Nora Ephron dies of cancer, deserting us of the hope of another Tom Hanks / Meg Ryan rom-com collaboration. She penned the screenplays for “When Harry Met Sally” (1989), “This is My Life” (1992), “Sleepless in Seattle” (1993), “Michael” (1996), “You’ve Got Mail” (1998) and “Julie & Julia” (2009), the latter gave us two good movies for the price of one, i.e., chef Julia Child and cook-blogger Julie Powell. She directed all of them following “This is My Life.”
She was a wit, the empress of rom-coms, the emissary of sweet and light entertainments – you didn’t come out of her movies with a heavy heart.
Yet there was more than just comedy to her. The most underrated thing Ephron ever did was pen the screenplay for the stark drama “Silkwood” (1983), a true story surrounding alleged conspiracies at a nuclear power plant. See the theatrical trailer here:
Or perhaps the most underrated comedy Ephron ever penned was “My Blue Heaven,” a deliciously mismatched buddy movie with Steve Martin as a mobster in the witness protection program and Rick Moranis as the FBI desk-jockey who takes his case. See the theatrical trailer here:
If there was one motif that ran through all of her directed movies it’s that her actresses showed-off wearing luxurious cotton pajamas.
Ephron was 71. Oscar nominations for writing were for “Silkwood,” “When Harry Met Sally” and “Sleepless in Seattle.” Marriages included Carl Bernstein, the reporter who broke Watergate, and screenwriter Nicolas Pileggi.