17/09/2026
Martha Stewart just shared one of the most haunting personal stories of her extraordinary life — and it involves a dinner with John F. Kennedy Jr. just four days before the plane crash that killed him, his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and her sister Lauren Bessette on July 16, 1999.
During the RHONY Season 16 premiere on September 8, Stewart, 85, revealed she had dinner with JFK Jr. on the Monday before his death. He had reached out wanting advice about his political lifestyle magazine George, which was struggling, and Stewart welcomed the conversation warmly. But what happened at the end of the dinner is the detail that has stopped the internet in its tracks.
"I said, 'Well, 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 copilot, right?' And he said, 'No, I don't need a copilot.'" Stewart then paused and delivered the words that have moved the internet to silence: "I've thought about that so many times that I told him to get a copilot."
The story emerged as Stewart appeared on RHONY to get her makeup done by series newcomer Nicole Daisy Toye — but the conversation quickly turned to JFK Jr. and Ryan Murphy's 2026 FX and Hulu series Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette, which brought the couple's story back into the cultural conversation this year.
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