Carl Reiner, who as performer, writer and director earned a place in comedy history several times over, died Monday night at his home in Beverly Hills, California. He was 98. His death was confirmed by his daughter, Annie Reiner.
Carl Reiner first attracted national attention in 1950 as Sid Caesar's multi-talented second banana on the television variety show, Your Show Of Shows, for which he was also a writer.
A decade later, he created The Dick Van Dyke Show, one of the most celebrated situation comedies in television history, and teamed with Mel Brooks on the hugely successful 2000 Year Old Man records.
His novel Enter Laughing became a hit Broadway play and the first of many movies he would direct; among the others were four of Steve Martin's early starring vehicles. He won praise as an actor too, with memorable roles in films such as The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming (1966) and, more recently, Ocean's Eleven (2001) and its sequels.
But he spent most of his career just slightly out of the spotlight, letting others get the laughs. His contributions were recognised by his peers, comedy aficionados and, in 2000, the Kennedy Center, which awarded him the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.
In his performances with Brooks and before that with Caesar, Reiner specialised in portraying the voice of sanity, a calm presence in a chaotic universe. But despite his claim to the contrary, he was never "just the straight man".
"He was a comedian himself, and he truly understood and still understands comedy," Caesar said of Reiner in his book Caesar's Hours (2003). "Most people still don't realise the importance of a straight man in comedy or how difficult that role is. Carl had to make his timing my timing."
Reiner contributed behind the scenes as well. He took part in the frenzied writing sessions that shaped the show, bouncing jokes off the walls of the writers' room with the likes of Brooks and Neil Simon.
"I became a writer because of that room," he recalled. "I'd say something and somebody would yell: 'What do you know? You're not a writer.' So I became a writer."
He characterised his later career moves with similar self-effacing humour in an NPR interview: "I acted like a director. I acted like a producer. I sat in front of a typewriter and acted like a novelist."
The next phase of Reiner's career found him again in the role of deadpan interviewer. This time, the interviewee was Brooks.
The 2000 Year Old Man began as an act Reiner and Brooks performed for friends at parties. When they put it on record, it became a phenomenon. There were ultimately five 2000 Year Old Man albums, one of which won a Grammy, and all of which are treasured by comedians and comedy fans.
In 1960, the same year he and Brooks made their first album, Reiner wrote and starred in a pilot for a TV series based on his own life, about a writer who works in New York for a larger-than-life, difficult-to-please comedian.
The show, Head Of The Family, was not picked up. It became a series only when it was recast with Van Dyke as the central character.
The workplace scenes in The Dick Van Dyke Show - featuring Morey Amsterdam and Rose Marie as Van Dyke's fellow writers, with Reiner making occasional appearances as their boss, Alan Brady - were inspired by Reiner's time with Caesar. The domestic scenes, with Mary Tyler Moore as Van Dyke's wife, were set in New Rochelle, New York, where Reiner lived at the time, and Moore's character was modelled on his wife, Estelle.
Reiner later attributed the show's success to the choice of "somebody with more talent to play me".
Seen on CBS from 1961 to 1966, The Dick Van Dyke Show won a total of 15 Primetime Emmy Awards for its cast and crew, five of them for Reiner as writer and producer. It is widely regarded as one of the greatest sitcoms of all time.
Reiner was born in the Bronx, New York, on March 20, 1922, to Irving Reiner, a watchmaker, and Bessie (Mathias) Reiner. After graduating from Evander Childs High School in the Bronx, he went to work as a machinist's helper and seemed headed for a career repairing sewing machines.
Then one day, his older brother Charlie mentioned seeing a newspaper article about a free acting class being given by the Works Progress Administration, the New Deal jobs agency. Carl tried his hand at acting, found he was good at it and joined a theatre troupe.
Reiner married Estelle Lebost in 1943. She died in 2008.
In addition to his daughter, an author and psychoanalyst, he is survived by his sons - Rob, known for directing When Harry Met Sally... (1989) and numerous other films and for his role as Archie Bunker's son-in-law on the groundbreaking sitcom All In The Family (1971 to 1979); and Lucas, a painter and film-maker - and five grandchildren.
NYTIMES
