Charles Shyer, who co-wrote and directed a protracted string of hit comedies, together with “Non-public Benjamin,” “Child Growth” and “Father of the Bride” — a lot of which featured sturdy feminine leads and had been made in collaboration together with his former spouse, Nancy Meyers — died on Dec. 27 in Los Angeles. He was 83.
His daughters Annie Meyers-Shyer and Hallie Meyers-Shyer, who can also be a director, stated he died in a hospital after an unspecified quick sickness.
Mr. Meyers was virtually raised by the movie trade — his father, Melville Shyer, was a founding father of the Administrators Guild of America — and his initiatives drew on his unabashed love for traditional films.
His portfolio of inspirations was huge, encompassing the famend, like “His Lady Friday” (1940) and “North by Northwest” (1959), and the obscure, just like the absurdist 1973 British comedy “O Fortunate Man!,” which he ranked amongst his favourite movies.
He and Ms. Meyers had been each romantic {and professional} companions. They had been already courting after they collaborated with Harvey Miller on the script for “Non-public Benjamin,” a 1980 movie a few socialite who enlists within the U.S. Military.
The movie, directed by Howard Zieff and starring Goldie Hawn, was a significant hit — it made $69.8 million on a $9.2 million funds — and the writing trio earned an Academy Award nomination for greatest authentic screenplay.
Extra success adopted. “Irreconcilable Variations” (1984), the primary movie Mr. Shyer directed, was adopted by “Child Growth” (1987), “Father of the Bride” (1991) and its 1995 sequel, and “The Guardian Lure” (1998), all written by Mr. Shyer and Ms. Meyer. “Father of the Bride” and “The Guardian Lure” had been remakes of films which are themselves thought of classics.
A lot of their movies featured sturdy feminine characters pushing in opposition to social norms. In “Child Growth,” for instance, Diane Keaton performs a hard-charging advisor who finds herself elevating a child on her personal.
“A number of years in the past, it will have needed to be a person,” Mr. Shyer informed The Toronto Globe and Mail in 1986, “as a result of it’s laborious to think about a lady who doesn’t know the best way to take care of a child. However these days it’s doable.”
He directed most of his movies with Ms. Meyers, although they switched locations for “The Guardian Lure,” her directorial debut.
Hollywood wags took to calling them the “Schmyers,” not solely due to the prolific nature of their collaboration but additionally due to its tightness — they labored in a one-room constructing behind their house within the Sherman Oaks neighborhood of Los Angeles, dealing with one another throughout a writing desk.
“I might lay down the scene, after which I might — it seems like I’m describing a film — pull the paper out and heave it throughout the desk, and he’d pencil it up,” Ms. Meyers stated in an interview. “Typically he would lay down the scenes after which I might revise them. There was a romance to it.”
The couple married in 1995 and separated three years later, however they remained pals.
All through their movies — and within the ones Mr. Shyer made after they cut up, like “Alfie” (2004), which was additionally a remake — Mr. Shyer tackled severe home points however leavened them with an enormous dollop of humor.
He usually recalled a bit of recommendation given to him by one among his directing heroes, Billy Wilder: “All of us need the identical factor, us writers and administrators. We need to make them giggle and make them cry.”
That, he informed Script journal in 2022, is what it’s all about.
“What he’s saying is you need to do a film that’s pleasant, however that has substance,” he stated. “And I believe that’s for me the large drive.”
Charles Richard Shyer was born on Oct. 11, 1941, in Los Angeles. His father was an assistant director and occasional director, and his mom, Lois (Jones) Delaney, managed the house.
He briefly attended School of the Desert, in Palm Desert, Calif. However he left when he was accepted into an apprentice program run by the Administrators Guild of America.
Mr. Shyer labored low-level jobs on quite a lot of films earlier than shifting to writing. He turned an assistant to Garry Marshall and Jerry Belson at across the time they tailored Neil Simon’s 1965 play “The Odd Couple” for tv in 1970.
“I received to take a seat in on story conferences. After which after they had been over, I might say stuff to Garry,” he informed Script. “And he stated, ‘That’s good. Converse up extra.’ And he would encourage me, after which he stated, ‘You may be a author.’”
Mr. Shyer obtained writing credit on three movies within the Seventies — “Smokey and the Bandit” in 1977 and “Home Calls” and “Goin’ South” in 1978 — earlier than teaming up with Ms. Meyers and Mr. Miller on “Non-public Benjamin.”
Mr. Shyer’s first two marriages resulted in divorce. His third marriage, to Ms. Meyers, resulted in 2000. He married Deborah Lynn in 2004; they divorced in 2009.
Alongside together with his two daughters, each from his marriage to Ms. Meyers, he’s survived by two youngsters from his marriage to Ms. Lynn, Jacob and Sophia Shyer, and three grandchildren.
Mr. Shyer’s final two films — “The Noel Diary” (2022), which he co-wrote and directed, and “Finest. Christmas. Ever!” (2023), which he co-wrote and produced — had been each made for Netflix.
He spoke warmly of his work for that streaming service, however he additionally bemoaned what he noticed because the fading of the theatergoing expertise.
“I believe film theaters are going to go the best way of bookstores and file shops,” he informed The Hollywood Reporter in 2022. “They’re simply not going to be round anymore, and that’s very unhappy to me. I’m grateful that I set to work throughout a time after they had been round.”
