RFK 40 years later: John Frankenheimer's Kennedy TV spot

In the mid-1960s, John Frankenheimer(The Manchurian Candidate) was arguably the hottest director in Hollywood, and prior to that, was the boy wonder of live television during the 1950s, and early '60s. JFK aide Pierre Saligner had approached Frankenhimer about being in charge of JFK's publicity during the 1960 campaign. The director had to turn him down, due to his busy schedule, a choice he later regretted.




When Salinger again approached Frankenheimer in 1968 about filling the same role for younger brother Robert Kennedy and his fledgling run for the presidency, Frankenheimer eagerly accepted. RFK and John Frankenheimer became close friends, and it was Frankenheimer who drove Kennedy to the Ambassador Hotel on June 5, 1968, the night he was fatally wounded by an assassin's bullet.

Here is just one of the television spots that Frankenheimer shot for Kennedy during the '68 campagin, where he speaks to a group of grade schoolers. Listen to Kennedy's prescient words about the environment, and other issues. Its cinema-verite style, which was a Frankenheimer signature, heightens its fly-on-the-wall realism, bringing to light what might have been, had fate not stepped in Robert F. Kennedy's path 40 years ago.