Delco native turns pen to the young Kennedys in bio
Prolific celebrity biographer J. Randy Taraborrelli a native of Ridley Township - is at it again. He’s back with a new tome chronicling the Kennedy kids.
“The Kennedy Heirs: John, Caroline, and the New Generation – A Legacy of Triumph and Tragedy” is the latest unauthorized biography from Taraborelli, in which he chronicles the lives of a political family many refer to as American royalty. This latest book gives readers a compelling insight into the lives of the offspring of six of the nine children of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and his wife, Rose, who produced a total of 29 grandchilden.
The new book authored by the Delco native takes readers on a journey that follows what happened to each of the adorable children gathered around their Kennedy grandparents for a photo at the family compound in Hyannis Port on Cape Cod, Mass., on their grandfather’s 75th birthday, Sept. 7, 1963, just a little more than two months before the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The photo is part of the gallery of photos in the book.
Taraborrelli’s knowledge of the Kennedy family gleaned over the past 20 years allowed him to detail how close-knit the family is. The description of the annual family clam bake every Labor Day weekend at the compound reads like it could be any family get together and makes a reader feel as if they are sitting on the beach taking it all in as a group of young Kennedy cousins dig a pit in the sand for the clambake.
“Ethel (wife of Bobby Kennedy) is the matriarch of the family and is definitely a character,” Taraborrelli said with a chuckle. “And I’m finding that she is the most popular one in the book. I don’t outline my books – ever – and I let my stories unfold, and Ethel has the best lines in the book.”
Tarborrelli writes about the unique relationship between Ethel and Ena, the governess she hired in 1959 to help with her growing brood of young Kennedys. Ena was beloved by all the young Kennedys in her charge through the years. He details the explosive disagreement between Ethel and Ena over Ethel’s parenting style that once took place in front of Jackie Kennedy. Ethel punished three of her sons for playing a rooftop tag game by locking them out of the house. Ena objected, words were exchanged and finally Ena said, “I quit,” Ethel said, “Good.”
But two days later Ena was back and stayed on for at least another 20 years. She and Ethel cleared the air and Ena continued to be an important part of the family. When she died at the age of 105, Ethel
“The Kennedy Heirs: John, Caroline, and the New Generation – A Legacy of Triumph and Tragedy” is the latest unauthorized biography from Taraborelli, in which he chronicles the lives of a political family many refer to as American royalty.
Kennedy and her children turned out for her funeral in Florida, where Ethel had set her up in a house when the winters of Cape Cod became too harsh for the elderly woman.
Taraborrelli recounts the tragedies that continued to dog the third generation of Kennedys, just as it did with the assassinations of the president and his brother, Robert F. Kennedy. Ethel and Robert’s son, David, died of a drug overdose, and Michael slammed into a tree while playing a game on the ski slopes on an annual family outing. Kara Kennedy, daughter of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, died eight years after undergoing lung cancer surgery, suffering a heart attack at a gym. The chemotheraphy she had after the cancer surgery had weakened her heart. She was 51. Sen. Edward Kennedy’s oldest son, Teddy, lost a leg to cancer when he was a young child, and Robert Kennedy Jr. lost his wife to suicide.
Perhaps the most jarring was the plane crash in July 1999 that took the life of John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Caroline, and her sister Lauren. The younger Kennedys had been on their way to Cape Cod for the wedding of Rory Kennedy, the child Ethel gave birth to months after Bobby Kennedy was assassinated. John had been at the controls of the small plane.
“Eunice (Kennedy) once told me if there was a family curse, it was the constant fixation by the public on the Kennedys,” the author commented.
The younger generation of Kennedys were not immune to scandal. The book details Michael Kennedy’s affair with his children’s teenage babysitter, and the affair between Maria Shriver’s husband, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and the family’s housekeeper that resulted in the birth of a son. Schwarzenegger had been a movie actor and served as governor of California. Many of the younger generations’ marriages ended in divorce. And for some, alcoholism was a struggle.
And then there was the improbable summer romance between singing star Taylor Swift and young Conor Kennedy, son of Robert Kennedy Jr. Conor was four years younger than Swift and still a teenager when the two met through his cousin, Patrick Schwarzenegger. For one summer in 2012 Taylor and Conor were an item in Hyannis Port. Taylor even bought a $4.9 million home on the cape to be close to Conor. But in September, Conor called in quits with Taylor and a few months later she sold the house near the Kennedy compound.
Taraborrelli said he still has more Kennedy material for a fifth book but he is now engaged in writing a book about the Bush dynasty that will be out in about two years.
“I started the Bush book about five years ago and then I put it aside and did the Beyonce book and ‘Jackie, Janet and Lee,’” the author said.
When asked about the extensive source notes in his latest book, Taraborrelli said compiling that section of the book, and all of his books, “takes everything out of me.”
“It’s harder than writing a book,” he said. “I can’t do the source notes while I’m writing the book. You would think after writing 21 books I would find a better way.”
In addition to writing the Bush book, Taraborrelli is also executive producer of the upcoming television series based on his book “Jackie, Janet and Lee,” the story of Jackie Kennedy Onassis, her mother, Janet Auchincloss, and her sister, Lee Radziwill.
“I hope the show will run for more than one season. It’s sort of the American version of ‘The Crown,’” Taraborrelli said. “It is really the book my readers liked the most. I received so much mail about that book.”
The show is not in production yet, but should be on the air by the end of next year, according to Taraborrelli.
It is probably safe to say that Taraborrelli is one of the more successful college dropouts as the author of 21 biographies to his credit, most of which landed on the New York Times Best Seller list. “Jackie, Ethel and Joan – Women of Camelot,” and his biography of Marilyn Monroe both became television miniseries. He has been a commentator on numerous shows for CNN and other television networks.
And it all started in the basement of the Taraborrelli family home on Kedron Avenue in Ridley Township, when he founded the first fan club of Diana Ross and The Supremes when he was just 17. The club soon went nationwide. After graduating from Ridley High School in 1974, Taraborrelli enrolled in Temple University but left after his sophomore year, heading for Hollywood to work in the public relations office for the Supremes organization. And up the ladder he went, becoming editor of “Soul Magazine.”
“When I was a kid ... I would run to the Morton News every month to pick up a copy of the magazine,” he recalled in a previous interview. “The store ordered just one copy and that was for me and it was always kept in the same place in the store. No one else would carry it.”
His first biography was titled “Call Her Miss Ross,” about Diana Ross, followed by biographies of Princess Grace and Prince Rainier, Elizabeth Taylor, Carol Burnett, Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra, Madonna, Marilyn Monroe, Beyonce, the Hilton family and now his fourth book on the Kennedys.
Taraborrelli offered a prediction on the political future of one of the younger Kennedys: Joseph Kennedy III, son of Ethel and Robert’s oldest son Joe and now a congressman. And he thinks Joe Kennedy II “really had what it takes” when he was a congressman.
“He could have gone all the way to the presidency until the scandal about (his brother) Michael,” Taraborrelli said.
Even though his parents, Rocco and Rose Marie Taraborrelli, are no longer living, the author said he comes home to the area two or three times a year to visit his siblings and assorted nieces and nephews.
“This is where my heart and soul is,” he said. “I have the sign ‘Taraborrelli 846’ that used to hang in front of our house.”