Carl Bernstein - Personal

Personal

Bernstein graduated from Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland. He subsequently attended the University of Maryland, College Park, but did not graduate. Bernstein, who considers himself a secular Jew, is an honorary lifetime member of B'nai B'rith and as a teenager served as president of B'nai B'rith YOUTH in Washington and the mid-Atlantic states.

He has been married three times, first to a fellow reporter at the Washington Post, Carol Honsa; then to writer and director Nora Ephron from 1976 to 1980; and since 2003 to the former model Christine Kuehbeck.

During his marriage to Ephron, Bernstein met Margaret Jay, daughter of British Prime Minister James Callaghan and wife of Peter Jay, then UK ambassador to the United States. They had a much-publicized extramarital relationship in 1979. Margaret later became a government minister in her own right. Bernstein and his second wife, Nora Ephron, already had an infant son, Jacob, and she was pregnant with their second son, Max, in 1979 when she learned of her husband's affair with Jay. Ephron delivered Max prematurely after finding out. Ephron was inspired by the events to write the 1983 novel Heartburn, which was made into a 1986 film starring Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep.

While single, in the 1980s, Bernstein became known for dating Bianca Jagger, Martha Stewart and Elizabeth Taylor, among others.

He is the father of Max and Jacob Bernstein, his two children with Ephron. After Bernstein and Ephron’s divorce, they shared joint custody of their sons. The elder, Jacob, is a journalist who writes for the New York Times and The Daily Beast. Max, a successful rock musician who has had his own bands and commercially-released albums, is now the guitar player for pop star Ke$ha.

Bernstein currently resides in New York with his wife Christine.