Conan O’Brien, whose holiday party was reportedly the site of several confrontations involving Nick Reiner in the hours before police say he murdered his parents, has broken his silence more than two months after the brutal slayings.
Nick, 32, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the fatal stabbings of his father, director Rob Reiner, and mother, producer Michele Singer Reiner, who were found dead at their home on Dec. 14.
The night prior, the couple — who also shared son Jake, 34, and daughter Romy, 28 — attended O’Brien’s holiday party with Nick, who a source previously told People was “freaking everyone out [and] acting crazy.”
At one point, Nick made a scene when he rudely interrupted a discussion comedian Bill Hader was having with another guest at the party, an insider told NBC News. When the “SNL” alum told Nick the conversation was private, the latter reportedly froze and stared before “storming off.”
Nick also got into a “very loud argument” with his father at the party, according to TMZ. Rob and Michele eventually left the event due to Nick’s concerning behavior.
“To have that experience of saying goodnight to somebody and having them leave and then find out the next day that they’re gone… I think I was in shock for quite a while afterward,” O’Brien said in an extensive interview with The New Yorker on Friday. “I mean, there’s no other word for it.”
O’Brien said he’d known Rob and Michele for a while but that he and his wife, Liza Powel O’Brien, had gotten increasingly closer with the couple in recent years.
“My wife and I were seeing them a lot,” he said. “They were just such lovely people.”
The former late-night host also went on to praise Rob Reiner’s work as a director, crediting his 1984 mockumentary, “This Is Spinal Tap,” with having “influenced my generation enormously.”
“I think it’s seven movies that Rob Reiner made, in quick succession, that are classics,” O’Brien said. “I think if you can make one great movie, that’s impressive. It’s an almost impossible feat. To make two means you’re one of the greats. To make seven in like a nine-year, 10-year, 11-year period is insanity.”
If convicted in his parents’ murders, Nick Reiner faces life in prison without the possibility of parole or the death penalty. He has not yet formally entered a plea, though he’s expected to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.
Nick has battled substance abuse since adolescence and reportedly suffers from schizoaffective disorder, which resulted in a mental health conservatorship for over a year, ending in 2021. A change in medications shortly before the killings reportedly made him “agitated, erratic and increasingly dangerous.”
The heart of his defense may hinge on allegations that his doctors didn’t attempt to place him on a psychiatric hold amid the shift in medication, despite his concerning behavior.
His former attorney, Alan Jackson, withdrew from the case in January, but has still insisted that Nick is “not guilty of murder.”
