Times are hard over at Netflix.
“Stranger Things,” their tentpole property for nine years, has given its three-month notice. The series is calling it quits on Dec. 31.
“Squid Game” Season 2 was a big floptopus.
And all that seems to hit now are quick one-off British limited series like “Adolescence” and “Baby Reindeer.”
So, just like rudderless Democrats have done for decades, the streaming service is turning in desperation to the Kennedy family.
Netflix is hard at work on a new, multi-year historical drama called “Kennedy,” which reports say they hope will fill the juicy dynastic void left by “The Crown.”
Sorry, the sordid lives of Joseph, Jack, Bobby and Ted are a far cry from the fascinating and regal world of the Windsors. Everybody is tired of them.
When the British palace intrigue show began nine years ago, viewers were, as ever, ravenous for royal family content.
Lucky them. They got an opulent, gorgeously acted, superbly written, imagined peek into lives of the planet’s most famous people.
Now in 2025, who in their right mind wants to devote several years to the tawdry grime of the Kennedys? And spend $18 to $25 for the privilege?
It’ll be episode after episode of gussied up sleaze, adultery, wrongdoing, reverberating national tragedies and pillbox hats.
The magic, mystique and grandeur of Buckingham Palace replaced by the repugnant horndogs of Hyannis Port.
“The Crown,” of course, had its share of devastating deaths and extramarital affairs. The final season, especially, leaned tacky and exploitative; nothing like the sophisticated history lessons of its early years.
But, remember, “The Crown” consistently had an extremely likable, respectable, admirable, duty-bound main character in the Queen — be she played by Claire Foy, Olivia Colman or Imelda Staunton.
The late monarch stoically watched society change around her as she grasped onto decorum and tradition, lifting up her country and commonwealth with steadiness during times of uncertainty and tumult.
Who, pray tell, is going to be the unshakable moral center of “Kennedy”?
Which womanizer, criminal or entitled nepo baby will they choose?
The first season is said to mostly revolve around founding patriarch Joseph P. Kennedy, who will be played by Michael Fassbender. He was a ruthless bully who cheated on his wife Rose with Gloria Swanson and Marlene Dietrich, and had his daughter Rosemary lobotomized. That’s taking capturing hearts and minds to a dangerous extreme.
Really, every episode can surely be neatly summed up as “Apple falls awfully close to tree.”
Now, you might be thinking that all this stitched-together scandal and famous names sound like the makings of a meaty soap opera; a store-brand Ryan Murphy show like “Feud.”
Murphy, actually, has his own Kennedy program on the way: “American Love Story,” about JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy.
But this clan is so obvious and worn out. The Kennedys are way too overexposed and over-explored. John F. Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy’s assassinations, JFK Jr.’s death in a plane crash, Ted Kennedy’s deplorable Chappaquiddick mess and JFK’s affairs with Marilyn Monroe and a harem of other women are the subjects of a whole cottage industry of books, documentaries, movies and TV shows.
Kennedys are still everywhere you look. One dated Taylor Swift. RFK Jr. is in the White House. And this Jack Schlossberg kid, who publications so glowingly profiled after taking a single glance at his photo, has turned out to be a nutjob.
It’s too much. I don’t want Camelot, or even Camelittle. Give it a rest.
