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Lee Radziwill

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In this Slavic name, the surname is Radziwiłł, sometimes transliterated as Radziwill.
Lee Radziwill
Radziwill in 1974
Born
Caroline Lee Bouvier

(1933-03-03)March 3, 1933
New York City, U.S.
DiedFebruary 15, 2019(2019-02-15) (aged 85)
New York City, U.S.
Burial placeMost Holy Trinity Catholic Cemetery
EducationChapin School
Potomac School
Miss Porter's School
Alma materSarah Lawrence College (B.A.)
Occupations
  • Public relations executive
  • Interior decorator
Political partyDemocratic
Spouse
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1953; div. 1958)​
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1959; div. 1974)​
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1988; div. 2001)​
Children
Parents
FamilyBouvier family

Caroline Lee Radziwiłł (/raˈd͡ʑiviw/; née Bouvier; March 3, 1933 – February 15, 2019), also previously known as Lee Canfield and Lee Ross, was an American socialite, public relations executive, and interior designer. She was the younger sister of former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and sister-in-law of President John F. Kennedy.[1]

Early life and ancestry

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Caroline Lee Bouvier was born at Doctors Hospital in Yorkville, Manhattan, New York City, to stockbroker John Vernou Bouvier III and his wife, socialite Janet Norton Lee.[2][3][a] She attended the Chapin School, in New York City, Potomac School in Washington, D.C., Miss Porter's School in Farmington, Connecticut, and pursued undergraduate studies at Sarah Lawrence College.[5] In her birth announcement, and from her earliest years, she was known by her middle name "Lee" rather than "Caroline".

Career and fame

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Considered by "New York's society arbiters and editors" as the city's leading debutante, Radziwill had her "coming out" party in 1950. A full-page photograph of her in her gown was featured in the "debutante" section of Life magazine (page 71) in the December 25, 1950 issue.

During the 1960s, Radziwill attempted a career as an actress. Her acting attempt was unsuccessful, if highly publicized. She featured in the 1967 production of The Philadelphia Story as the spoiled Main Line heiress Tracy Lord. The play was staged at the Ivanhoe Theatre in Chicago, and Radziwill's performance was much criticized. A year later, she appeared in a television adaptation of the 1944 movie Laura, which was also criticized.[6]

A London townhouse and a manor, Turville Grange (which she owned and shared with her second husband), had both been decorated by Italian stage designer Lorenzo Mongiardino and were greatly admired and frequently photographed by Cecil Beaton and Horst P. Horst. She worked briefly as an interior decorator in a style influenced by her association with Mongiardino. Her clientele were wealthy; she once decorated a house "for people who would not be there more than three days a year".[7] She frequented celebrity company, including travelling with The Rolling Stones during their 1972 tour of North America,[8] which she attended alongside the writer Truman Capote.[9]

Radziwill was named to the Vanity Fair International Best Dressed Hall of Fame in 1996.[10][11] Her Paris (Avenue Montaigne 49)[12] and Manhattan (160 East 72nd Street)[13] apartments were featured in the April 2009 issue of Elle Décor magazine. She was interviewed by director Sofia Coppola in February 2013 about her life as part of Radziwill's cover story for T: The New York Times Style Magazine as well as about Coppola's movie The Bling Ring and the loss of privacy.[14][unreliable source?] She was listed as one of the 50 best-dressed people older than age 50 by The Guardian in March 2013.[15]

Family at Grey Gardens

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Radziwill hired documentary filmmakers Albert and David Maysles in 1972 to work on a movie about the Bouvier family. At the outset, the brothers filmed two eccentric and reclusive members of the extended family, Radziwill's aunt and cousin, Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale ("Big Edie") and her daughter Edith Bouvier Beale ("Little Edie"). The Beales lived in a rambling, decaying home in East Hampton, New York, and were funded by other members of the family.[16]

