Hollywood just got hit with a tragedy, and for once, it’s not a bad reboot or box office bomb. Rob Reiner and his wife Michele were murdered on Sunday, and while the internet lit up with all kinds of takes—some measured, some absolutely disgusting—one person showed what real class looks like: actor James Woods.
Yes, that James Woods. Proud conservative. No stranger to political heat. But when it came to Rob Reiner, he set politics aside and spoke straight from the heart. “Rob literally saved my career,” Woods said on Fox News. “He really fought for me when a studio didn’t want me in a movie.” That movie got him an Oscar nomination. That’s not just Hollywood fluff—that’s life-changing stuff.
Woods didn’t sugarcoat their differences. He knew Reiner was a card-carrying liberal, loud Trump critic, and proud Democrat. But as Woods put it, “We had a different path to the same destination, which was a country we both love.” Imagine that—two people disagreeing without trying to destroy each other. Try finding that kind of maturity on Twitter.
What really set Woods off, though, were the nasty comments being thrown around online from folks who couldn’t help but dance on Reiner’s grave because of his politics. “I find it, quite frankly, infuriating and distasteful,” Woods said. “Did I agree with his politics? I did not. Did I love him as a friend, as an artist, as an icon of Hollywood, and as a patriot? I most certainly did.”
Meanwhile, President Trump didn’t hold back either. He called Reiner a victim of “Trump Derangement Syndrome” and said he was “very bad for our country.” Ouch. But Trump’s never been one to fake sympathy when he doesn’t feel it.
Want to see how it all went down? Watch the video and see Woods drop the politics and show the heart.