The previous few weeks had been especially difficult for the couple. Carolyn had become more withdrawn and more dependent on drugs. “I went over to their house two weeks before he died to watch a basketball game, and it was weird,” recalled a friend. “She was definitely doing a lot of coke, and I think she was involved with her coke dealer who lived across the street. She was out of control.” Friends had been telling John that they thought Carolyn was having an affair. At this point, he did not know what to believe. Now she seemed to be taunting him by not attending the wedding. “I’m not going to go to the wedding, how’s that?” she said to him. “I am going to make a big scene, and I am not going to go to the wedding, and then you are going to have to explain it, and you are going to come home and feel really bad that I wasn’t there.”
John probably saw Carolyn’s threat as the last straw. He knew that her absence, and not the wedding of his cousin, would dominate the headlines as a result. If Carolyn was so insensitive that she would embarrass him in front of his entire family, there seemed little left to salvage in their relationship. “If she’s done, I’m done,” he told a friend, who wished to remain anonymous. They agreed that John should move into the Stanhope Hotel on Fifth Avenue. It would not be his first stay there, though. He had spent many nights at the hotel in the past and often retreated there following similar fights with Carolyn.
This time was different. John told friends that he was not going back to Carolyn and would instead continue to live at the Stanhope for the foreseeable future. It was a painful decision, but a necessary one, he thought. He knew that the tabloids would eventually discover that he and Carolyn were living apart, which would only intensify public scrutiny of their private lives. He still wanted to make the marriage work, but he needed to send Carolyn a clear signal that the status quo was not acceptable. For now, he planned to make it through the weekend without becoming an unwanted distraction before Rory’s wedding.
After lunch, John returned to his office and called Caroline, who was leaving for Idaho the next day on a rafting trip to celebrate her and Ed’s thirteenth wedding anniversary and Ed’s fifty-fourth birthday. He told his sister that Carolyn was not going to be attending the wedding that weekend and that his marriage was imploding. He wanted her to know before the story flooded the tabloids. He apologized for being distant and suggested that they both make more of an effort to spend time together. Caroline responded graciously and compassionately. She invited John over, but he said that they could talk more after the wedding. For that brief moment, they recaptured the genuine affection that had animated most of their lives. It was the last time they would speak.
John stayed in the office reading copy, chatting with editors, and making phone calls until eight at night. He left the office and headed to the Stanhope, where he checked into room 1511. He told the receptionist that he was staying at the hotel because “my wife kicked me out.” John always got special service wherever he traveled, and the Stanhope was no different. Less than an hour after he arrived, a waiter showed up with his favorite turkey club sandwich and a bottle of mineral water. He also received a visit that evening from Julie Baker, a former model whom he had dated before marrying Carolyn.
Unlike with his other girlfriends who faded out of his life, John remained close to Baker long after their romantic relationship ended. Their relationship now rested on mutual trust and respect. “John and I had an easy, uncomplicated friendship,” Baker reflected in 2019. “We had a very special bond that throughout the years became stronger and stronger. I believe we knew we would always be there for each other.” Their close friendship was no secret to Carolyn, who was completely comfortable with the arrangement. “John and Julie remained friends and were in touch about once a month,” recalled RoseMarie. “Their friendship was completely transparent, and Carolyn even invited Julie to one of John’s birthday celebrations at their apartment.”
During these difficult final months of his life, John reached out to Baker for comfort and conversation. They talked about many of the topics that close friends discuss. John would mention a book that he was reading or say something about the George issue they were working on at the time. They were close enough that they could also sit in silence for long periods of time. But Julie was one of the few people whom John would open up to and discuss his personal issues with. A few weeks earlier, John had come over to her apartment, where the two “hung out.” Now, on his first night alone at the hotel, he asked her to join him.
Baker remembers John as being “conflicted” in those final days. Conflicted about George and what should be his next steps. He did not want to abandon the magazine, but he was not sure if he could attract other investors. Most of all, he was conflicted about his marriage. He had heard from many of his friends that Carolyn was abusing cocaine. But she denied it. The biggest issue was whether he should stay with her or leave. John felt that Carolyn had stopped working on the marriage a long time ago. Why, then, should he work so hard to keep the marriage going? “I cannot begin to know what would have happened on all fronts of his inner turmoil,” Julie told me. “But I know he wouldn’t just lie down and sulk about things. He would have taken thoughtful steps” and made the best choices possible.
Julie remembers John speaking openly of his fear of being alone. It was understandable, given the circumstances. He had come to terms with the prospect of losing his lifelong best friend at any moment. Anthony was the brother that John never had. He also had to contend with his marriage ending. The loss of those two people—one was certain, the other likely—would have left a huge hole in John’s life. But he would have recovered. “John was the most resilient person I ever met in my life,” RoseMarie reflected. John had lots of close friends who would have been happy to help to fill the void, but it is extremely hard to replace your best friend and your spouse all at once.
