tonight on "nightline" -- from sleepless to seattle -- >> she made everything beautiful. >> to when "harry met sally" to julie and julia. nora ephron gave a voice to a generation of women. tonight weed by farewell. and millions of screaming pans but now justin bieber is all grown up as the rest of us. tonight, one dad trice to get in tune with bieber fever. our own bill weir. plus, final witness. a father who survived an unthinkable crime in the dark of night, only to face the shock of a lifetime.

a story of love, forgiveness and ultimate betrayal. good evening. i'm cynthia mcfadden. tonight, we mark a sad passing only hours ago legendary writer and film director nora ephron died from complications brought on by leukemia. she created complex female characters who captured american hearts and always seemed to triumph in the end to humor and smarts, sort of like the lady herself. abc's david wright salutes a hollywood legend. >> reporter: you might say she was the aaron sorkin of romantic comedy. ♪ it had to be you

♪ >> reporter: a writer so gifted. when harry met salary boy meets girl formula when the chaerlracs were so smart, so quirky. >> so you're saying a man can become friends with a woman he finds attractive. >> reporter: their quanda quand universal it outlasts big hair. >> men don't want to be friends with women. they have already got friends. they've got friends that they can talk to about important things like baseball statistics, things like that. women, on the other hand, want to be friends with men because they think if i could just understand them, then maybe it wouldn't be so hard. >> oh, god. >> reporter: in the most famous scene in the film, sally lets harry in on a female secret to sex. >> yes! yes! yes!

oh! oh! oh! oh, god. oh. >> i'll have what she's having. >> reporter: a writer so talented she could even make billy crystal a credible leading man. >> are you comfortable? >> sure. >> reporter: with tom hanks it was less of a stretch. >> thinking about seattle. >> reporter: he starred opposite meg ryan in two of efron's films. in "sleepless in seattle" playing a man who is single through no fault of his own. >> i just want someone i can have a decent conversation with over dinner without falling over some weepy movie. >> reporter: in "you've got mail" he was the businessman who secretly has a heart of gold.

movies in which the girl rescues the guy, not the other way around. and when efron penned bewitched became a marvel. in real life efron famously married carl bernstein in 1976 at the height of his watergate fame. she was one of the handful of people who claimed to know the true identity of deep throat, bernstein's secret service. and "heartburn" was inspired by the meltdown of that marriage after she'd discovered he'd had an affair with a mutual friend. bernstein threatened to sue but never did. in hollywood, efron was beloved for writing strong female characters. the sort of characters meryl streep would play. karen silkwood in silkwood discovered a true whistle-blower

at a nuclear plant. julia child in julie and julia about a famous chef and efron herself in "heartburn." >> i highly recommend having meryl streep play you. if your husband is cheating on you with a car hop, get meryl to play you. you'll feel much better. >> reporter: in nora ephron's life as in her films, humor is what helped make love possible and heartbreak bearable. nora ephron died today of leukemia at age 71. and she will be missed. >> indeed. our thanks to david. outpouring stars like tom hanks, meryl streep have expressed their condolences to her family. to which i owe my own, we were friends for the past 25 years. ever want to know what it's

like to jam with justin bieber? well, my co-anchor bill weir finds out next. well the kids wanted a puppy, but they can be really expensive. so to save money i just found them a possum. dad, i think he's dead. probably just playin' possum.

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a generation ago, parents were scared of elvis. and then the beatles. well, today teenage pop star justin bieber has millions of americans' young daughters wrapped around his little finger. so one dad set out to unravel the mystery. here's my co-anchor bill weir. >> reporter: the first time i met justin bieber -- he looked like he just arrived from a land of r&b elves. >> taught yourself guitar,

trumpet, piano? >> yeah. >> reporter: he was a puppy, adorable beyond and impossible to resist. ♪ >> reporter: well, those days are over. because in the eyes of the law, this molten moppet is now a man. >> great to see you. >> great to see you, too. >> reporter: a man who makes our young daughters do this. so long as he gazes from a pillowcase from my 15-year-old niece, i get to hear about tattoos, and whether he punched a paparazzi last month as reported. >> i can't talk about that. >> reporter: but before we get to that, there are things that moms and dads are able to judge, his music. >> if they take the time and it's different and it's new, i think people will really be surprised. >> reporter: fair enough. ♪ love love me do ♪ >> reporter: if the beatles can

