Billy

THE list of living names in Billy Joel’s We Didn’t Start the Fire has shrunk to a jaw-dropping three.

Three decades after the tongue-twister song topped charts around the world, most of its human landmarks are gone. 

Out of the 59 people name-checked in the 1989 mega-hit, only Bob Dylan, rock n roll singer Chubby Checker, and “subway vigilante” Bernie Goetz are still alive. 

The grim-but-fascinating fact has been doing the rounds on social media after Bardot’s death was announced on Sunday.

One shocked fan admitted: “This is how I find out Chubby Checker is still alive.” 

Another said: “The kind of useless trivia I’ll be physically incapable of not repeating at the next dinner party.”

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Billy’s catchy banger is a whirlwind history lesson.

It rattles through headlines and pop culture moments in strict chronological order starting the year Billy Joel was born in 1949, and racing toward the late 1980s.

One of the song’s most packed lines – “Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Khrushchev” – covers 1956, the year iconic French actress Brigitte Bardot shot to global fame in And God Created Woman. 

It also nods to the Hungarian Revolution in Budapest, the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Alabama, and Nikita Khrushchev’s rise to power in the Soviet Union after Stalin’s death. 

Music also runs through the song like a second timeline.

Chart topper Billy, now age 79, kicks things off with Cry singer Johnnie Ray in 1949, one of the first modern pop stars signed to a major label. 

He quickly follows with Bill Haley & His Comets, whose Rock Around the Clock sent rock ’n’ roll into overdrive. 

Elvis Presley turns up in 1955, Buddy Holly marks 1959 and the tragedy of the Day the Music Died, Chubby Checker dances into 1960.

Bob Dylan appears in 1961 as pop music takes a sharp turn toward protest and social change.

By the time Joel hits the mid-to-late 1960s, it’s Beatlemania and Woodstock.

Bernie Goetz gets a mention after he became a household name in 1984 for shooting four black men on a train in New York after they allegedly demanded money.

One of the men was left brain damaged and paraplegic, and the shooting became a symbol of deep racial divide in the city.

Goetz handed himself in to police nine days later and was dubbed the “subway vigilante” by local media.

A group of Rob Reiner’s closest friends released a joint statement Tuesday praising the legendary film director’s masterful storytelling and remembering him as a “passionate, brave citizen” who did everything he could to make the world a better place.

“His comedic touch was beyond compare, his love of getting the music of the dialogue just right, and his sharpening of the edge of a drama was simply elegant,” the statement reads. “For the actors, he loved them. For the writers he made them better.”

It was signed by Billy and Janice Crystal, Albert and Kimberly Brooks, Martin Short, Alan and Robin Zweibel, Larry David and Ashley Underwood, Marc Shaiman and Lou Mirabal, Barry and Diana Levinson and James Costos and Michael Smith.

The friends wrote that, in addition to being an excellent comedic actor, Reiner had an unmatched range as a director.

“From comedy to drama to ‘mockumentary’ to documentary he was always at the top of his game,” they stated. “He charmed audiences. They trusted him. They lined up to see his films.”

The friends, many of whom worked closely with Reiner on film and TV projects, said that he was a truly collaborative partner. Reiner directed the 1989 film “When Harry Met Sally…,” starring Billy Crystal, and “Albert Brooks: Defending My Life,” a 2023 documentary about Brooks. He appeared as a recurring version of himself on Larry David’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”

Crystal was one of the first people contacted by family members after Rob and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, were found stabbed to death in their home Sunday afternoon, family friends told The Times. He visited the home that afternoon and left in tears.

“If you had an idea, he listened, he brought you into the process,” the group of friends stated. “To be in his hands as a film maker was a privilege.”

They praised Reiner and his wife for their political activism and dedication to helping others.

“Strong and determined, Michele and Rob Reiner devoted a great deal of their lives for the betterment of our fellow citizens,” the statement reads. “They were a special force together — dynamic, unselfish and inspiring.”

The statement closes with a quote from one of Reiner’s favorite movies, “It’s a Wonderful Life”: ”Each man’s life touches so many other lives, and when he isn’t around, he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?”

“You have no idea,” the friends wrote.