It was shocking news to read that Rob Reiner and his wife Michele Singer were found murdered in their Brentwood home.
I remember the many times I interviewed this great movie director, humanitarian and political activist in my career as an entertainment journalist and the articles I wrote about his work.
In 1989, I wrote an interview with Rob Reiner for CIAK, the Italian Film monthly, about When Harry Met Sally.
In 1990, I wrote for CIAK interviews with Rob Reiner and James Caan about Misery.
For VENICE, Los Angeles Arts and Entertainment Magazine, I wrote an interview with Rob Reiner about Misery.
Also for VENICE in 1992, I wrote interviews with Tom Cruise and Rob Reiner about A Few Good Men.
In 2018, I wrote an obit of Penny Marshall for the Golden Globes website, where I mentioned: In 1971 Marshall married fellow comedy-actor-turned-director Rob Reiner, who adopted her daughter Tracy. They divorced in 1981. Reiner said: “I loved Penny, she was born with a great gift, a funny bone and the instinct of how to use it. I was very lucky to have lived with her.”
I wrote the 9 times Golden Globe nominee bio for Rob Reiner
I also interviewed Rob Reiner in 1995 about The American President, in 1996 about Ghosts of Mississippi, in 1999 about Alex and Emma, in 2017 about The Bucket List, in 2017 about LBJ, in 2018 about Shock and Awe.
As we take time to mourn and feel a deep sadness sink into our hearts, we quote what Rob Reiner said during an exclusive 2018 interview with the journalists of the Hollywood Foreign Press about Shock and Awe, that could apply to 2025, so we can find some hope for the future of American democracy.
When asked if Donald Trump was aiming to be a dictator, he replied:
“He already is. He basically is turning his back on the rule of law. Today (July 6) we read that Government agencies are only allowed to watch Fox News. You could laugh about it, but what’s happening is not a joke anymore. So yes, he wants to be a dictator, he would like nothing better than to be Vladimir Putin, he’s got ‘Putin Envy.’ He wants to be someone who can run the country and have everything come through him, so he gets his taste of any business transaction that goes through. I believe he’s going to fail, I believe in the goodness of the American people and that our institutions will hold, but right now the Press is struggling, the rule of law is under attack and there’s no checks and balances anymore, which is what was designed in the Constitution when it was first written. So we will see how far he can take it. There’s a new Supreme Court nominee (Brett Kavanaugh) that’s going to be put forward on Monday, and will tip the court to a conservative court. This President right now is under investigation for money laundering, for obstruction of justice and for conspiring with a foreign enemy to undermine democracy. That Justice may be hearing these three things, can a sitting President be indicted, be compelled to testify or pardon himself? And this new Justice is going to be a part of that new determination, which is really scary. And you know that Trump is going to ask for a Pledge of Loyalty.”
As the whether the Democrats would be able to regain a majority in Congress, he said:
“The question is, are our institutions strong enough to hold? I would like to believe that they will, but I don’t know, because if the democrats are not able to win back the house, then you won’t have any oversight of this President for another two years going up to the election, and that is enough to really destroy us. But that’s very difficult because they are now facing gerrymandering, voter suppression and also this disinformation campaign that is coming from Trump and from the Russians. So you can’t just win, you have to win by a lot to overcome all that, because even though we won by three million votes this last election, we lost. And the Republicans don’t know about how to govern, but they know how to win, and they will do anything to win, they will break all the rules. Mitch McConnell won’t let a guy be questioned for a Supreme Court confirmation, and now he is going to try to shove somebody right through. In November we have to win the House back, and if we do, then at least there will be some investigations of what is going on.”
As to what can be done to elect a Democratic majority in the House, he stated:
“The main thing we can do right now, because America is the oldest democracy on the planet and it is the one shining light that people look to, is to do the political calculation. We have to look at the most up for grabs congressional districts, the Democrats need 24, if they can flip 24 seats, then they are controlling all of the committees and the judiciary, the intelligence community, they could have hearings and subpoena power, actually compel people to testify in public. We don’t know anything that is going on in the Russia investigation, nobody does except Robert Mueller. If you want to help, you can look at the map and see what districts are in play and say: I am going to register people to vote and get them to the polls to flip 24 seats. We are so divided now that there is almost no hope of reaching those people on the other side. So you want to keep your side as energized as possible, because it’s all about turnout and getting people to the polls. Usually on the midterm, you don’t see the national voice emerge, that is during the Presidential elections, but this midterm is the most important that I have ever seen, because democracy is on the ballot.”
About the electoral collage, Reiner said:
“It’s ridiculous. The electoral college initially was designed to give smaller states more power in electing a President, and it has done the exact opposite, because what has happened is that candidates won’t bother to go everywhere, they only campaign in 17 swing states. But if you thought it was one person, one vote, you would want to spend a lot of time in California to mine as many of the 40 million votes in the state that you can. Right now there are efforts in play to try to get rid of the electoral college, but in order to do that, enough legislatures of enough states, equaling 270 electoral votes, have to vote to get rid of the electoral college. And they are at 172, so they need 98 more votes from enough states to undo the electoral college, which is a long shot. But we have lost now two times with winning the popular vote, we won in 2000, Al Gore beating Bush by about 600,000 votes and in 2016 Hillary beating Trump by almost three million votes. So it doesn’t make any sense, it should be one person, one vote.”