‘Father of the Bride’ director dies

Charles Shyer, who directed hit comedies like Father of the Bride, has died at age 83.

A representative for Shyer confirmed to Entertainment Weekly that the filmmaker died on Friday. A cause of death was not given.

“It’s with an indescribably heavy heart that we share the news of our beloved father Charles Shyer’s passing,” Shyer’s family told Deadline. “His loss leaves an unfillable hole in our lives, but his legacy lives on through his children and the five decades of wonderful work he’s left behind. We honor the extraordinary life he led and know there will never be another quite like him.”

Born in Los Angeles in 1941 to Hollywood filmmaker Melville Shyer and Lois Delaney, Shyer attended University of California, Los Angeles and worked as an assistant director through the Directors Guild of America’s apprenticeship program. He was an assistant to Odd Couple producers Garry Marshall and Jerry Belson as one of his earliest jobs, and he became a writer on the show in 1971. He created the short-lived TV comedy Getting Together the same year, and also wrote an episode of The Partridge Family.

Shyer’s first writing credit on a theatrical film came with 1977’s smash hit Smokey and the Bandit. He then penned the Walter Matthau dramedy House Calls and Jack Nicholson’s directorial project Goin’ South in 1978.

Perhaps the most pivotal project of Shyer’s writing career came with 1980’s Private Benjamin. The war satire starred Goldie Hawn as Judy Benjamin, a woman who enlists in the U.S. Army, and ultimately earned Shyer an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay. The movie also marked his first screenplay collaboration with Nancy Meyers, whom he met while she was working as a story editor at Motown. The co-writers married the same year Private Benjamin was released and went on to make a dozen films together.

Shyer made his directorial debut with 1984’s Irreconcilable Differences, which he co-wrote with Meyers. The film starred Ryan O’Neal, Shelley Long, and Drew Barrymore in one of her first big-screen roles. The same year, the couple co-wrote Protocol with their Private Benjamin co-writer, Harvey Miller. In 1986, Shyer and Meyers co-wrote Jumpin’ Jack Flash under pseudonyms. Shyer returned to the director’s chair with 1987’s Baby Boom, another gender-conscious comedy he co-wrote with Meyers. In the film, Diane Keaton, who went on to collaborate with the couple on several projects, starred as an ambitious Manhattan professional who unexpectedly inherits a distant relative’s toddler.

The couple’s next film, 1991’s Father of the Bride, starred Steve Martin and Keaton as a middle-aged couple grappling with the stress of their daughter’s wedding. The movie, which was a remake of the 1950 comedy of the same name, became the biggest financial success of Shyer’s directing career, earning $129 million at the box office. It spawned a sequel, 1995’s Father of the Bride Part II, which Shyer also directed from a script he wrote with Meyers and which featured the entire core cast reprising their roles from the first film.

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In between their two Father of the Bride movies, the couple co-wrote Once Upon a Crime, and Shyer directed 1994’s I Love Trouble, a rom-com starring Julia Roberts and Nick Nolte that he also co-wrote with Meyers. Four years later, Shyer co-wrote and produced Meyers’ directorial debut, the 1998 remake of The Parent Trap starring Lindsay Lohan. 

Shyer and Meyers divorced in 1999, and Shyer’s first project after their separation was 2001’s The Affair of the Necklace, a historical drama starring Hilary Swank that received an Oscar nomination for Best Costume Design. He then helmed 2004’s Alfie, the Jude Law–starring remake of the 1966 romance led by Michael Caine. The film bombed at the box office, earning just $35 million on a budget of $60 million, and Shyer did not direct another film until 2022’s Christmas rom-com The Noel Diary, which he co-wrote with Rebecca Connor and David Golden.

Shyer and Meyers reunited on 2017’s Home Again, the directorial debut of their daughter Hallie Meyers-Shyer. Meyers served as a producer on the film, while Shyer served as second unit director. 

Shyer’s final feature film credit came with 2023’s Best. Christmas. Ever!, which he co-wrote and executive-produced. He is survived by his four children.