Rob Reiner, the Jewish-American director, actor, writer behind some of the most iconic comedies in history – among them When Harry Met Sally, This is Spinal Tap, and The Princess Bride – as well as many outstanding dramas, including A Few Good Men and Stand By Me, was found murdered with his wife, Michele Singer, in their home in Los Angeles on December 14. He was 78. According to reports, his son Nick Reiner is a suspect in the case.
But the tragedy of his death wasn’t the kind of ending he would have given one of his movies.
His films tended to be about quirky, flawed people who overcame obstacles to find love or to prove themselves. They were touching and memorable, and like the best characters he created and played, his life had an interesting arc.
He was the son of one of the greatest comedy writers, Carl Reiner, who was best known for the beloved television series, The Dick Van Dyke Show. In the kind of comedies created by Carl Reiner, who died in 2020, you laughed with the endearing characters as much as at them, and this was a gift Rob Reiner inherited.
Reiner has said that his household growing up was secular, but he did have a bar mitzvah.
Creator of a genre
More important to his work, perhaps, was that through his father and the Jewish comics who were Carl Reiner’s friends and collaborators, among them Mel Brooks and Sid Caesar, he absorbed the American-Jewish comic ethos of self-deprecating, often pessimistic humor growing up. Like the greatest American-Jewish funnymen, he used humor to make light of situations that could have been dark and depressing.
Rob Reiner started out as an actor and had small roles in some of his father’s early films, Enter Laughing and Where’s Poppa?. He paid his dues as an actor, taking bit parts in television shows such as The Partridge Family, before he got his breakout role in Norman Lear’s groundbreaking sitcom about a working-class family, All in the Family.
The character he played in All in the Family was hard-hat Archie Bunker’s staunchly, sometimes cluelessly liberal live-in son-in-law. His character’s name was Michael but he is best remembered by his father-in-law’s put-down nickname for him, Meathead.
Reiner took a thankless, forgettable role and turned it into comedy gold, matching the quick rhythm of Carol O’Connor, who played Archie. Reiner won two Emmy awards for Best Supporting Actor for the part.
The series had a good run, and following its end Reiner moved into directing. His first major film as a director created a new category of movie, the “mockumentary.” This is Spinal Tap (1984), which followed the exploits of the fictional group Spinal Tap, “England’s loudest band,” and spoofed spoiled, crazed rock stars, as well as the earnest critics who lionized them. He had a small but key role as Marty DiBergi, the fast-talking director of the film within the film, clearly based on Martin Scorsese in The Last Waltz.
The film instantly became a cult classic, and spawned several sequels, including one that Reiner also directed and which was just released, Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, which was released this year. His final film as director was the completed but unreleased Spinal Tap at Stonehenge: The Final Finale, which brought the band’s regulars, including Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, and Michael McKean, back together, along with rock legends such as Eric Clapton.
FOLLOWING THE original Spinal Tap film, he made some of the best films of the 1980s and 1990s. He collaborated with his friend, journalist Nora Ephron, who wrote the screenplay for his 1989 film, When Harry Met Sally…, which starred Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan as friends who become lovers, and is considered the best rom-com of all time by many. It featured the famous deli scene, in which Ryan fakes an orgasm at Katz’s Deli, followed by an older woman at the next table telling a waiter, “I’ll have what she’s having.” The bit with the older woman was added to the script by Crystal, and Reiner cast his mother, Estelle Reiner, as the envious bystander.
Another iconic film Reiner directed, The Princess Bride (1987), was an adaptation of a quirky fairy-tale novel written by William Goldman. It features a framing device of a wisecracking grandfather (Peter Falk), reading a book to his sick grandson (Fred Savage), who asks for a story with no kissing and gets a wacky tale of screaming eels, a kidnapped princess, and all kinds of magic and wonder. The film starred Robin Wright, Crystal, Wallace Shawn, Mandy Patinkin, Carol Kane, and many great character actors, and is still a great favorite with audiences of all ages.
When Reiner turned to drama, he was just as successful. His adaptation of Aaron Sorkin’s play, A Few Good Men, featured Tom Cruise as a cocky young military lawyer and Jack Nicholson as a high-ranking military official concealing a crime. The two had one of the most memorable dramatic scenes, with Nicholson’s character yelling at the lawyer, “You can’t handle the truth!”
Reiner adapted Stephen King’s novel, Stand by Me, into a beloved coming-of-age drama that was recently referenced in the Netflix series, Stranger Things.
Kathy Bates won a Best Actress Oscar for Reiner’s 1990 film, Misery, an adaptation by William Goldman of Stephen King’s book about a crazed superfan who kidnaps and tortures a romance novelist (James Caan), when he kills off her favorite heroine.
He consistently worked with the best screenwriters and worked with Sorkin again on The American President, a 1995 dramedy about a single president (Michael Douglas) who falls in love with a lobbyist (Annette Bening).
Other notable movies he made included The Bucket List (2007), starring Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson; Rumor Has It… (2005), about a woman (Jennifer Aniston) who learns that her family was the basis for the film The Graduate, which also starred Kevin Costner; and LBJ (2016) a biopic of president Lyndon B. Johnson starring Woody Harrelson.
Ghosts of Mississippi (1996) told a story of racial injustice that reflected his passionate political commitment. It starred Whoopi Goldberg, Alec Baldwin, and James Woods, about a district attorney investigating civil-rights leader Medgar Evans’ murder.
Reiner was working at a slower pace in recent years but still acted and directed. One of his most recent roles was as an aspirational business advisor in The Bear earlier this year and he was a scene-stealing delight.
Like his famous All in the Family character, he was never silent about politics and spoke out for liberal causes. He was particularly critical of President Donald Trump and the policies of his administration.
Reiner married actress/director Penny Marshall in 1971 and adopted her daughter from a previous marriage. The couple divorced. He met Michele Singer while she was working as a photographer on When Harry Met Sally… He credited Singer and his love for her with his decision to make the ending of that film more optimistic. He and Singer had three children.
Perhaps the best way to honor his talent and his life following his tragic death would be to watch, or rewatch, some of his great movies, which are widely available on streaming services and very popular.
Tributes began pouring in after the news of Reiner’s death was announced.
Former president Barack Obama wrote, “Together, he and his wife lived lives defined by purpose. They will be remembered for the values they championed and the countless people they inspired.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom and his wife Jennifer Seibel Newsom said in a statement, “That empathy extended well beyond his films. Rob was a passionate advocate for children and for civil rights – from taking on Big Tobacco to fighting for marriage equality to serving as a powerful voice in early education. He made California a better place through his good works.” Actor Josh Gad said, “Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle were two of the most kind and caring souls you could ever imagine. He cared so much for those who had no voices.”