Who Were Real Life the Swans Who Conspired to Destroy Truman Capote?

Lee Radziwill

The least developed of the show's four main female characters is Lee Radziwill (Calista Flockhart), and yet it's Radziwill who delivers the line – in memory of Babe Paley – "She was the one who made this whole thing work.... She made us show up." The observation is more than a memorial to Babe; it's an incisive comment that anticipates how, without Babe, the swans are destined to drift apart. It's also Radziwill who, once things have passed a point of sense, decency, or good taste, presses Slim to ease up on her punitive stance against Capote... and it's Radziwill who (no spoilers!) calls Slim out on her own shocking behavior.

Sister to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Lee Radziwill was born into New York society on March 3, 1933, as Caroline Lee Bouvier. She had a short-lived career as a stage actor, but her real contribution to entertainment was inadvertent: She commissioned a documentary on her famous family that eventually led to a movie focused on two relatives, Aunt Edit Ewing Bouvier Beale and cousin Edith Bouvier Beale, better known as Big Edie and Little Edie... the "stars" of the Maysles Brothers' 1975 documentary "Grey Gardens." Radziwill's second husband was a Polish nobleman, and it was through her marriage to him that she at one time styled herself a princess. After her death in February, 2019, The New York Times recalled that she was "an international socialite and fashion icon who for years was on lists of the world's best-dressed women."

Indeed, even late in life Radziwill was cited as one of the world's best dressed women.

Ann Woodward

Kept in the wings for much or the season yet playing a crucial part in the plot as well as the depiction of Capote's emotional issues, the character Ann Woodward (Demi Moore) is a magnetic, enigmatic, and tragic figure. In the show, Capote poisons society against Woodward by spreading gossip to the effect that she murdered her husband, William Woodward Jr., by shooting him with a rifle and then claiming that she mistook him for a housebreaker; "Answered Prayers" made similar insinuations. In a pair of powerful scenes – one tense with rage, the other a heartbreaking dream sequence – Woodward recalls to Capote that he told her she reminded him of his mother (played by Jessica Lange). Both scenes are revelatory, with Capote retorting in the former that his mother was, like Woodward, a "criminal" and a "rotten mother," and the latter scene communicating the depth of Capote's loss when his mother committed suicide.

Only included as an "honorary swan" in the series (and at one point dismissed by Hollander's Capote as a "peahen"), the historical Ann Woodward started life much more modestly than the other swans. Born to working class parents in Kansas on Dec. 12, 1915 as Evangeline Lucille Crowell, Ann sought a career in show business and became a radio actor. She also worked as a model and showgirl; it was in the latter occupation that she first met Woodward's father, William Woodward Sr., though she ended up marrying the son. As suggested in the show, Woodward was exiled by society after her husband's shooting death – despite the tragedy having been ruled accidental. Perhaps not coincidentally, she had not initially been welcomed by the high-end set in the first place. Woodward died on Oct. 10, 1975, after swallowing cyanide. In the series, Slim blames Ann's suicide squarely on the imminent publication of "La Côte Basque," in Esquire magazine, though it's unclear what role Capote's writings played in her suicide, if any.

Joanne Carson

Relegated almost to bit player status, Joanne Carson, played by Molly Ringwald, is nonetheless listed alongside the other swans on the show's poster and in post-final scene titles detailing the swans' ultimate fates. In the show, Joanne hosts Capote and an abusive boyfriend named Tom O'Shea (Russell Tovey) at her home in California when even C.Z., under pressure from Slim, refuses to include him in a celebration of what Capote declares is his favorite holiday. Later on, Capote nearly drowns in Joanne's pool. It's in Joanne's care that Capote, his body failing after years of drug and alcohol abuse, spends the final days of his life. (Capote died in 1984.)

The second wife of talk show host Johnny Carson, Joanne – née Copeland – was married to Carson for nine years, from 1963 - 1972. Their marriage began early in Carson's decades-long reign on "The Tonight Show"; Joanne herself had a talk show, "Joanne Carson's V.I.P.'s." Capote reportedly had his own "writing room" in Joanne's Los Angeles home. In the show, Joanne is mocked for having an inferior sense of home décor and fashion, but in the end she was closer to the famed write than any of the others: She was buried in a plot next to Capote's grave after her death in 2015 at the age of 83.

Babe Paley and Naomi Watts (who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"

Slim Keith and Diane Lane (who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"

C.Z.Guest and Chloë Sevigny (who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"

Lee Radziwill and Calista Flockhart (who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"

Ann Woodward and Demi Moore who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"

Joanne Carson and Molly Ringwald who plays her) on "Feud: Capote vs. The Swans"