From every direction for him to make it more about himself.

David pecker, the c.E.O. Of hachette,

Would put john on the cover every day with his shirt off.

That's the magazine they wanted.

Say you have a fight, michael, over the next cover.

Let's say? I think we've had about four today.

Advertisers then re-negotiated their fees.

George was not getting the amount of money

It was getting before.

Michael was hearing this from the advertisers --

"it's not distinctive enough.

We wanted a magazine that had more john in it."

And so michael was getting that pressure.

And then their own personal dynamic changed,

Especially when carolyn comes into the office

And starts getting involved in some editorial issues.

You know, a partnership is really difficult,

Especially when you know the other person

And, you know, you had a friendship

Before the partnership.

Carmody: John was afraid of being seen as a business shill.

He wasn't used to having to ask people for favors.

He was used to people asking him for favors.

...Wasn't getting the readers.

It wasn't getting the advertisers.

South: Just by nature of that business,

Everybody is chasing newness.

Advertisers were horrible then,

And carolyn knew that john

Could be a little princely about things.

And I think carolyn certainly knew how the system worked.

I'm sure carolyn was a taskmaster

About that stuff with john.

If people call 316-8735,

They'll be able to get a subscription to george.

King: An 800 number -- did you think it would come to this?

Kennedy: Spoken like a true publisher.

Gillon: Michael berman believes that george has no identity,

No definition separate from other magazines.

And he's coming to editorial meetings

And trashing the writers.

And it got to the point where john was actually

Holding editorial meetings at a hotel across the street.

You're having fights. How is it --

Absolutely.

It makes for a great partnership.

Who wins?

It depends.

You know, some --

The better party usually wins,

And that's the great thing about a 50/50 partnership.

Gillon: You know, in most magazines, you have a publisher

And then you have an editor.

And because john and michael were both partners,

Michael wanted to be involved in every decision that john made,

Including editorial.

His battles with michael berman culminated in a shoving match

Where john ripped michael's shirt.

Michael chased john across the floor of george magazine.

And when john went into his office,

Michael was trying to pick the lock to get in.

It was really an explosive relationship.

Imus: How are things at the magazine?

We had a big power struggle there

Last time we talked, right?

Kennedy: No, I mean, I think we had, um --

What's the term of art? -- Creative differences.

Anthony: I believe the fights that took place at george

Were about the editorial.

They were really having fights up there every day,

Physical fights.

There was enormous pressure.

John -- when he was mad, he could be raw.

He and michael? It was a fucking disaster.

It just went from bad to worse,

And eventually michael left the magazine for good.

I feel like the vision for the magazine

Got really blurry after michael left.

♪

♪

King: Who runs the show?

Berman: Should we both answer at once?

Ohh.

Carmody: I think they started going wrong...

...Right when michael left.

Now, you're a friend of his, right?

Absolutely. Some days.

How do you -- [ laughs ]

Michael and john's relationship

Had deteriorated before that.

And also michael was the gatekeeper for john.

He would be the one to go to john

And say, "you have to do this," or, "you have to do that."

Lamb: Does the magazine make money?

Uh, not quite yet. Soon.

Lamb: When do you think it will?

Well, I mean, usually it takes about 10 years or so

For a magazine to get into the black.

Gillon: He was down.

He was tired.

He had just gotten a letter from hachette

That shook him up.

And he said, "come back to the apartment,

And I want you to read the letter

And give me, you know, fresh eyes."

And carolyn comes in, and she's smoking a cigarette.

She's wearing a columbia university

Oversized sweater.

And I'm trying to read the letter,

And she's like, "john, everybody [bleep] you, john.

You let everybody [bleep] you.

You got to start [bleep] people back, john."

With carolyn, I mean, it's obvious from what I saw

That there was, you know, issues there.

He was trying to keep the magazine alive,

And it was failing.

It was clear that hachette

Was not interested in publishing the magazine.

Reporter: Stars and gossip hasn't increased

The magazine's readership or ad sales.

Monthly circulation hovers at about 400,000.

Kennedy recently said it would take a circulation

Of about 600,000 for george to turn a profit.

