When the Kennedeys met the Windsors (with Caroline Hallemann)

0:00Dana Schwartz:This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human. During Memorial Day at Lowe's, shop household must-haves for less. Save$80 on a Char-Broil Performance Series 4-Burner Grill to chef up something special. Plus, get up to 45 % off select major appliances to keep things fresh. Our best lineup is here at Lowe's. Lowe's. We help, you save. Valid through 527. While supplies last, selection varies by location. See Lowe's.com for details. Visit your nearby Lowe's on South Loop 288 in Denton. What's up, y 'all? Summer's got a different tempo. Everything's a little looser, brighter. One plan turns into another.

0:42You hear something, you stay a little longer. Next thing you know, you're somewhere you didn't plan to be. It's those in-between moments. That's where the ideas hit. Conversations stretch out. Little memories sneak up on you. Sometimes, it's just about what's in your hand. That color. That chill.

0:59Dana Schwartz:The new Tropical Butterfly Refresher from Starbucks. Guava and passion fruit flavors with mango pineapple flavored pearls. Yeah, that feels like summer before you even taste it. Funny how one small stop becomes the best part of the day. Start your summer rhythm with Starbucks. Try the new Tropical Butterfly Refresher from Starbucks. Do you want to find a stress-free way to buy your next car? Start at CarMax and shop your way. If you want to browse with confidence, get pre-qualified online with no impact on your credit score and shop cars within your budget. From luxury cars to family rides, CarMax has options for almost every price range, including more than 25 ,000 cars priced under$25 ,000.

1:47Dana Schwartz:So, hey, want to get started? Just head to CarMax.com for details and get pre-qualified today. Want to drive? CarMax. Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manke. Listener discretion advised.

2:06Dana Schwartz:Welcome to a very special episode of Noble Blood. I'm Dana Schwartz, and I'm joined by Caroline Halliman, who's the digital director of Town and Country and the author of the new book, The Kennedys and the Windsors, which is out next week, available for pre-order now. It is a fascinating book, super readable, super fun, like the best sort of historical gossip about these two families that are a global obsession. Caroline, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to talk to you today. My first question is, what drew you to a book focused on these two families in particular?

2:46Sure. So I, as the digital director at Town & Country, I have covered both of these families for just about 10 years now. So I came into writing this book with kind of a deep background on both of them. But what really kind of sparked the idea to write a book was when Prince William announced that he was bringing his Earthshot Prize, which is his big environmental initiative, to Boston. and that was in the second year of the prize. And he talked a lot about how President Kennedy's moonshot and his kind of ambition to go to the moon and his declaration that we would do that within 10 years was really an inspiration and a driving force for William's big project.

3:33And I just started thinking about that. And I was like, that's so interesting because it was Prince William kind of leaning on the Kennedy iconography and the Kennedy mythology and kind of like the language of the Kennedys to launch his big project on a global scale to bring that to America. And I was like, that is just, it just felt like a reversal of the whole, like the Kennedys are the closest thing that America has to the Royal family. And so I actually covered that visit to Boston for town and country. And, and I just kept thinking about that. And I kept thinking about the different connections between the two families.

4:08And the following week, Prince Harry had another event with another branch of the Kennedy family. He received the Ripple of Hope Award. And so I just kept thinking about it. And I kept thinking about Joe Kennedy in the UK prior to World War II. And I kept thinking about the 1961 meeting at Buckingham Palace, which has been fictionalized on the crown and all of these things. And I was like, there must be a book about this. And so I was looking it up. I was trying to find something and there wasn't one. And so then I was like, well, maybe maybe I should try and write something. And my I pitched it to my agent.

4:42I had been kind of working on a separate idea. And she was like, that's it. Like, that's the book. You should start on that. And so that's kind of the origin story.

4:50Dana Schwartz:I love that infamous visit that you mentioned that was depicted in The Crown when Jackie Kennedy and JFK visited Queen Elizabeth and her husband Philip. As you mentioned, it was depicted in The Crown, but you also write about it very beautifully in the book. Can you explain the context of that visit and what happened? Sure. So the 1961 visit, it came after President Kennedy was in Vienna, which was kind of like a key meeting with Khrushchev about the Cold War. And they talked about the state of Germany. They talked about the state of Laos. It was a big meeting for him. And they knew that he wanted to debrief with the UK prime minister afterwards, but he didn't want to make kind of other allies in NATO mad about essentially the US-UK special relationship.

