Joyce DeWitt still remembers the phone ringing. The “Three’s Company” star told Page Six in a recent exclusive interview that her final evening with John Ritter, weeks before his passing in 2003, was “extraordinarily special.”
DeWitt, 77, said she had no idea at the time that it would be their last night out together.
Joyce DeWitt Reflects on Last Night with John Ritter
August 2003. DeWitt was in New York. So was Ritter. Neither knew the other was in town.
Paparazzi told her. According to Page Six, DeWitt then called Ritter to see if he wanted to hang out, and heard nothing back for hours. She was seconds from walking out of her hotel room, headed to Lincoln Center for a movie, when he finally returned the call. She pointed out this was before cellphones. One more minute and she would have been gone, with no way for him to reach her.
DeWitt described the timing as something close to divine help, a phrase she used to explain how the two ended up with that time at all.
They made plans for the same night. Dinner was at an Italian restaurant in the Village, and Jim Belushi came along. DeWitt told Page Six they had a wonderful time and called the evening dear and precious.
Ritter passed away the following month. He became ill with chest pains and severe nausea while rehearsing his sitcom “8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter,” was rushed to the hospital, and passed away that night. The cause was later found to be an aortic dissection. He was 54.
One Phone Call Before Cellphones
Ritter and Joyce DeWitt had shared a set for years before that dinner. “Three’s Company” ran for eight seasons, from 1977 to 1984, and followed three single roommates through misheard conversations and romantic mix-ups. By 2003 the show was two decades behind them. They were still the kind of friends who would drop an evening’s plans to see each other.
Old castmates drift. Most do. Schedules split, cities split, and the people who once saw each other every working day end up exchanging a call a year. DeWitt and Ritter happened to be in the same city on the same days, and one of them picked up the phone.
Nothing about the night was planned. No anniversary, no reunion, no reason beyond being nearby. A missed callback and DeWitt would have been sitting in a movie theater, and the last memory would have been some earlier, ordinary goodbye that neither of them marked.
Twenty-three years later she can still recite the minute-by-minute of it. The hotel door. Lincoln Center. The restaurant in the Village. Small details survive because the night became the last one, and DeWitt only learned that afterward.
Last nights rarely announce themselves. The people who end up with a good one usually got there by saying yes to something small on short notice.
The ‘Three’s Company’ 50th Anniversary at Joe’s Pub
Joyce DeWitt is bringing that history back to New York. On Nov. 2, she and Amy Yasbeck, Ritter’s widow, will host a “Three’s Company” 50th anniversary celebration at Joe’s Pub, according to Page Six. The evening will include a reading featuring Jason Biggs and other famous names.
DeWitt also talked to Page Six about why the show worked. She called it a modern take on a 16th-century farce, a classic comedy of misunderstandings. She said the show suited her because it hinted at things rather than spelling them out, and that being explicit would never have worked for her.
Her point went further than taste. DeWitt said that when people laugh together at the subjects they are least comfortable discussing in public, it brings them a step closer to being comfortable with each other.
Ritter will not be at Joe’s Pub. His widow will be hosting beside the woman who shared his last dinner in the Village, in the same city where that call came through one minute before she left.
Sources: Page Six
