JFK’s grandson hits out at Ryan Murphy for ‘making millions’ from tragic love story with new series
Jack Schlossberg, JFK’s grandson, has accused Ryan Murphy of ‘making millions’ from the family’s tragedy. (Getty)
Jack Schlossberg, JFK's grandson, has accused Ryan Murphy of 'making millions' from the family's tragedy. (Getty)
Jack Schlossberg, grandson of former US president John F. Kennedy, has hit out at Ryan Murphy for dismissing his concerns related to Murphy’s upcoming American Love Story series.
The first series of Ryan Murphy’s American Love Story, set for release in February 2026, focuses on the romance between JFK’s son (and Schlossberg’s uncle) John F. Kennedy Jr., and his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy.
Both JFK Jr., a socialite and journalist, and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, a fashion publicist, tragically died in a horrific plane crash in July 1999. He was 38, and she was 33.
Schlossberg had previously described Murphy’s decision to “profit off of” the Kennedy’s story as “grotesque”, a claim which Murphy shut down during an appearance on the This Is Gavin Newsom podcast.
Talking about Schlossberg’s comments, Murphy said it was an “odd choice to be mad about your relative that you really don’t remember”.
“The thing I was not prepared for was the Kennedy firestorm, which I thought was very strange because nobody’s read anything,” Murphy added. “It’s very sympathetic. It’s a love story. It’s not a takedown.”
Schlossberg, 32, was six-years-old when his uncle was killed.
In a new post on Instagram, the writer – who is currently a political correspondent for Vogue – slammed the suggestion that he doesn’t remember his uncle, and urged Murphy to “say it to [his] face”.
“My earliest memories are of John calling me Jackolatern and ‘the nudist,’ picking me up from school, his Pontiac convertible. I remember being the ring bearer at his wedding and the day he died,” Schlossberg wrote.
“I remember Wyclef singing at his funeral. More memories are passed down from stories – like the time he locked himself out of a car in an intersection and asked the guy screaming at him if he could borrow a golf club to smash the window to get the keys, and then did it.”
Jack Schlossberg also reiterated his initial issue with the upcoming American Love Story series, stating that Murphy would “make millions off John” and was “making a public spectacle” of his relationship with Bessette-Kennedy, and their deaths.
Alongside Kelly, American Love Story will star I Know What You Did Last Summer actress Sarah Pidgeon as Bessette-Kennedy. 21 Grams star Naomi Watts will play JFK’s wife and JFK Jr.’s mother Jackie Kennedy, while Grace Gummer, Meryl Streep’s daughter, will play JFK Jr’s sister Caroline Kennedy. Tár star Sydney Lemmon will play Lauren Bessette, the sister of Bessette-Kennedy.
In his initial takedown of American Love Story, Schlossberg said that JFK Jr’s family were not consulted and are not involved in the making of the series.
“There’s really not much we can do,” he wrote.
“I hope those making this show about him take seriously what he stood for in his life, all that he achieved in it, and that they donate some of the profits [from] what they’re making to the John F. Kennedy Library.”
He added: “For the record, I think admiration for my uncle John is great. What I don’t think is great is profiting off of it in a grotesque way.”
It’s far from the first time Ryan Murphy has been criticised by the subjects or families of the subjects involved in his TV depictions of real-life events.
Last year, Erik Menendez, who alongside his brother Lyle Menendez formed the basis of Murphy’s Netflix series Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, hit out at Murphy for being “inaccurate about the facts of our lives”.
“It is sad for me to know that Netflix’s dishonest portrayal of the tragedies surrounding our crime have taken the painful truths several steps backward,” he wrote.
“Murphy has shaped his horrible narrative through vile and appalling character portrayals of Lyle and of me and disheartening slander.”
Similarly, Murphy was criticised back in 2022 by some of the families of the victims of Jeffrey Dahmer, for the way the serial killer was portrayed in Murphy’s show, Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.
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