Charles Shyer, the American movie director, screenwriter, and producer behind movies similar to “Non-public Benjamin” and “Child Growth,” handed away on Friday, December 27, on the age of 83.
In an announcement given to Deadline, his household wrote, “It’s with an indescribably heavy coronary heart that we share the information of our beloved father, Charles Shyer’s passing. His loss leaves an unfillable gap in our lives, however his legacy lives on by his youngsters and the 5 many years of fantastic work he’s left behind. We honor the extraordinary life he led and know there’ll by no means be one other fairly like him.”
Born on October 11, 1941, in Los Angeles, California, Shyer was the son of Lois Delaney and Melville Shyer, a manufacturing govt and movie director who co-founded the Administrators Guild of America. Shyer later benefited from his father’s work, collaborating within the guild’s apprenticeship program following his research at UCLA. His profession started on the Seventies TV sitcom model of Neil Simon’s “The Odd Couple,” the place he served as an assistant to Garry Marshall and Jerry Belson, then later head author and affiliate producer.
Following his work on the collection, Shyer met Nancy Meyers and collectively, they’d assist revitalize the comedy and romantic comedy style all through the 80s and 90s, beginning with their Oscar-nominated screenplay for “Non-public Benjamin,” co-written with Harvey Miller. The movie, starring Goldie Hawn and Eileen Brennan, would go on to be one of many highest grossing movies of the yr, later spawning a short-lived tv collection.
Shyer would quickly develop from screenwriter to director, helming tasks similar to “Irreconcilable Variations” (1984), “Child Growth” (1987), “Father of the Bride” (1991), and its sequel “Father of the Bride Half II” (1995), all of which had been co-written with Meyers, at that time his spouse. He additionally labored with Meyers when she stepped behind the digital camera, co-writing and producing her directorial debut, “The Dad or mum Lure” (1998), earlier than ultimately divorcing in 1999. Collectively, that they had two daughters, together with Hallie Meyers-Shyer, who adopted in her mother and father’ footsteps, writing and directing movies similar to “Residence Once more” (2017) and “Goodrich” (2024).
Shyer’s first movie credit score got here as a author on the Burt Reynolds comedy “Smokey and the Bandit” and he additionally served as a screenwriter on two movies directed by Jack Nicholson, “Home Calls” and “Goin’ South.” He continued working in his later life, writing and directing “The Noel Diary” for Netflix in 2022 and serving as a co-screenwriter and producer on “Finest. Christmas. Ever!” in 2023.
Talking to IndieWire in 2022 with regard to “The Noel Diary” and the way the movie business had modified since he started working in it, Shyer mentioned, “It’s scary on the market. I’ve 4 children, together with a 16-year-old son, and I fear as a result of he desires to be a filmmaker. I believe, ‘Fuck, man. It’s not prefer it was once I began out, which was a a lot simpler highway.’ It was at all times laborious, and also you at all times needed to have expertise or some type of business viability. However I fear, it’s so slim now, the highway to success.”
Shyer is survived by his three daughters and son.