Two weeks after his death, legendary director Martin Scorsese penned an emotional tribute to actor and filmmaker Rob Reiner.
“Rob Reiner was my friend, and so was Michele,” Scorsese, 83, wrote in an essay for The New York Times. “From now on, I’ll have to use the past tense, and that fills me with such profound sadness. But there’s no other choice.
“Rob and I were both Eastern transplants, in a way,” Scorsese continued. “He and his family had moved to Los Angeles when he was young, but he was born in the Bronx and lived in New Rochelle as a child. Rob came from New York show business royalty. This was 100 percent New York humor, and it was in the air I breathed.”
The Killers of the Flower Moon filmmaker described how close the two were as friends and collaborators. Reiner played the father of Leonardo DiCaprio's character in The Wolf of Wallstreet, Scorsese's 2013 film.
“We had a natural affinity for each other,” the director said. “He was hilarious and sometimes bitingly funny, but he was never the kind of guy who would take over the room. He had a beautiful sense of uninhibited freedom, fully enjoying the life of the moment, and he had a great barreling laugh.
“What happened to Rob and Michele is an obscenity, an abyss in lived reality,” Scorsese concluded. “The only thing that will help me to accept it is the passing of time. So, like all of their loved ones and their friends—and these were people with many, many friends—I have to be allowed to imagine them alive and well … and that one day, I’ll be at a dinner or a party and find myself seated next to Rob, and I’ll hear his laugh and see his beatific face and laugh at his stories and relish his natural comic timing, and feel lucky all over again to have him as a friend.”
Rob and Michele Reiner were found dead in their home on Dec. 14 from “multiple sharp force injuries,” according to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner. Their son, Nick Reiner, was later arrested and charged with two counts of first-degree murder. His bail was set to $4 million.
Nick Reiner is set to be arraigned on Jan. 7.
