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The lateRob Reinerhad spoken candidly about his son, Nick — who is nowcharged with his parents' deathson Sunday — and his attempts to help him with his substance abuse.
"There's no end to it," Reiner toldEntertainment Weeklyfor EW Radio on SiriusXM in 2015 when his movieBeing Charlie, which was based on his family's own experiences with addiction, was released. "Whatever the issues are that you will struggle with and the reason why you self-medicated with either drugs or alcohol or gambling or sex addiction — whatever it is — those issues are there."
He continued, "And you have to wrestle with them and deal with those issues your whole life. And, hopefully, with the right kind of help, you can manage, and you can manage those things, so that you don't wind up self-medicating. And those issues are always gonna be there, and we don't wrap it up with a happy bow. Its life goes on."
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Nick, 32, was officially charged Tuesday in the murders of his parents, Rob and photographerMichele Singer Reiner.
The director of popular movies such asWhen Harry Met SallyandThe American PresidentdescribedBeing Charlieas "the most personal film that I've done."
Reiner noted that Nick had gone into "a number of rehab programs" in his late teens, and he wanted to present the story from the perspective of his son, as well as himself and his wife. He said the project helped him to better understand what Nick experienced, even though he had attended meetings on the subject.
TheAll in the Familyactor said what they'd been through had taught him a lesson.
"I learned something that I should have known from the beginning, which is that as a parent you know your child better than any expert would," Reiner said. "And I listened."
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Reiner said he would listen to anyone with "a desk and a diploma" while contending with his son's addiction, because he didn't know which action to take.
"You don't know what to do with your child is struggling with this, and you wanna help them because your first charge as a parent is keep your child safe," Reiner said. "And if you see them running into the street, you wanna grab them before the truck hits them. So I didn't know what to do, so I did what they told me, but what I've learned is that you know your child better, and I should have listened to my own gut more than what the experts were telling me."
In the same conversation, Reiner explained that he'd told Nick many times that he was "the heart and soul of this film."
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