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Mandy Patinkin’s friendship with late director Rob Reiner went well beyond their time working together on 1987’s The Princess Bride.
“He was just one of the most generous, kind people I ever knew,” Patinkin, 73, said during a Tuesday, December 23, episode of CBS Mornings. “I was going through a difficult time at one point, and he called Kathryn [Grody], my wife, and myself and Michele [Singer Reiner], and he took us out to dinner, and he didn’t even mention any of the [difficulties]. He didn’t talk about anything. He just wanted us both to know that they were there for us if we needed them.”
Patinkin also remembered a specific moment in between filming scenes for The Princess Bride that stuck with him all these years later. (He famously portrayed Inigo Montoya in the film adaptation of William Goldman‘s 1973 novel of the same name.)
“One of the most beautiful things I could never forget is we were on the bus going from London to Sheffield [where] we shot all the castle scenes, and Rob was sitting on the window here in front, and Billy Crystal was next to Rob. Chris Guest was next to me, and I was here, and these three guys had a savant-like ability to remember every single stat, inning and play of baseball games when they were 6, 7 [and] 8 years old,” he shared. “They would go over it, and I was just drop-jawed. My father loved baseball like this. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. And I also just couldn’t believe the friendship of these people.”
“Where my heart is really just trying to hold them is I can’t even [fathom] what they’re going through, let alone the children, and even I go to the gym, and people who never met Rob say, ‘You know, we can’t stop thinking about it,’” Patinkin concluded. “This is not the only time in people’s lives where this kind of situation happens. It’s unbearable.”
Patinkin’s latest comments came over a week after Rob and Michele were found dead in their Brentwood, California, home with stab wounds on December 14. Their son Nick Reiner was arrested hours later and charged with two counts of first-degree murder. He faces life in prison without parole or the death penalty if convicted. (Rob and Michele also shared kids Jake, 34, and Romy, 27, as well as Rob’s adopted daughter, Tracy, 61, from his marriage to late ex-wife Penny Marshall.)
Patinkin was one of the stars who took part in CBS News: Rob Reiner — Scenes From a Life on Sunday, December 21, remembering Rob’s legacy amid the tragic news.
“I heard this news at about 11-something on Sunday night. I was in bed. I was in shock. I didn’t sleep at all. I just kept wailing and crying. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to process it. I still don’t know how to process it, and I’m not looking for how to process it,” Patinkin said of learning of Rob and Michele’s deaths.
Through tears, Patinkin credited Rob for giving him a career breakthrough and always believing in him.
“Rob worked hard to try to get me to be the best human being I could be,” the Homeland alum said during the episode. “One time he said to me, ‘I just wish you could get out of your own way,’ and I haven’t been able to achieve that to this day, but I won’t quit trying. He cared about my nature. He showed it to me over and over again. I believe that we can connect with Rob and Michele, and every time we’re thinking about this or talking about it or anyone tells a story, he’s here. He will not be forgotten.”
