NEW YORK – In 1995, John F.
Kennedy Jr. introduced the world to his new political magazine with the
memorable words, "Ladies and gentlemen, meet George."
Then,
with a smile and a flourish, he unveiled the first issue, featuring Cindy
Crawford in a powdered wig and men's colonial garb (and a taut bare midriff), posing as
the father of our country.
Matt
Berman, who oversaw the sexy Crawford cover shoot, was the magazine's young
creative director. Now, nearly 15 years after Kennedy died in a plane crash at
age 38, Berman is looking back at those heady days and recalling his friend in
a new memoir, JFK Jr., George
& Me (Gallery Books).
Why
now?
"Weirdly,
there are people under 30 who have never heard of George magazine, people I hire and work
with," says Berman, 49. "Some of them, sadly, will ask me, 'Was that
the president's son?' It's crazy."
Berman
writes that he, the "self-conscious, self-deprecating" son of a
restaurant supplier, and JFK Jr., the "confident, charismatic" son of
President Kennedy, made an unlikely team.
But
despite his star power and movie star looks, young Kennedy was a "regular
guy," easy to work with and a supportive boss.
"He
had this maturity about him. He always had an answer to every question,"
Berman says. Kennedy was also fun. "He had a great sense of humor. He used
it to make friends, to manage us at work. If he was upset with something, it
usually was some sort of ribbing or joke. You got the message."
Their
collaboration over five years meant cover shoots with the likes of Robert De
Niro, Drew Barrymore, Demi Moore, Claudia Schiffer and Barbara Walters. Berman
remembers a particularly priceless session in Malibu where he and Kennedy
wrangled Barbra Streisand into posing as flag-stitcher Betsy Ross.
But George's glow had begun to fade
by the time Kennedy was killed; the magazine's mix of politics and pop culture,
Berman believes, was ahead of its time. A little over a year after Kennedy's
death, George folded.
Kennedy's
glamorous wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette, died along with John,
who was piloting the small plane that crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off
Martha's Vineyard on July 16, 1999.
There were rumors of trouble in
the Kennedys' marriage, but Berman says he never saw any evidence they were
unhappy, aside from the normal bickering of any couple.
Carolyn,
he says, was a friend who liked to hang out in his office. When John would come
in to say hello, "it was always very romantic and I'd kind of walk out of
the room," Berman recalls with a laugh. Carolyn's icy image was unfair, he
says, assumed by a public that saw her unsmiling in photos because she was
uncomfortable in such a public role.
"She
was a really caring, funny person," he says, "really entertaining,
high energy, always with a big, big smile."
The
deaths of John and his wife, Berman says, were "devastating," and it
was difficult to relive that time in his book. "It threw a lot of us off
course for a really long time. It was a huge, huge, healing process."
Berman
left George and for several years worked in
Paris. He's now a creative director for advertising in Los Angeles.
His
friend John would now be 53. Does Berman think Kennedy would have followed in
his father's footsteps?
"I
always saw John as someone who really lived in the moment," Berman says.
"Everybody always thought he'd go into politics, but it was never a real
plan. I would hope he would have done that by now if he were living, because
the person I knew would be someone that everybody would love to know. He could
have done a lot of good for a lot of people."
Click here
for the original article in USA Today.