WEddiNg?

PIANNINg

from that event, he came to identify
with anybody else who was hurt or
wounded or grieving in any way. It
began to open him up, not just to
blacks and to the handicapped, but to
anyone who was victimized."
And while Kennedy came to care
for all the disenfranchised, the poor
and minorities, Newfield says
Kennedy had a special place in his
heart for Jews and Israel — an irony
since Bobby's father, Joseph Sr., used
to sit at the dining
room table and
make anti-Semitic
remarks.
"I talked to him a
lot about that —
because my Jewish
identity is very
strong," Newfield
says. "He acknowl-
edged that his
father would make
disparaging
remarks about
Jews. He also spoke
about an openly
anti-Semitic cardi-
nal from Boston
with whom his
father was close.
"But Bobby cov-
ered the founding
of Israel for one of
the Boston papers.
He was there for
three months in
Robert E Kennedy: Writer Jack Newfield was with Bobby
Kennedy
on
the
night
he
was
assassi-
1948, and that
\---A Memoir that
nated exactly 30 years ago. "It was the
made a tremendous
worst night of my life, " he says.
impression on him.
"It was the
By the time I met
worst night of my
him, most of his staff was Jewish.
life," Newfield maintains.
Bobby over time went out of his way
On Sunday, June 7, from 8-11
to surround himself with Jews.
p.m., the Discovery Channel will air a
"In fact, convicted assassin Sirhan
three-hour documentary commemo-
Sirhan's
diaries suggest he decided to
rating Kennedy's life. Also called
kill Kennedy when Sirhan saw him on
Robert E Kennedy: A Memoir and writ-
television wearing a yarmulke and mak-
ten and produced by Newfield, the
ing a speech supporting the sale of
program is a tribute to Kennedy that
fighter planes to Israel."
includes some warts — after all, he
One of Kennedy's major attributes
was at one point a counsel to Joe
was his curiosity and his ability to lis-
McCarthy — but is always loving in
ten, says Newfield. "He was very inter-
its tone.
ested in me and my life because I had
"I wanted everyone born after 1968
grown
up in Bedford-Stuyvesant," one
to know what it was like, to know
of the few Jews in a neighborhood
what politicians could be like,"
that was at that time already three-
\ Newfield says.
quarters black.
The road from ruthless rich kid to
•
Newfield, 60, went to Hebrew
champion for the poor and victimized
school and was bar mitzvahed. His
is what the documentary — narrated
father died when he was just 4 years
by Glenn Close, Mario Cuomo and
old, and his mother went out to work
Ving Rhames — is about.
as a sales clerk at a department store.
The assassination of Jack Kennedy
But he admits he didn't have much
was the defining moment in Bobby's
of a Jewish identity until the early
life, says Newfield. "He hurt so much

the national political scene. He wasn't
interested.
He was, however, fascinated by
Kennedy, whom he saw as a
person/politician in a state of flux —
on a journey from a wealthy, conserv-
ative, anti-Semitic upbringing to
becoming a liberal spokesman for the
poor and under-represented in soci-
fty.
"I began to hang around with him
more and more, and that's how I got
to know him,"
Newfield recalls.
"By 1968 we were
friends."
When Kennedy
threw his hat into
• the presidential
/- ring that year,
Newfield decided
to follow him
throughout the
campaign and
write a book after
the election. Of
course, that wasn't
to be.
He was with
/— Kennedy on June
5, 1968, the night
the senator was
murdered follow-
ing his California
primary victory,
and began to write
what became

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