After 35 years, When Harry Met Sally still holds up as one of Meg Ryan‘s most memorable performances.
Marking the film’s milestone anniversary, Ryan’s co-star Billy Crystal recently recalled the “guttural” reaction Princess Diana had to her infamous fake orgasm scene when the film had its “memorable” royal premiere at Leicester Square on Nov. 30, 1989.
“Princess Diana was coming, so we were all taught what to say and not to say,” Crystal noted Friday on The Graham Norton Show. “There she is, a magnificent person. We waited, Meg and I, and the limo pulls up and she gets out. She couldn’t have been more gracious, and stunning, and tall. Just her presence was astounding.”
After they were greeted with trumpeters, Crystal and Ryan were seated on either side of the Princess of Wales. “The lights go down, and she whispers to me, ‘I’m gonna take my shoes off,’” he said. “So, I go, ‘I’m gonna take my pants off.’ Sometimes I say the wrong thing. She just [goes], ‘Oh, you’re naughty. You’re naughty.’”
Crystal continued, “So, now the movie’s playing beautifully and we get to the famous fake orgasm scene. And everybody knew about it, but I don’t think she did. So, I could look over the balcony, and everyone in the orchestra just turns around to look at her, who I’m sitting next to.
“And she starts laughing this incredibly guttural sound that was like,” he said, mimicking the throaty laugh. “Over and over, couldn’t catch her breath. It was stunning. I thought, here’s this unbelievable person, but if it was a date, I don’t think I’d see her again. Just because the laugh was just — I can’t. She’s beautiful, she’s a princess, guys, but the laugh. You know what I mean.”
Directed by Rob Reiner, who co-wrote the beloved romantic comedy with Nora Ephron, When Harry Met Sally follows the titular pair as they come in and out of each other’s lives after a contentious road trip from Chicago to New York in 1977.
Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal in When Harry Met Sally (1989). (Columbia/Courtesy Everett Collection)
Arguably the film’s most iconic scene takes places at Katz’s Delicatessen in NYC, where Crystal’s Harry and Ryan’s Sally debate about whether a man can tell when a woman is faking an orgasm. To prove her point, Sally loudly and convincingly fakes climax in the middle of the lunch rush.
Last year, Ryan said her kids called the scene a “very unique embarrassment” after visiting the restaurant for the first time.