With george, I definitely sensed a stress

That I never sensed when we were in college, law school,

The d.A., never.

You know, I'd known him at that point for 20 years, I guess,

And I'd never sensed

That he felt professional pressure until george.

You know, now he's in his mid 30s.

"I'm gonna devote however many years

I need to devote to make this work

So that I can get on to the next,

More important part of my life."

King: Your own interest in politics -- you write about it.

You were raised in a family that lives off it...

Mm.

...And on it and through it and with it.

Mm-hmm.

What about you?

The old definition of politics

Was that you bring it at the end of your life,

When you really have something to sort of offer.

And maybe that's a good thing for me.

I think that just added to this sense

That he's the chosen one.

He believed that he was the heir apparent.

[ cheers and applause ]

I never looked so good.

[ laughter ]

Reporter: Kennedy even hired political figures

To jazz up the magazine.

Former u.S. Senator al d'amato

Dispenses advice in his column.

Ginsberg: He was looking at the political horizon.

What al d'amato had been kind of encouraging him

Was to run for office.

At some point in time, there's going to be a vacancy.

And so who knows? It may be john kennedy.

What do you think, john?

Not today, certainly, and not --

Not while we have such an exciting roster of columnists.

[ laughter ]

On saint patrick's day 1999,

He met with a powerful leader of a new york labor union,

Who said, if john were to run, he would throw his support.

And he sent a message to hillary clinton not to get in.

Reporter: On February 16, 1999,

Hillary clinton confirmed she was considering

Running for the u.S. Senate.

Well, I mean, listen, it's made

A otherwise humdrum race

Into something that is truly exciting

And has engaged new yorkers of all stripes.

But john didn't want to be in the senate.

He was gonna run for governor of new york.

And I'm not being coy here,

But if it changes into something else in --

In a number of years, great.

And if it doesn't, then I have no complaints.

He was now ready to serve the public in a meaningful job.

You know, he looked at his father's career

And had heard enough

About how his father was frustrated

Being a house member and a senator

Because of the tedium of legislative hearings.

If he had a choice,

He'd much rather be in an executive role

Than in a legislative role.

So what john, I think, realized from george

Was what a good leader he was, a leader of men and women,

That he could inspire, he could set agendas,

He could set priorities and then let others execute on that.

John's greatest accomplishment was his ability to navigate

These pressures that were placed upon him by everybody

And come up with a true identity.

And it took him a long time to do it.

And one of the many tragedies of his death

Was that he had finally figured it out.

He had finally decided that,

"yes, I want to get into politics."

Do you still use the "jr."?

Sometimes, but generally not.

King: You're your own man, aren't you, john?

You are your own bewilderment.

We'll be right back.

He's in the right business -- media.

We'll be right back. Don't go away.

♪

Radziwill: Ironically and -- oh, it's sort of awful to think --

But what would be the last week of his life,

He was writing anthony's eulogy.

And carolyn was really glad about that

Because he was finally coming to terms

With the fact that anthony was going to die.

And he struggled with it so much.

The heartache that he was in over his cousin dying

And the pressure and the stress he was feeling

Over trying to save his magazine at the same time.

Brown: You know, I think that john kennedy

Loved that magazine.

It was also a major embarrassment for him

If the magazine folded, and everybody would have said,

"you know, 'gilded kid' couldn't do it."

He would have had to find someone to buy it,

I think, to get out from under.

Reporter: George achieved a circulation of 420,000,

But it's been struggling,

Its publisher weighing whether to drop it.

And in recent weeks, kennedy has been looking for other partners

In an effort to keep his creation alive.

I knew that john was looking for new owners for the magazine.

Hachette had already told him a few months earlier

That they were no longer gonna finance it.

If he wanted to keep it alive, he had to finance it on his own.

James murdoch and lachlan murdoch

Were interested in taking a look at it.

Announcer: John kennedy jr. In the ballpark tonight.

So I was like, "hey, john, let's just go to this yankees game

With lachlan and james."

Lachlan and james chatted with john,

You know, during the break in innings.

Um, it wasn't gonna go anywhere.

