Martha Stewart shared the warning she gave John F. Kennedy Jr. just days before his tragic death in a 1999 plane crash.
President John F. Kennedy’s son was just 38 when the light plane he was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the western coast of Martha’s Vineyard, killing him, his wife Carolyn Bessette, 33, and her older sister Lauren, 34.
On Tuesday’s premiere of The Real Housewives of New York City, Stewart, 85, told her makeup artist and new cast member, Daisy Toye, about her last conversation with JFK Jr, revealing she questioned him about having a co-pilot.
‘I was with John-John the Monday before the Friday when they died. He called me,’ Stewart explained.
She said he called to get advice about his political lifestyle magazine George: ‘I was running Martha Stewart Living Magazine. He called me and he said he’s in trouble.’
‘I said, of course, anything you want,’ Stewart remembered. ‘We had a very nice dinner.’
Martha Stewart, 85, shared the warning she gave John F. Kennedy Jr. just days before his tragic death in a 1999 plane crash
JFK Jr and his wife Carolyn Besette-Kennedy (seen together in 1998) were both killed in a plane crash off Martha’s Vineyard in 1999, alongside her sister Lauren
‘And then at the end of the dinner, I said to him, “What are you doing this weekend?” He said, “Oh, we’re going to a wedding in Martha’s Vineyard, and I’m taking my wife and her sister.”‘
‘I said, “Well, who’s flying?” And he said, “I’m flying.” I said, “You have a co-pilot, right?”‘ Stewart recalled.
‘No, I don’t need a co-pilot,’ JFK Jr allegedly replied.
‘I’ve thought about that so many times that I told him to get a co-pilot. I feel sorry,’ Stewart said.
Stewart made the revelation when Toye asked about her recent TV watchlist.
‘Love Story, of course,’ Stewart said, referring to Ryan Murphy’s recent FX show about JFK Jr and Bessette.
The series, starring Sarah Pidgeon as Bessette and Paul Anthony Kelly as JFK Jr, was inspired by Elizabeth Beller’s book Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and explored their undeniable chemistry, whirlwind courtship and high-profile marriage over nine episodes.
After their secret 1996 wedding, Bessette remained a figure of intense fascination and mystery, never giving an interview before the pair died in a plane crash.
On Tuesday’s premiere of The Real Housewives of New York City, Stewart told her makeup artist and new cast member, Daisy Toye, about her last conversation with JFK Jr, revealing she questioned him about having a co-pilot
‘I said, “Well, who’s flying?” And he said, “I’m flying.” I said, “You have a co-pilot, right?”‘ Stewart recalled. ‘No, I don’t need a co-pilot,’ JFK Jr allegedly replied
The couple (seen in 1999) were on their way to Cape Cod for the wedding of Rory Kennedy and Mark Bailey
Kennedy and Bessette pictured in his plane in 1998
Their iconic romance was recently explored in Ryan Murphy’s series Love Story, starring Sarah Pidgeon as Bessette and Paul Anthony Kelly as JFK Jr; Seen in a still
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The couple were on their way to Cape Cod for the wedding of Rory Kennedy and Mark Bailey when the tragedy occurred.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the probable cause of the crash was: ‘The pilot’s failure to maintain control of the airplane during a descent over water at night, which was a result of spatial disorientation. Factors in the accident were haze and the dark night.’
After a five-day search, the wreckage was discovered in the late afternoon of July 21.
The bodies were recovered from the ocean floor by Navy divers and taken by motorcade to the county medical examiner’s office, where autopsies revealed that the crash victims had died upon impact.
New episodes of Real Housewives of New York air on Tuesdays at 8pm ET on Bravo and stream the next day on Peacock.
