Nichols died of a heart attack on November 19, 2014, in his New York City apartment.

SUSAN FORRISTAL: You know how it goes—it’s like Rashomon. Everybody gets it wrong. The first thing that I heard was that he and Diane were in the car together, being driven to a dinner, or they were going to the theater, which I doubted. So then you start picturing this happening in the back of the car and her going through this by herself like some Jackie Kennedy nightmare—how do you deal with that? But apparently they were home together, thank God. The great thing is you’re at home with the one you love, but you never get that picture out of your mind.

CANDICE BERGEN: Max [Nichols] called the night that he died and I just stayed in bed the next day. I’d never done that.

TOM STOPPARD: It was the most wrenching bereavement I can ever remember experiencing. I’m not reconciled to it yet.

You just want to carry on thinking he’s up there high on the East Side, going into the Met, and going downtown to see a play.

ERIC IDLE: I miss him so much because—well, just to be able to pick up the phone—sometimes I’ll think of a funny line, and I’ll go, Oh, I have to tell Mike! He was a great appreciator.

CANDICE BERGEN: The gathering at his house that Diane had the week after he died—the apartment was filled with people. All of them were remarkable, and all of them had this deep, rich relationship with him. And I thought, How did he do it? I mean, how did he find the time?

Nichols’s legion of admiring friends and colleagues continue to revere both his intellectual prowess and original sense of humor.

CARLY SIMON: I talked to [writer] Renata Adler not too long ago, and we both said we didn’t know how to think anymore—we always would see everything through Mike’s eyes, and that now we didn’t know exactly what to think, about ourselves or anything else.

MICHAEL HALEY: We still work on movies in my dreams. Sometimes it’s fun, sometimes it’s insane, but he’s there and I’m always happy to see him. He’s with me constantly.

ERIC IDLE: He was a comedian first and foremost. That’s why I loved him.

And he was always very forthright about things he’d been through. Again, that’s a comedian thing; you never try and conceal what may be used against you. It’s a disarming dishonesty.

HANNAH ROTH SORKIN: His business card said, “Mike Nichols: Films, Plays, Snotty Remarks.”

It didn’t have an address.

ERIC IDLE: We were once in St. Paul de Vence, going to lunch, and we passed this art gallery, and it had a Salvador Dalí statue there in the window. He went in and he said, “How much is that Dalí in the window?”

And he would say the most outrageous things. He came in once a bit late for rehearsal, and he said, “I’m sorry, but the whole Upper East Side was Yidlock.” He could get away with these jokes.

LORNE MICHAELS: He loved to laugh. Comedy is too important to be left to professionals because professionals tend to go, That’s funny, and nod.

HANK AZARIA: You’d have to cover him with a blanket and move him farther and farther from the set because he would laugh out loud. It’s like, Mike, what’s the matter with you? We’re never going to do it that well again!

MARTIN SHORT: I was doing a show on Broadway and it was really strenuous. I’m thinking, Oh my God, I’m so tired, I know how to do 80 percent today and get away with it. And then I say to my dresser, Who’s in the audience? And he says, “Mike Nichols, Diane Sawyer, and Stephen Sondheim.” I go, Oh fuck. I thought I was safe.