On Thursday morning, July 15, John returned to Lenox Hill Hospital, where his surgeon removed the cast that had been molded to his ankle for the previous six weeks and gave him the go-ahead to fly. According to a reliable source, Carolyn accompanied him, and the two were very affectionate, kissing passionately while seated in a small reception area. The scene revealed the volatility of their relationship. They could be fighting one minute and then unable to keep their hands off each other the next. Carolyn was no doubt relieved that they had survived the past six weeks with her husband immobile. John emerged from the hospital on crutches and went straight to the George offices on Broadway in midtown Manhattan. He had an important meeting later that afternoon with his new boss at Hachette, Jack Kliger.
In May, David Pecker had left Hachette and purchased American Media Company, which owned the National Enquirer and other tabloids—the very ones that bought pictures from the same paparazzi who tortured Carolyn. Hachette replaced him with Kliger, a low-key numbers guy who lacked Pecker’s dramatic flair and had no emotional attachment to George. When he took over as CEO, the French told Kliger that one of the early questions he would face was what to do with George. He was informed that the magazine was losing money and that Hachette did not see a viable way forward for the partnership. Hachette’s priority was protecting Elle and figuring out how to make the company operate more efficiently. They asked him to look further into the issue and make a recommendation on how to proceed. “It was the first big issue that I faced,” he recalled.
Kliger met often with John over the next few weeks and told him that the current business plan was not working. “My point to John in the beginning was we have to either figure out if the business model can be redone, or, if not, what’s a graceful way for us to part,” he shared in 2017. He made clear to John, however, that parting ways did not mean shuttering the magazine. If they chose to end their association, Hachette would stick with him for a reasonable amount of time until John could find another partner.
John took Kliger’s recommendations to heart and submitted a revised business proposal in June. “I thought it w
as a viable plan,” Kliger admitted. It called for cutting the number of pages in the magazine, producing fewer copies, and raising the newsstand price. However, Kliger never presented John’s modified business plan to the French executives because he still concluded that the partnership could not be rescued. There was not, he recalled, “much faith at Hachette in George.” Hachette, he pointed out, was a “bottom-line-driven company that didn’t really have as big a franchise in either news or lifestyle.” While John was picking up hints that Hachette was going to pull out of their partnership, he retained a glimmer of hope.
Kliger extinguished that glimmer on Thursday, July 15. The two men had a meeting scheduled for two in the afternoon, but John kept pushing it back. He finally showed up at four o’clock. “Jack, I am very sorry,” John apologized. “I wish we could come to a final decision on the plan.” Kliger broke it to him that Hachette did not want to continue as partners but that it would stay with George until he was able to find another buyer. John made it clear that he did not want Hachette to help in the search and that he would do it himself.
Afterward, John went downstairs to his office with a big grin on his face. “So, Jack told me they’re not going forward with George,” he told Rose. She was stunned, not so much by the news as by the image of John’s gleaming smile while he shared it with her. John said he figured it out even before Kliger opened his mouth. “You know how I knew?” he asked. “When I went into his office, I put my water bottle on his desk. And he was so nervous, he picked up my bottle of water and started drinking from it.” Later that evening, John recounted a similar story to his close friend and former George editor and legal counsel Gary Ginsberg. “I knew I was fucked,” he said, “because I met with Kliger today, and I brought a bottle of water, and I put it on the table between us. Kliger was so nervous that he took my bottle of water and started drinking it. That was when I realized, this guy’s so nervous because he knows he’s going to cut the cord on me.”
That evening, John attended a Yankees game with Ginsberg, who introduced John to James and Lachlan Murdoch, the children of News Corporation CEO Rupert Murdoch. Gary, a senior executive at News Corp, organized the meeting in the hopes that the Murdoch family would want to partner with John. As they watched the Atlanta Braves rock Yankees starter Roger Clemens, a television crew spotted John and flashed his face to New Yorkers following the game at home. The evening went well, but they left the game without securing a commitment.
George was not the only topic of conversation that evening. In the long car ride to and from the stadium, Gary talked with John about his political ambitions. John mentioned that he was eyeing the New York governor’s race in 2002. “That’s the race,” John told Gary. He had stopped brooding over the Senate seat that Hillary Clinton had moved to claim. “I’m intellectually and temperamentally better suited to be an executive than a legislator,” he said. “My dad didn’t like it, either,” he revealed, referring to his father’s time in the House and the Senate. John felt he could beat incumbent George Pataki, a bland moderate Republican who was seeking a third term. John realized that he had to get his house in order before he could make the move. He worried whether Carolyn would ever be emotionally capable of dealing with him running for office. And then there was George, which was hanging like a dark shadow over his future ambitions. “He was looking for a graceful way out of George,” Ginsberg recalled.
Even on the last night of his life, John felt trapped between two worlds. He had finally come to acknowledge his political ambitions and embrace his role as the heir to his father’s legacy, but before he could seek office, he needed to come to terms with a troubled marriage and a failing magazine.
* * *
—
When John arrived at his office on Friday morning, he told RoseMarie that Carolyn would not be accompanying him to the wedding. Rose decided to stage an intervention. “John,” she said, “I need to have a little chat with your wife in private.” She asked him to leave his office so she could make the important call.