I could tell.

He had to make a graceful exit out of that

Into a political future.

This was actually the last night of his --

Last full night of his life.

He was gonna fly the next day,

Friday night, the 16th.

It was just, you know, one of those phone calls

That you dread. Immediately, you know.

It's 11:00 or nearly midnight Friday night.

And john's friend pinky was calling from hyannis airport

Saying, "they're not here. Are they there with you?"

And I mean, even like -- oh, my god --

25 years later, I still get, like, this pit in my stomach.

And then I went into the kitchen,

And I just started making phone calls.

And, you know, I was a reporter, so I knew how to get

Information from people.

And I just started calling --

You know, I called everybody,

The coast guard, the faa, logan air traffic control,

Caldwell airport, hyannis airport.

Every call I made was just more bad news, more bad news.

Called caldwell, and I got a janitor.

He said, "I see his car. It's in the corner of the lot.

But his plane's not here."

John was flying carolyn's sister lauren to the vineyard.

And so I called again, and I said,

"did she -- is lauren there?"

And he said, "no."

You know, I called carolyn's mom

Just to tell her that, you know, they hadn't arrived

And that the plane was kind of missing,

But, you know, how do you say that to a mother?

Finally, someone from hyannis called.

I think it was joe kennedy, yeah.

And I'm like, "um, joe, john never arrived,

His plane is missing, and I just called the coast guard

And reported it missing," you know, just thinking,

"well, wait a minute. Maybe it's not

What I think it definitely is."

Anthony did get up, and he came into the kitchen.

And he saw at that point I had, uh, yellow post-it notes

All over the wall next to the phone.

He just looked at it and was like --

Just the sadness, just like...

I remember him just putting his head down

In his -- his -- his hands and was just like --

He couldn't even cry, he was so weak.

Gillon: The last time I saw john,

I think I, you know, hugged him

And I went right and he went left.

And at some point, for some reason,

I turned around and saw him,

The silhouette in the streetlight.

He just looked so lonely.

His hands in his coat pocket and head bowed down.

I just felt so bad for him.

Yeah.

Reporter: Many are saying that the kennedy legacy meant

That if john jr. Had decided at some point in the future

To run for office, he would have had enormous potential.

It was on every news channel across the world.

It was a crazy fucking summer.

[ airplane engine humming ]

South: The one thing I will never forget

Is the sound of the helicopters.

[ helicopter blades whirring ]

Helicopters that were doing the search,

But also news helicopters.

And then it just kind of went from there.

I was in connecticut.

I was supposed to have been with them that weekend,

But I'm a nervous flyer.

And I flew enough times with john.

I think john was a very good pilot,

But the idea of, like, those little planes,

Going back and forth with him --

I'd done it enough and thought, "never again."

I got a phone call from carole like 5:00 a.M. In the morning.

I got on a plane

And flew to the vineyard early enough that morning

That we still didn't know the news.

Reporter: The us coast guard is conducting a search

For a private aircraft.

South: Senator kennedy's office had been notified.

There are reporters everywhere,

And they're gonna find out that john kennedy's plane

Has been reported missing.

Reporter: The faa would not confirm the number of passengers

On board the aircraft, but all odds are pointing

Toward it being the plane with john kennedy jr.

Gillon: I'm on the phone with people at george,

And I was like, "they're gonna find

That the plane made a soft landing

And john had a rope in his mouth and he's swimming to an island

And lauren and carolyn are sitting in the back seat."

I just couldn't -- I couldn't imagine john being gone.

More information now concerning a private plane

Believed to be piloted by john f. Kennedy jr.

Thought to have been on board with him

Was his wife and one other person.

Anthony: That morning there was a news alert

The plane had gone missing

Because he was going for rory's wedding.

It was dark.

It became something that people obsessed about.

It got non-stop coverage.

It was something that every person in america

Was well aware of.

Gillon: I just couldn't imagine it.

As the day went on,

The big thing was that john's sister, caroline,

Called george and told them to tape up john's office.

And that's when we kind of knew that it was over.

Reporter: The transportation safety board

Has just made it official.