Radziwill's original movie project was suspended, and she retained the footage of the Beales. However the Maysles brothers saw the cinematic potential of the two women and their peculiar lives, and after raising funds for film and equipment of their own, returned and recorded many hours of new footage with Big Edie and Little Edie—the resulting 1975 film Grey Gardens is widely ranked among best of the documentary genre. The film was adapted as a 2006 musical of the same name, where the characters Lee and Jackie Bouvier appear as visiting children in retrospect. HBO produced the 2009 television movie Grey Gardens based on the lives of the Beales.[17]

Surviving footage of Radziwill's 1972 visit to the Beales was included in the 2017 film That Summer.[18][19]

Books

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  • Radziwill, Lee (2001). Happy Times. New York: Assouline. p. 168. ISBN 9781614280545.
  • Radziwill, Lee (2015). Lee. Foreword by Peter Beard, introduction by Richard David Story. New York: Assouline. p. 184. ISBN 9781614284697.

Personal life and death

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Lee Radziwill with President John F. Kennedy and other family on Christmas Day 1962 in Palm Beach, Florida

Radziwill was married three times. Her first marriage, in April 1953, was to Michael Temple Canfield, a publishing executive. They divorced in 1958, and the marriage was declared annulled by the Sacred Rota in November 1962.[20] According to the memoirs of Loelia, Duchess of Westminster, Edward VIII believed that Canfield was actually the biological son of his brother Prince George, Duke of Kent (the fourth son of King George V and uncle of Elizabeth II) and Kiki Preston.

Her second marriage, on March 19, 1959, was to the Polish aristocrat Prince Stanisław Albrecht Radziwiłł, member of the House of Radziwill, who divorced his second wife, the former Grace Maria Kolin (Grace later married William Ward, 3rd Earl of Dudley as his third wife. Dudley's second wife was Viscountess (Frances) Laura Long née Charteris who later married Michael Temple Canfield, Lee's first husband) and received a Roman Catholic annulment of his first marriage to re-marry. (His second marriage had never been acknowledged by the Roman Catholic Church, so no annulment was necessary.)[20] Upon her marriage, she began to use the title of Her Serene Highness Princess Caroline Lee Radziwiłł and was sometimes referred to as Princess Radziwill in the American press.[21][22] However, the Second Polish Republic had abolished the legal recognition of noble titles in the March Constitution of 1921 (article 96),[23] with the effect that the Radziwills were pretenders to the title. They had two children, Anthony (1959–1999) and Anna Christina (b. 1960).[24] Their marriage ended in divorce in 1974.[25]

In 1976, The New York Times reported Peter Francis Tufo, a lawyer and real estate developer, was a "frequent escort" of Radziwill.[26]

On September 23, 1988, Radziwill married for a third time, becoming the second wife of American movie director and choreographer Herbert Ross.[27] Their divorce was finalized during 2001; he died later that year, and she returned to using Radziwill, the transliteration of her children's name, Radziwiłł.

Radziwill died on February 15, 2019, aged 85, in her apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.[28][29][30]

The funeral service was held at St. Thomas More in New York City; among the funeral guests were Caroline Kennedy, Carole Radziwill, Marc Jacobs, Tory Burch, Andre Leon Talley, Sofia Coppola, Carolina Herrera, Peter Beard and Deeda Blair.[citation needed]

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Gilda Radner, performing a Roseanne Roseannadanna skit on Saturday Night Live, notably mused about "Princess Lee" in December 1978.

Radziwill was portrayed by Calista Flockhart in Feud: Capote vs. The Swans (2024).

Notes

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  1. ^ Though some sources say she was born in Southampton, the New York Times of 14 March 1933 reported that "A daughter was born to Mr. and Mrs. John Vernou Bouvier 3d on March 3 at the Doctors Hospital".[4] New York City is likely correct, as she was born in late winter; Southampton is a summer retreat.

