Comedy icon Carl Reiner left a message for these trying times through ‘Dispatches from Quarantine,” an online video series. His interview, conducted in May, was the last from the comic legend behind TV’s “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” who died June 29 at age 98.
Presented by Reboot, a nonprofit Jewish arts and culture organization, Tiffany Woolf’s “Dispatches from Quarantine” underscores the importance of capturing the wisdom of a lifetime of experiences while we can.
Reiner told Woolf he kept his spirits and laughter going by keeping up his friendship of almost 70 years with Mel Brooks with daily visits (with social distancing), even during quarantine.
He also told Woolf “the only thing that really matters in life is your progeny, people who come after you, people you send out to the world.” Reiner is survived by his sons, Rob, a filmmaker and activist, and Lucas, a painter, printmaker, and photographer; and daughter, Sylvia Anne, an author, playwright, poet, and singer.
The Bronx-born Reiner called himself a “Jewish atheist” whose faith in God ended with the Holocaust. He was an actor, producer, and director as well as a writer who got his start in television’s early days writing for “Your Show of Shows” and “Caesar’s Hour.” He’s also known for the comedy album “The 2,000 Year Old Man,” created with Brooks, and for his work on more than a dozen films including “Where’s Poppa,” “Oh God,” “The Jerk,” and “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid.”
“Dispatches from Quarantine” is produced and directed by Noam Dromi. Watch the Reiner interview and others, including Ellen Burstyn, Larry King, and Norman Lear, at www.silverscreenstudios.org/dispatches.