At the wreckage site, the divers successfully located

The bodies of john f. Kennedy jr.,

Carolyn bessette-kennedy, and lauren bessette.

Radziwill: It was so cruel for anthony to have to watch that.

John and anthony -- they were real brothers.

And all I could think of is, like,

"I'm the only one left."

♪

♪

Reporter: The skies were hazy, it was dark,

And he was over water.

Those are conditions that contributed

To spatial disorientation,

Where a pilot has difficulty determining

Whether the plane is climbing, descending, or in a turn.

Anthony: He was there almost,

But he flew by sight.

He didn't fly by instruments.

The whole thing was just not a good idea.

I just said, you know,

"how could he do this to himself, to his family?"

Just no matter what, I wish he hadn't done that.

Obviously, we all do.

Crawford: I remember having that thought, like,

"oh, I'm gonna remember this,

Just like my mother remembered when john kennedy was shot."

Brown: It's just astounding how many of the kennedys

Have ended in tragic ways.

Jfk jr. Should not have been at the helm of that plane.

He was told it was not a good time to fly.

So, in that sense, character is destiny.

You know, it was like, "I'm gonna do it anyway."

And that's really what the kennedy curse is, essentially.

People don't say no to you.

And sometimes you have to listen.

They are, as a family collectively,

Often doing reckless things,

Dying in ski accidents and air crashes.

Gillon: The whole week was a blur.

I couldn't watch the news. I didn't watch tv.

I just couldn't read a paper,

Just blocked it out completely.

Some of the streets are now being shut down

As the family members of john f. Kennedy jr.

And carolyn bessette-kennedy

Prepare to say a final goodbye to their loved ones.

The overwhelming memory I have of that day

Was just silence of getting to the upper east side

And then walking into the church and seeing just pure grief,

Seeing john kerry crying in the back.

It was less than a week after the plane had gone down.

Carolyn will ever be that beautiful, 6'0" blond,

Blue-eyed, mysterious woman who married john f. Kennedy.

Gillon: And then we left the church,

And there was a reception a few blocks away.

And the streets were lined with people.

And for me, that was the first realization I had

Of what john meant to so many other people.

He was john to me.

And every once in a while, I had to be pulled out of that

And to recognize that he was john f. Kennedy jr.

And we were walking to the convent.

I was like, "you know, john, you did okay."

[ cries ]

Wright rigueur: When we think of these big political moments

From the 1960s --

The assassination of john f. Kennedy,

The assassination of martin luther king jr.,

The assassination of robert f. Kennedy --

Similar kind of gravitas in the 1990s

Because of princess diana's death

And then john and carolyn's disappearance.

It's not political violence,

But it still has the kind of weight that matters.

This has implications for politics

And how we understand, you know,

Our connection to political memory.

It's a generational-defining moment.

Clinton: For more than 40 years now,

The kennedy family has inspired americans to public service,

Strengthened our faith in the future,

And moved our nation forward.

And through it all, they have suffered much.

From the time he saluted his dad at the funeral,

John was never going to be fully human, you know?

He was always gonna be part of the myth

Of camelot in the culture.

Born of the sun,

They traveled a short while towards the sun.

An unwavering commitment to the poor,

To the elderly,

To those without hope,

Regardless of fashion or convention,

Is the greatest reward of public service.

Wright rigueur: But actually, I think if we look

At the brief flash of success of george,

He ushers in an era that really captures

The intersection of politics and celebrity.

He had the foresight to understand,

"this is where the country is going,

And we need to address it."

There was an opportunity here

To change the definition of a political magazine.

Lots of people write about john as the "what-ifs."

What could he have been?

And this is, I think, the great tragedy

Of john's death,

Which is, at exactly the moment

Where he looks poised to take the mantle from his father,

His life is cut short.

What would he have done?

What would he have been?

I think john's legacy is far more complex and comprehensive

Than we actually give credit for.

♪

♪

Kennedy: If you're asking if it's hard being me, it's --

King: Well, it's brought you a unique life.

Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely, and great opportunities

And some challenges.

But all in all, I feel very fortunate.

♪