5:43So they wanted to get to the UK. and actually his goddaughter was being baptized. So Jackie Kennedy's sister, Lee Radsewell's daughter, Tina, had been premature. It had been a difficult pregnancy. And this was a good enough reason for them to get over to the UK after Vienna, that President Kennedy's goddaughter was going to be baptized. And so that's a whole lot of context for why they were there. But while they were there, Queen Elizabeth was like, of course, please invite them to dinner. You know, forth about whether the Radziwells would be invited because they had been divorced and there was just all of this back and forth.

6:21Dana Schwartz:But as we know, divorce in the royal family at this time, big no, no. Exactly. Exactly. But eventually President Kennedy and Jackie, they get to Buckingham Palace for this dinner. And what the crown gets right is that Jackie was not exactly impressed with Buckingham Palace. She thought that, you know, she thought that Prince Philip and she thought that the queen were nice enough. But we have several accounts of her saying, you know, that she was a little bit disappointed. She was disappointed with the food. She was disappointed with the state of Buckingham Palace. And she was disappointed with what the queen chose to wear.

6:56And I think that that little kernel has just like expanded and expanded and expanded beyond in the kind of telephone of history and has led to this kind of idea that the two women had this intense rivalry or something like that. And that's not true. And when you think about it, I mean, they had a lot in common. They were very different. But at the same time, they were both young mothers. They were both two women, you know, under enormous scrutiny in the public eye. And what I like to point to is that they were both passionate equestrians. Like, if you know anything about these two women and their hobbies, you know that they love horses.

7:35So even though that first meeting together was kind of, you know, as I say, Jackie was less than impressed. She returned the following year and had lunch at Buckingham Palace. Again, that is depicted in The Crown and is fictionalized. certainly what we know happened is that they talked about horses in that second meeting, and that's what they really connected on. And, you know, I just love that bit of history. I think of them both as kind of family matriarchs, but also horse girls.

8:07Dana Schwartz:They are both horse girls. And both of them, I often think about how lonely and isolating it is to be famous feels almost like a diminishing word for what the queen or what Jackie is like, so constantly scrutinized. And there are so few people who understand what that's like. And even if these two women weren't quite friends, there was probably an understanding between them. Absolutely. I think that hits the nail right on the head. They have singular experiences that very few other people can understand. And they occupy different roles, But I think there was commonality there for sure. Do we know how the Queen felt about Jackie?

8:51Dana Schwartz:The crown depicted her as a little envious, that Jackie was more beautiful, more glamorous, this French-speaking woman. Was that a fictional invention? I think, yes, it was fictionalized. That is true. But I would say that certainly the royal family, they looked to the Kennedys for kind of like an injection of vitality. They saw how successful that was. And the royal family definitely took inspiration from that in the years to come. And frankly, I think they could do that again, honestly, kind of in present day. Yes, I think you're absolutely right. What I also find interesting that you mentioned before is this symbiotic relationship between the two of them.

9:36Dana Schwartz:How did the Kennedys benefit from their royal associations, both with the idea of Camelot and by associating themselves with the Winters? Sure. I think to answer that question, you have to go back to Joe Kennedy, who was President Kennedy's father. He was the ambassador to the UK prior to World War II. when he started in that position, when he brought his family over to the UK, he saw it as a real opportunity to kind of push them up the social ladder. And to that effect, you know, Rose Kennedy, his wife, JFK's mother, really saw kind of their time in the UK as kind of the first step toward JFK's presidency.

10:16So while they were there, they took every opportunity to socialize with royals and with aristocrats and for their children to as well. And I know you did an episode, I can't remember if it was earlier this year or at the end of last year about Kick, who is fascinating.

10:31Dana Schwartz:I was about to bring up for audience members who don't remember, Kick Kennedy was the sister of JFK who married into British nobility and she died very tragically young. Yes. But during their time in the UK, you know, that was seen as a real benefit of this position, is that Joe could have his children make these connections with people. And, you know, those were some of JFK's very close associates during his presidency as well. I feel like that's a great example. And then you kind of look toward the myth-making of Jackie after President Kennedy's death and the idea of Camelot. For listeners who are unfamiliar, in the handful of days after President Kennedy's assassination, Jackie gave an interview for Life magazine in which she kind of crafted the myth of Camelot.

11:21She spoke about how she and JFK had listened to records, the famous Broadway musical Camelot, how that was one of his favorites. And she kind of made a comparison linking the Kennedy administration and their family to the myth of King Arthur and his knights in Camelot. And that it was a time of, you know, prosperity and goodness and celebration of the arts and all of those things. And so it is a link that she crafted between royalty and the Kennedy family. And the Kennedys had been called kind of the closest thing that America has to the royal family during the Kennedy administration. That didn't start with this, but it certainly has had a long lasting impact on how this family is viewed in American popular culture.

