In the aftermath of the tragic murder of Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, there has been a lot of speculation. But as the details become clear, I want to honor the wishes of the Reiner children, who asked “for our parents to be remembered for the incredible lives they lived and the love they gave.”
The USC Shoah Foundation recently shared a video of Michele Reiner that shows how her mother, Holocaust survivor Nicole Silberkleit. thought of her and her two sisters, Suzanne, a TV producer turned Reform rabbi, and Martine, the president and CEO of Children’s Institute.
“My children — well, I think they’re the greatest, naturally,” Silberkleirt, who was born in Strasbourg, France, says with a melodic French accent, “But they are, they’re very understanding, loving, and affectionate. I’m very proud of them because they did very well on their own, they all had careers, and I think they’re terrific children.”
In that same 1994 video testimony, we also see Michele crying, moved by her mother and her story of survival. “My mother is the most incredible person; she’s very strong,” she says.
Silberkleit was 17 years old when police in Nice, France, rounded her up in 1944 and sent her and her family on cattle cars to Auschwitz, a two-week-long journey that included spending time at a holding camp.
“There was no room to sit, no food and no water. … Once in a while they would open the cars to throw out the dead people,” Silberkleit shared with the Guardian in 2001.
Silberkleit survived the Holocaust by escaping the death marches from Auschwitz. “My mother is the only one of her family that survived,” Michele shared on Instagram in 2022, urging people to “never forget.”
In 2023, Michele and her family traveled to France and Poland to commemorate their mother, who died in 2003. “Yesterday we celebrated and commemorated the lives of my mother, Nicole Bernheim, and her family who were taken to Auschwitz, and she was the only survivor, by unveiling these brass stones,” she shared in June of 2023, “A Stolperstein is a ten-centimetre concrete cube bearing a brass plate inscribed with the name and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination or persecution. Meaning ‘stumbling stone’ and metaphorically ‘stumbling block’. It was powerful to have my whole family there to remember this moment. As my son Jake said ‘Her will to live is the reason I’m alive.'”
Singer was a successful photographer (she even took the photograph on the cover of Donald Trump’s “The Art of the Deal,” which Reiner once joked, she would have to atone for) who turned film producer and worked on many of her husband’s projects, including as set photographer in “Misery” and a producer on his now last film, “Spinal Tap II: The End Continues.” Michele also famously helped change “When Harry Met Sally…” from a sad film about a broken friendship into a true romcom that ends with the most romantic of professions. Reiner changed the ending of his famous film after he met and fell in love with Singer while shooting it.
“Michele was an enormously talented photographer whose eye applied not only to what she captured on film but also to her own personal aesthetic,” Rita Wilson wrote of her late friend on Instagram. “Her work as a producer focused on social justice and creating awareness of our world. She was wry, funny, opinionated but also reasonable and self-reflective.”
The Reiners were also devoted to political and social activism. It was Nicole’s story of survival that inspired her daughter to fight for justice and change. And it was Michele who helped fuel her husband’s activism.
“I can honestly say the reason I’ve done as many things in the political sphere is largely because of her,” Rob Reiner shared in 2016. “She is my Bunsen burner that lights the flame in my ass.”
“There’s just too much injustice in the world, and she wants to fix it all,” Reiner also said of his wife.
May her memory be for a blessing.
