Billy Crystal Provides Unrealistic Update for ‘When Harry Met Sally’ Characters

Presumably because he can just sense Hollywood award shows the way that some dogs can detect earthquakes, Billy Crystal showed up at Sunday’s Emmys and presented the award for Outstanding Talk Series. The City Slickers star also took the opportunity to wax nostalgic about his first Tonight Show appearance, before calling out each nominated host for bailing on past dinner plans. 

Prior to the event, Crystal hit the red carpet, and was asked by E! Live From the Red Carpet host Laverne Cox about When Harry Met Sally, the beloved 1989 romantic comedy in which Crystal and Meg Ryan play two best friends who eventually fall in love — likely because Harry’s sweater game just can’t be topped.

The whole thing ends with Harry running to meet Sally at a New Year’s Eve party where they express their true feelings for one another. And in the film’s final moments, we learn that the couple got married just three months later.

Clearly When Harry Met Sally resonated with audiences, because even now, Crystal is fielding questions about it. Specifically, Crystal was asked by Cox about what the titular characters would be up to today. “They’d be talking about downsizing. They’re not ready for assisted living yet,” Crystal joked. “But they’re still romantic, still in love. They’re probably having a great time with their grandchildren and finding new ways to be with each other.” 

And presumably those “new ways to be with each other” involve regular trips to the deli. 

This is certainly an optimistic viewpoint. Despite its place in the rom-com canon, some viewers have confessed that Harry and Sally may not have been right for each other, after all. Would their relationship really have lasted for the past 35 years?

Amazingly, Harry and Sally’s relationship nearly didn’t last the full length of the movie. As director Rob Reiner revealed earlier this year, “The original ending of the film that we had was that Harry and Sally didn’t get together.” Why? Because according to Reiner, he wasn’t in a good place to make a movie that didn’t end with bitterness and abject loneliness.

“I had been married for 10 years, I had been single for 10 years and I couldn’t figure out how I was ever going to be with anybody, and that gave birth to When Harry Met Sally,” Reiner recalled during an episode of CNN’s Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace. “I hadn’t met anybody, and so it was going to be the two of them seeing each other after years, talking, and then walking away from each other." 

Luckily for fans of movies that aren’t huge bummers, Reiner met the woman who would later become his wife during production, so he “changed the ending.” 

While the film’s screenwriter, Nora Ephron, passed away in 2012, we’ll just accept Crystal’s red carpet banter as When Harry Met Sally canon, and proclaim that love isn’t dead after all. 

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