References

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  1. ^ Storey, Kate (April 27, 2016). "Princess Lee Radziwill Opens Up About Her Sister Jackie Kennedy and JFK". Harper's Bazaar.
  2. ^ "Janet Lee Auchincloss Morris, 81".
  3. ^ "Lee Radziwill, stylish sister of Jackie Kennedy, dies at 85". AP NEWS. February 17, 2019. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
  4. ^ "Daughter to Mrs. J.V. Bouvier 3d" (PDF), The New York Times, vol. LXXXII, no. 27, 443, New York City, p. 21, March 14, 1933
  5. ^ McFadden, Robert D. (February 16, 2019). "Lee Radziwill, Ex-Princess and Sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Dies at 85". The New York Times. Retrieved February 16, 2019.
  6. ^ Clarke, Gerald. Capote: A Biography (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988), pages 388–89.
  7. ^ New York Magazine, "The Decorating Establishment" February 12, 1979.
  8. ^ Keys, Bobby. Every Night's a Saturday Night (Counterpoint, 2012) page 159
  9. ^ Barna, Dan (February 16, 2019). "Lee Radziwill, American Style Icon and Jackie O's Sister, Dies at 85". W Magazine. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
  10. ^ VF Staff (1996). "World's Best Dressed Women". Vanity Fair: The International Hall of Fame: Women. Archived from the original on July 12, 2013. Retrieved February 15, 2012.
  11. ^ Zilkha, Bettina (2004). Ultimate Style: The Best of the Best Dressed List. Assouline. p. 160. ISBN 2-84323-513-8.
  12. ^ "Lee Radziwill's Paris Apartment - Scene Therapy".
  13. ^ "Lee Radziwill's Upper East Side apartment sells for $4.25M". October 30, 2019.
  14. ^ Radziwell, Lee (June 9, 2013). "In Praise of Privacy". The New York Times Style Magazine. Retrieved June 10, 2013.
  15. ^ Cartner-Morley, Jess (March 28, 2013). "The 50 best-dressed over 50s". The Guardian. London. Retrieved October 31, 2019.
  16. ^ Woodman, Sue (February 9, 2002). "Obituary: Edith Bouvier Beale". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
  17. ^ Rohter, Larry (April 7, 2009). "'Grey Gardens,' Back Story Included, on HBO With Drew Barrymore". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved February 18, 2019.
  18. ^ Weissberg, Jay (March 30, 2018). "Film Review: That Summer". Variety.
  19. ^ "It's All In The Film: Direct Cinema, 'Grey Gardens' and 'That Summer'". The White Review. September 27, 2018. Retrieved February 16, 2024.
  20. ^ a b "Roman Catholics: The Law's Delay". Time. February 28, 1964. Archived from the original on November 2, 2012. Retrieved September 4, 2009.
  21. ^ Halberg, Morgan (August 10, 2017). "Lee Radziwill Is Ready to Part With Her Glamorous Paris Home". The New York Observer. Retrieved April 27, 2021.
  22. ^ Locker, Melissa (July 13, 2017). "The Bouvier Sisters: 12 Things You May Not Know About Jackie Kennedy and Lee Radziwill". Southern Living. Retrieved April 21, 2017.
  23. ^ "Ustawa z dnia 17 marca 1921 r. - Konstytucja Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej".
  24. ^ Haslam, Nicky (February 7, 2013). "The Real Lee Radziwill". The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved November 24, 2020.
  25. ^ "For Princess Lee Radziwill, It's the End of a Marriage". People. July 29, 1974. Archived from the original on February 10, 2011.
  26. ^ "Notes on people: Alexandra Creel married Goelet Museum President". The New York Times. September 11, 1976. p. 12. Retrieved October 12, 2019.
  27. ^ "Lee Bouvier Radziwill Weds Herbert Ross, Film Director". The New York Times. September 24, 1988. Retrieved June 21, 2007.
  28. ^ Codinha, Alessandra (February 16, 2019). "Lee Radziwill Is Dead at 85". Vogue. Condé Nast. Retrieved February 16, 2019.
  29. ^ Rathe, Adam (February 16, 2019). "Lee Radziwill Has Died". Town & Country. Hearst Communications. Retrieved February 28, 2019.
  30. ^ "Lee Radziwill Dies at 85". Yahoo! Finance. Oath, Inc. February 16, 2019. Retrieved February 28, 2019.

Bibliography

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