Carolyn Bessette Kennedy was ‘irked’ by ‘little miss perfect’ Gwyneth Paltrow

I have such strong memories of a Chloe Sevigny interview in Harper’s Bazaar, circa 2001, where she called out several celebrities including Gwyneth Paltrow. Chloe praised the late Carolyn Bessette Kennedy for being fashion-forward and then Chloe said something like “Gwyneth wishes.” There was a period of time in the 1990s when Carolyn and Gwyneth were two of the most famous women in America, and they wore similar styles for a time. To be fair, many women were doing that minimalist-chic/American-classic look. To be fair, Carolyn was considered a major style icon in her day, and many women were copying her in real time. I’ve always believed that Gwyneth was one of Carolyn’s biggest imitators, and Chloe Sevigny felt the same way! Well, as it turns out, Gwyneth and Carolyn met a few times through Carolyn’s job at Calvin Klein. Carolyn couldn’t stand Gwyneth, at least according to this new Gwyneth biography.

In the mid-90s, Gwyneth Paltrow and a not-yet-married Carolyn Bessette were both blonde, beautiful, privileged and fashionable young women raised in or around NYC who would dominate national headlines — but they decidedly were not friends. In Gwyneth: The Biography, author Amy Odell reports that the fellow It Girls had a professional connection via Calvin Klein, where the future Mrs. Kennedy served as a publicist and Paltrow was a celebrity client. As revealed in an early book excerpt exclusive to Us Weekly, Se7en star Paltrow “irked” Bessette:

Gwyneth said she had arranged for an appointment at Calvin Klein, where she had become a regular presence at the office. One of the publicists on the brand’s small team who helped Gwyneth was Carolyn Bessette (who would go on to become Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy). According to one person familiar with her thinking, Gwyneth irked her. When there were pictures of Gwyneth in the papers, Bessette, who viewed her as “little miss perfect,” would make cutting remarks about her.

With or without Bessette’s begrudging help, Paltrow was enthusiastically championed and dressed by Calvin Klein since the earliest days of her fame; he threw parties in her honor and lent her his helicopter, while she sat in the front row of his fashion shows around the world. Paltrow wanted to wear the brand in her 1998 film Sliding Doors, although its expensive, high-end line was mostly “too fabulous” for her role as a British woman who works at a sandwich shop, Odell writes.

How does Paltrow feel about the bombshell book? The mogul, 52, “isn’t too bothered,” an insider told Us exclusively, adding that she’s “been in the Hollywood game for a long time and so has a thick skin. This book isn’t a big deal for her.” Unlike Odell’s last A-list subject — none other than Anna Wintour, for 2022’s New York Times bestseller Anna: The Biography — Paltrow “did not participate” in the process, the insider said.

[From Us Weekly]

Do you believe Carolyn made snotty remarks about Gwyneth? Sure. I believe that. Just like I believe that as soon as Carolyn was John Jr’s established girlfriend/fiancee/wife, Gwyneth basically copied Carolyn’s whole look, down to her shade of blonde. Even in the 2000s, you could see Gwyneth still doing a version of Carolyn Bessette.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.