12:08And so it's that idea of the Kennedys as royalty, as the closest thing America has to royalty, it has really perpetuated. And I think that stems from Jackie. And she didn't really give interviews after that, which makes that interview all the more important. And it really solidified what she wanted JFK's legacy to be. And then she kind of left it at that. And she kind of disappeared, which I find, I mean, she didn't disappear. But from giving interviews and sharing her perspective, she never wrote a memoir or anything like that. And I think that link was important to her.

12:44Dana Schwartz:One thing I find really compelling about your book is the parallels you draw between generations. I think that the comparison between Jackie O and Queen Elizabeth makes sense. I think people also sometimes associate her with Princess Diana, just as this young figure who, as you said, injected some vitality into the family she married into. But you in the book draw a link between JFK Jr. and Diana, which makes a lot of sense as two very glamorous figures who died young. Can you talk a little bit about that comparison? Yeah, sure. I mean, Diana is someone who I think you could compare to many people in the Kennedy family.

13:25I think she's, you know, a fascinating figure. But during the 1990s, there were, you know, few people as famous as Princess Diana and JFK Jr. and I think two people who were courted by the media intensely. And I think how they handled it is interesting. I think a lot of people make a comparison between Princess Diana and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, and absolutely there's one to make there. But I think Carolyn was not as adept at kind of handling the media. She just kind of she she didn't have a sense of how she could work with them or or make it work for her in any way, which Diana was kind of masterful, really.

14:13Exactly. Exactly. And I would say John F. Kennedy Jr. was the same way. He he didn't let it bother him as much because, well, first of all, it's all he'd known his whole life. That that is a differentiator between these two people. But he certainly knew how to use it to his advantage. I don't think he was upset to be on the cover of People magazine, you know, Sexiest Man Alive. Like that did not bother him.

14:37Dana Schwartz:I don't know who it would bother. But so I do think that that I think that that is the interesting comparison between them is kind of is in the sense of the media, certainly. In terms of the tragedy of these two families, how do you think each family handled their respective tragedies individually? Obviously, these are different systems in place, but the royal family was sort of stymied in their ability to respond to the death of Diana. that. Yeah. I mean, I think certainly, I mean, that also was a comparison between these two people is the way they were grieved by the public and the kind of almost cathartic outpouring of grief by people who didn't know them, the parasocial relationship that people had between themselves and Princess Diana and themselves and John F.

15:30Kennedy Jr. In both cases, people kind of created memorials to them outside. There was weeping in the streets in both cases, which is difficult to kind of imagine that, but that's what happened. And the parallel of public grief for both of them was one of the first things that came to mind. And obviously with Princess Diana and her sons kind of walking behind her coffin. And then for every time there is a death in the Kennedy family. It is public. Even for a death like Tatiana Schlossberg recently, you know, there were photographs of the family leaving the funeral that were published in a variety of publications.

16:15There is, and she was not a very public facing person. That is one of the parallels between these two families that illustrates how challenging it is to be in the public eye. There are so many benefits to being as famous as these two families are. That is undeniable. But there are, because so much is expected of them, there's an expectation for them to grieve in public. And that's just not something that is expected of very many people.

16:46Dana Schwartz:So these days, I'm trying to be really intentional about what is actually in my closet. I have a very small closet and I need it to be really curated, full of pieces that work in multiple contexts, nothing extraneous, things that are just functional and simple and make getting dressed easy. And recently, Quince has been my go-to. The fabrics feel elevated, the fits are all really flattering, and everything in my closet just works without me having to overthink it. Quince makes it easy to refresh your everyday this spring with pieces that feel as good as they look. They use premium materials like 100 % European linen, organic cotton, ultra soft denim, and it's all really affordable.

17:31Dana Schwartz:Their lightweight linen pants, dresses, and tops start at just$30. Everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80 % less than similar brands because they're working directly with ethical factories, cutting out the middlemen, so you're paying for quality and craftsmanship, not brand markup. Recently, I just got a quince cashmere sweater vest that has become the centerpiece of several recent outfits. I'm like inventing new outfits to find ways to wear this cashmere sweater vest. It's incredibly versatile, so soft, so comfortable, like the perfect fit that's really flattering. And the crazy thing is it's just a price.

18:11Dana Schwartz:I really had to do a double take to be like, this is the price of a cashmere sweater vest, but it is. So refresh your everyday with luxury you'll actually use. Head to quince.com slash noble for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's q-u-i-n-c-e dot com slash noble for free shipping and 365-day returns. quince.com slash noble. From the world of Jane Austen comes Britbox's new original drama, The Other Bennett Sister. It's a fresh spin around the ballroom for one of Jane Austen's most unassuming characters, Mary Bennett, the seemingly unremarkable middle sister in Pride and Prejudice.

