A Love Untold - The Carolyn Effect - Love Story- John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette - FX

I know like five people here. You wouldn't know that from the way everyone's staring at you. Oh, I think they're all staring at you. The character of Carolyn was the epitome of 90s fashion. She's a pop culture icon, whether she wanted to be or not. It was really important to recreate her look and her aesthetic accurately. Hey. Collaborating with Ryan Murphy, he just brings together such an amazing team. We had seven people who were either fashion experts or academics to talk about how to get this style specifically right. What if we did a little shopping? Of course, there was a lot of photographs from 1996 and later. But for earlier, we relied heavily on a researcher and the author of the CBK book, Sunita Kumar Nair. She was really instrumental in telling us what she might have done. She would put cardigans around her neck instead of scarves. I need the updated book for the Milan show. It was all these very important small layers to the character of Carolyn's fashion DNA. It really showed the team's dedication, making sure that they stay true to Carolyn's style lexicon. You know, she would always wear a lot of Calvin Klein. I like your dress, by the way. Thank you. Calvin Klein's a leading fashion house, which she was very much part of. We've gotten a lot of the actual runway pieces through private collectors and vendors. And so a lot of the pieces that the character Carolyn wears in the series are actual pieces that she wore at the time. They're pieces that I buy at vintage stores from Yoji Yamamoto and Prada. I was reaching out to people on Instagram, like super fans that just live Carolyn the set. When we secured this, it was like the holy grail. The Prada camel military coat, which she was photographed in probably the most. This was the original one. One of the most iconic looks was this Miu Miu faux fur coat. She had a very strong coat game. She was famous for wearing the 517 Levi's jeans. So we have about 100 pairs of these, because you have to go through that many to find one that fits. Very iconic look. The camel Prada skirt. This is an original piece from a collector. Hunting for those and connecting to collectors who actually had those pieces was a really fun part of the process. This was an actual Calvin Klein dress, an actual Prada coat that she wore. Beautiful Yoji Yamamoto. He described his clothing as armor that women could wear. And I think that in considering the character of life and what she was dealing with when she started dating John. Not being able to go three feet without a camera flashing in your face or someone yelling at you. It made a lot of sense that she was attracted to that type of clothing. She's almost unknowable. She's guarded, elusive. She's not trying to sell you anything or hamming up for the camera. She's just letting you in. I started her off a little bit more natural. Her brows in her younger days were a little fuller. Also, her lip color in the beginning is quite neutral. As she becomes more involved in the Kennedy's world, everything becomes a little bit more covered. The skin becomes a little more opaque. There's a little more coverage. It's a little more matte. And then you'll see the pops of the red that she's famous for. Plus, you gotta dress for the part you want, not the part you have, right? Sarah was a very, very dark brown bob before we started this to get her to where she is on camera now involved a full team to transform Sarah. Our goal was to get the color, the length, the texture, bring those to life with Sarah's own hair to get the most natural version of this character as possible. In the 90s, hair color was very different than it is today. Highlights were more vibrant. They were bolder. It was gold and bold. As the decade progressed, it became more sophisticated. Her palette became lighter until it became almost platinum. It was a long process. The first few days were 12, 14-hour days of just gradual, slow lifting. This is me getting ready. I source naturally wavy hair so we can kind of recreate that very lived-in Carolyn Bessette finish. And then I am bonding each individual hair onto her natural hair so that it looks like she doesn't have extensions at all. You really know how to make an entrance, by the way. Although I'm not gonna lie, I was sort of hoping it was Prince. It was such a beautiful, magical process to witness to really see the essence of Carolyn coming to life in Sarah. So many people wanted to be like them. I did. And I love that we can tell the story over again. There's not so many images of her, but every one tells a different story and is iconic in the sense of these are looks that people are replicating. Carolyn, at the beginning, doesn't look like anybody else in the street, in the office. No one's dressing like her. No one has her hairstyle. By the end of the series, if you look at the background and look at our extras, you'll see that people are trying to dress just like the character of Carolyn. The way she dressed, the accessories she wore, the way she did her hair, all of it was so understated and simple. I'm excited to see how many, many Carolyns we have running around after this show airs. You understand just why she's so revered, and people talk about her beauty 30 years later.