HOLLYWOOD is in shock after the tragic slaying of legendary director Rob Reiner and his wife Michele Singer.
The 78-year-old film maker, best known for the beloved movies When Harry Met Sally, Spinal Tap and Stand By Me, was found stabbed to death alongside Michele, 68, on Sunday afternoon at their home in Los Angeles.
The devoted couple’s story is intrinsically linked to the 1989 hit romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally starring Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan.
While preparing to make the movie, divorcee Rob was told by a friend that he knew that woman he’d marry – Michele Singer.
A few weeks later when the pair met for the first time, he instantly fell for her and seven months later they wed.
Thankfully, Michele had not been put off by Rob’s admission that the character Harry, who wants to get up and leave women as soon as he’s slept with them, was based on himself.
It has been reported online that the couple’s second son Nick, who has struggled with drug addiction, is being questioned by detectives in connection with the deaths.
Last night tributes flooded in for Rob, whose other movies include A Few Good Men, The Princess Bride and Misery.
Former US president Barack Obama wrote: “Rob’s achievements in film and television gave us some of our most cherished stories on screen”.
And actor Josh Gad said: “He was one of the greatest directors of our time. He was a friend. He was simply a beautiful person.”
Rob meeting Michele is the reason When Harry Met Sally had a happy ending with the couple getting together.
Last year he revealed: “The original ending of the film that we had was that Harry and Sally didn’t get together, because I’d been single for ten years, and I couldn’t figure out how I was ever going to be with anybody.
“And that gave birth to When Harry Met Sally. And I hadn’t met anybody, so it was going to be the two of them seeing each other after years, talking, and then walking away from each other.”
Rob was born with showbusiness in his veins, because his dad was the comedian, actor and director Carl Reiner and his mum Estelle was an actress and singer.
Emmy winner Carl was best known for creating the Dick Van Dyke Show, while Estelle is probably going to be remembered most for the punchline she delivered in When Harry Met Sally.
She played the diner who says “I’ll have what she’s having” after Meg’s Sally fakes an orgasm.
First marriage
Rob, who was born in New York, started out in theatre before moving onto supporting roles in TV shows such as Batman and The Beverly Hillbillies.
His big break came in an American adaptation of the British Alf Garnett sitcom Till Death to Us Part.
In the US version called All in the Family, Rob took on the role made famous by Cherie Blair’s father Tony Booth of a leftie layabout.
Renamed Michael Stivic for the Americans, the character was a huge hit as was the show which ran for over 200 episodes from 1971 to 1979.
It was during this time that Rob met his first wife Penny Marshall, a Golden Globe winning actress who went on to be a top director, making Big and A League of Their Own.
Rob also adopted Penny’s daughter, Tracy, now 61. Tracy appeared in When Harry Met Sally and Penny passed away aged 75 in 2018.
Their marriage ended after ten years in 1981 and he then had a long relationship with Downton Abbey actress Elizabeth McGovern, 64.
Rob’s switch to directing came with the 1984 all time great comedy Spinal Tap, which he also wrote and starred in.
The film about a hapless British heavy metal band is credited with inventing the mockumentary.
This cult hit was quickly followed by the beautiful coming of age Stand By Me, starring River Phoenix in 1986 and the truly original fantasy comedy The Princess Bride in 1987.
Inspired by divorce
It was When Harry Met Sally, though, that Rob is most associated with.
He was brutally honest at the time of making it that he wanted to expose his own questionable attitudes to women in a movie.
Rob told the screenwriter Nora Ephron about himself, admitting: “The character of Harry is an extension of myself. She pried into our personal lives and made us reveal all kinds of problems, disgusting things about ourselves and then found a way to structure it into a screenplay.
“It was hard. But I wanted to show what it was like for someone to be thrown back into the dating world after a painful divorce.”
Nora thought that Rob should play Harry, but he felt that his friend Billy Crystal should take the role instead.
The central premise of the movie asks whether men and women can ever just be friends.
Harry thinks that men will always want to have sex with women, which shocks Sally.
But Rob did want to settle down again and told his director of photography Barry Sonnenfeld that he really wanted to meet somebody.
Barry told him “There’s a girl in New York named Michele Singer and you’re going to marry her.”
Rob recalled: “So I said, ‘What are you talking about? You’re crazy.’ Then, one day on the set a few weeks later, this woman came out to meet Barry for lunch.
“I asked Barry who she was and he said, ‘It’s Michele.’ Instantly I was attracted to her. And seven months later – can you believe it? – married.”
Family trauma
The couple had three children Jake (born in 1991), Nick (born in 1993), and Romy (born in 1997).
Nick told in 2016 how he was homeless when he had a heroin addiction, going from state to state.
He said: “I spent nights on the street. I spent weeks on the street. It was not fun. If I wanted to do it my way and not go to the programs they were suggesting, then I had to be homeless.”
Rob directed a movie called Being Charlie in 2015, which is loosely based on Nick’s experiences.
It ends with father and son being reunited.
At the moment the police are not commenting on reports that Nick is being questioned about the violent deaths of his parents.
It has been reported that their bodies were found by their daughter Romy and that his close friend Billy Crystal later appeared at the scene.
Rob’s remarkable run of hits did not end with When Harry Met Sally.
It was followed in 1990 by the Stephen King horror Misery, which earned Kathy Bates a best actress Oscar and the 1992 Tom Cruise hit a Few Good Men, which was nominated for a Best Picture Oscar.
Rob’s final movie was this year’s sequel to his first one – Spinal Tap II: The End Continues, which attracted cameos from Sir Elton John and Sir Paul McCartney.
Those who knew Rob are struggling to come to terms with this unimaginable end to the life of a true movie giant.
Ben Stiller wrote: “What a huge loss. Rob Reiner was one of my favorite directors. A kind caring person who was really really funny and John Cusack said: “Shocked by the death of Rob Reiner – a great man.”