19:01Dana Schwartz:While the Bennett sisters are admired for their distinct qualities, Mary was the one sister who stood on the sidelines, awkward, anxious, and overlooked. But in Britbox's new drama, Mary is finally brought into focus. Thoughtful and perceptive, she navigates a world that rewards charm over intellect, and where independence comes at a cost. It's the story of what happens when someone long overlooked at last begins to see herself clearly. And now her greatest chapter is yet to come. Don't miss The Other Bennett Sister, streaming May 6th only on BritBox. Watch with a free trial at BritBox.com. And now another appliance triumph from your friends at Grand Appliance.

19:52Dana Schwartz:Meet Chad. With the laundry piled high, Chad's washer died days before a two-week vacation with his family of five. But Chad didn't panic. I just called Grand Appliance. They recommended a large capacity Samsung option with a super speed wash mode that washed everything in no time. Best of all, it was in stock and they delivered it next day. Another crisis averted by Grand Appliance. Shop GrandAppliance.com to learn more. How did celebrity culture and sort of the paparazzi culture affect both families in the 90s and early 2000s? Sure. I think we think about paparazzi and we think about celebrity culture today and we think, wow, it's really obtrusive.

20:35These people are being photographed all the time, all of that. Take it back to the 90s and amplify it to the nth degree. It was different back then. And Diana is the perfect example. Yes, she manipulated and had a relationship with the press. She was able to get what she wanted from them in some cases, but certainly they also pursued her. That is absolutely true. And the same was the case for Carolyn in the 90s. They would not leave them alone. There was no way for them to kind of escape interest. In the modern day, I think there is, it's not a parallel, but it's interesting to think about the fact that everyone has a cell phone.

21:15That is a way that you cannot escape that in the modern day. But, you know, I think recently about Tom Holland and Zendaya, they got married. Nobody's seen pictures. Nobody knows about it. That is possible now. That wasn't really possible in the same way. So, yeah, it's just different.

21:35Dana Schwartz:We'll find out how possible it is if we get secret pictures of Taylor Swift. Yes, exactly. Exactly. That's going to be the real test. So the meeting between the The Kennedys and the Windsors in 1961 is very famous. But are there any other times that these families have come together that you find notable? Sure. This is it's not exactly a meeting necessarily, but one of my favorite parts of the book is Jackie covering Queen Elizabeth's coronation as a journalist. Prior to Jackie marrying JFK, she worked as a journalist at the Washington Times-Herald in D.C. And she, you know, was sent to cover the coronation for her inquiring camera girl column, which was kind of a man on the street column.

22:20And so she covered the ship over, which was what she dubbed kind of the coronation crossing. And then she spoke with numerous people on the ground. She reported from the ground about all of the festivities leading up to the coronation. She went to several kind of legendary parties after the coronation. And this is kind of my favorite chapter because I feel like it offers rare insight into what Jackie was like before she was famous, which I think is really interesting. it's a great parallel between her and Queen Elizabeth because it's kind of these two young women on the brink of exceptional lives kind of right on the edge of something um and you know Jackie is funny and she has these doodles that she drew and she's just just you know I just I love it because like I said you know she was so public and polished during the Kennedy administration.

23:24And then she gave these kind of final interviews and then you don't hear from her again. And so it's just a really insightful look at who she was at her core as a young woman.

23:34Dana Schwartz:I love that. What would you say are the things that each family has learned from each other? What lessons have they taken from the other side? That's a great question. The kind of youth and vitality piece of it, I think is what the Royals had learned from the Kennedys and they looked to them and that was a piece of kind of what they saw as helpful and the PR of it all. I think they saw that and they were like, okay, they're, you know, that is the way to go. I think both of these families, their histories and their perceptions have been so shaped by television. And I think that the Kennedy presidency in the Kennedy administration, you know, he won the debate because of TV.

24:19Jackie gave her kind of television tour of the White House. And you kind of see television is starting to have importance with the coronation of Queen Elizabeth and kind of with other events. So I think that is so interesting. Their perception of how they are seen, I think is so key. And I think that's, you know, the royals always knew that, but I think that was like one lesson they learned from the Kennedys, what the Kennedys took from the royal family. That's interesting. I think, again, not to keep talking about this, but the kind of, you know, never complain, never explain attitude of, you know, not speaking to the press unless it's like absolutely necessary.

24:59You saw that with Jackie, you saw that with Caroline Kennedy. And I think you see that today. You know, the reason why her speaking out against her cousin, RF Kennedy Jr., prior to him being appointed to the Trump cabinet, why that had so much impact is because she doesn't speak to the press. I think it had much more impact because of the rarity of it all.