Despite her frustration with both, Rose understood the necessity of Carolyn showing up at the wedding. “I don’t know what the hell you are trying to prove,” RoseMarie declared, “and I don’t know what the hell you are doing, but it’s not working. You are smarter than this; you are better than this. Why are you staying out, and not calling?” Rose told Carolyn that she was acting “like a teenager.” By this point, Carolyn was crying hysterically. “I’m so sick of everything,” she sobbed. Rose told her that whatever her legitimate grievances, she was dealing with them the wrong way. “I don’t know what you are looking for, what kind of attention you are looking for, but you are not getting it, and you are fucking up your life.” In fact, she was only aggravating the situation. “If you are trying to get him to pay attention, he’s not,” Rose said. “He is getting angrier and pulling further away.” By this point, Carolyn was distraught. “I am just so sick of my life. I am exhausted from this, there’s always an event, there’s always something, it’s always about him, it’s always about the magazine. It’s never about me.”
Rose empathized but insisted that this was not the time to take a stand. “His whole family is going to be at this wedding, and you need to go with him.” Carolyn finally backed down. “I just want some normal married time,” she confessed. Rose realized that despite all their fame, John and Carolyn needed what every couple desired: privacy and sufficient time to spend together without distraction. “Listen, Carolyn,” she told her. “You don’t want to put John in a position where he has to explain where you are, and you don’t want to put yourself in a position of being judged. You get enough of that.” Reluctantly, Carolyn agreed to go to the wedding.
Could Carolyn’s decision to attend the wedding have been a possible turning point in their relationship? It certainly marked the first positive development in months and revealed that Carolyn still wanted to improve their marriage. There would have been ample work ahead. Carolyn needed to come to grips with her newfound celebrity and find some cause to occupy her time, while John had to talk less about having children and instead listen to Carolyn’s legitimate concerns. But despite all the obstacles that loomed, Carolyn’s gesture was a meaningful one, and according to RoseMarie, John clearly appreciated it.
The rest of the day proceeded routinely for John. He went to lunch with a group of George editors and attended an afternoon staff meeting. At 4:05 P.M. he sent a message to his old friend John Perry Barlow, who had just buried his mother. John praised him for staying by his mother’s side while she died. “I will never forget when it happened to me,” John wrote, “and it was not something that was all that macabre.” Meanwhile, now that she was going to the wedding, Carolyn needed a new dress and spent most of the afternoon shopping in midtown Manhattan. Late in the afternoon, she went to Saks Fifth Avenue, where she found a short, black dress by Yves Saint Laurent that cost $1,640.
John left the office immediately after sending the email to Barlow and went to visit his old friend from Brown, Pat Manocchia, who now owned the exclusive fitness center La Palestra. As he headed toward the door, Rose reminded him that he had to meet Lauren Bessette in the lobby at six thirty. She then asked him if he was okay with her leaving at five thirty that evening. “Sure, Rosie, no problem. I’ll call you later.” He took a few steps before turning and looking at Rose. “Rosie, you’re the best. Thanks for smoothing things over.” Before she left for the day, Rose put a pink sticky note on the table in his office: “Meet Lauren in the lobby at six thirty.” Rose knew it never hurt to remind John twice. She was planning to spend the weekend at John and Carolyn’s apartment. The forecast was for hot, muggy nights, and Rose’s air-conditioning was broken, so John and Carolyn had offered her their place for the weekend.
John took a car to Pat’s Upper West Side gym. “We trained a lot that last couple weeks because of his injury,” Pat recalled. “On that last day, we did some soft tissue work to try to get so
me range of motion back.” Pat described John as “despondent.” He was happy to have the cast off, but he was not sure what he was going to do about George. “He was demoralized by his meeting with Hachette,” he recalled. “He wasn’t sure whether the magazine could survive or if he wanted to continue with the magazine even if it did.” Pat declined to say what, if anything, John said about his marriage.
John returned to the office just in time to meet Lauren. He first went to his office and checked the weather conditions for Martha’s Vineyard and the surrounding area. The official report gave little evidence of the trouble that lay ahead, indicating clear skies and visibility at between four and ten miles along his route. The forecast was crucial since he was flying under visual flight rules, or VFR, which meant that he was navigating on his own rather than relying on instruments. At the time of his flight, John was enrolled in an instrument training course and had completed half of the twenty-five lessons.
Reassured by the forecast, John grabbed his bag and descended to the lobby. At a quarter to seven he and Lauren hopped into his white Hyundai convertible for the short trip to Essex County Airport in Fairfield, New Jersey. As they crawled through Times Square, people spotted John and waved. Normally it would have taken about forty minutes, but on a July weekend, it took seventy-five minutes.
They arrived at the airport shortly after eight and pulled into a Sunoco gas station across the street. The owner of the station thought it was too late for John to be flying. “He usually showed up between five and seven,” he told Time magazine. But John showed no signs of being in a hurry. Wearing a light gray T-shirt, he made small talk with the cashier and bought a banana, a bottle of Evian, and six AA batteries. The attendant asked John how his leg felt. “I just got the cast off yesterday,” John responded, “but it’s feeling better.” On his way out, he scanned the magazine rack near the front door, perhaps looking for a copy of George. He then climbed into his car and drove across the street to the airport.
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