Three-time Academy Award nominee Nora Ephron was in town this week to promote her collection of essays on aging, “I Remember Nothing,” at the Free Library.
Since “When Harry Met Sally” earned the 69-year-old a nomination for best original screenplay, Ephron has been a cultural touchstone. Now, she wants us to laugh about growing older, rechristening the senior moment the “Google Moment” and joking that “name tags should be required for people over 40.”
Ephron made her journalistic mark writing about her breasts. On Tuesday, she dismissed concerns about the lack of women directors in Hollywood. “What about the women in Africa?” she asked.
She also confessed that one of the most famous lines in romantic-comedy history -— “I’ll have what she’s having” — wasn’t hers, despite being credited with it. “Carl Reiner inspired the line. Meg Ryan suggested that the scene take place in a restaurant. Billy Crystal actually wrote the line,” she said, noting that the movie had a different ending in the original screenplay.
While her life with ex-husband Carl Bernstein is an open book, the author is more discreet about her grown children. “I just hope I taught them the right fork to eat salad with,” said Ephron, who noted that she plays two games of Scrabble daily.
Riling up an A-lister
Ephron’s essay “The D Word” raised the ire of actor Alec Baldwin. As editor of the Huffington Post’s divorce section, Ephron wrote about her ex-husband Carl Bernstein three decades after the two parted ways.
“She simply can not shut up about her anger, her betrayal, her unresolved feelings, and her bottomless contempt for her ex, who has been a devoted and great father to their two wonderful children,” Baldwin, who is a friend of Bernstein’s, retorted on the site.
Eprhon’s response: “I would work with Alec because I think he is a great actor.”