go from "love me" let's dig in. ♪ if i was your boyfriend never let you go ♪ >> reporter: boyfriend, more bass, more falsetto, but laced with lyrics that have sent more dopamine than donny osmond. i figured out the chords. >> you figured it out, okay. three, two -- "if i was your boyfriend i'd never let you go i'd never be alone ♪ and i could be a gentleman anything you want but if i was your boyfriend i'd never let you go ♪ >> i know that. >> want to go to the bus station and make some money? >> maybe we can. >> you don't need any. i can use some. but when you hear that, did you

write that hook? >> yeah, me and mike kloza. he's a good writer. >> and you do chords first or how do you -- >> it was already a production. so the beat was there. so we kind of went in and wrote lyrics and melody. yeah, that's how it happened. ♪ baby, baby baby oh you would be mine ♪ >> reporter: with a song like that, when you're 14, flirtatious, you're in the video. ♪ i'd like to be >> reporter: when you sound like that when you're 18, it adds a whole other sense of danger to that. how do you think about that? how do you manage that for the young girl fans? >> my music's definitely developing. i'm growing up. i'm becoming a man. my fans are growing up with me. >> reporter: for a teen raised

first by a young single mom and then by a team of handlers around the globe, signs of rebellion are amazingly hard to find. even when he does get a tattoo, it's the sort that would make his devout christian mom proud. >> it's jesus. i thought i'd never get tired of that. >> and are you devout in a moral sense? a lot of christians believe you should save yourself for marriage? >> i don't judge anybody. god's the only one that can judge you. >> everybody, if they're lucky, has that thunder clap, swept off your feet romance at some point in your life. has that happened to you yet? >> i'm still growing. i'm finding out what love is every day and learning. >> reporter: at one point, an attractive woman pondered into the interview stage, and justin reminded us all of his

red-bloodedness. >> you can walk by anytime. >> reporter: makes you wonder what selena gomez might say, according to my source who sleeps under the poster, the two are going steady but she asked not to talk about her. >> that's when my fans are going to start resenting me. yeah, we're so in love, they don't want to hear that. as much as i don't want to talk about that, because that's not what it's about. ♪ this girl she wouldn't stop almost had to call the cops ♪ >> reporter: but bieber found musical inspiration of a woman who falsely accused him of fathering a child during a backstage hookup. >> did you want to take the paternal test? >> i just wanted it to be over. >> you got a song out of it? >> yeah, i got a song out of it.

everything happens for a reason. that's what i like to say. >> reporter: you know what, he really seems to believe he got famous for a reason. and he seems to respect that power. so in the end, your daughters could be in love with a lot worse. justin, one more request, on the next tour, would it kill you to mix in some emilio? he's canadian. and then the dads, he can share a little. ♪ >> way to go, bill. bieber's new album "believe" is in stores now. and we will be right back. [ male announcer ] aggressive styling. a more fuel-efficient turbocharged engine. and a completely redesigned interior. ♪ the 2012 c-class with over 2,000 refinements. it's amazing...inside and out. see your authorized

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one father's life forever. a terrible crime that took his wife and two little boys and left him critically wounded,

only to culminate in a shocking twist. but the tale of forgiveness in the face of astonishing betrayal. >> i want to take you to a very dark time. a dark valley in my life. >> reporter: kerry cappy is a survivor of a murder attempt. arson that burned down his house. and most horrific of all, he survived when his wife and two sons, 13-year-old bubba and 8-year-old tyler did not. >> so let's go back to that horrible night. >> i was sound asleep in my bed. then the gunshots went off. took a shot in the face. fell out of bed. >> now, abc's "final witness" cinematically re-creates the drama. >> all i see is the smoke, i'm bleeding, choking, in shock. i thought, i got to get to my

children. i saw her, it was just a terrible scene. nearly decapitated. i knew she was gone. >> the children were also executed. bubba was shot in the face. tyler was shot to death as he cowered in the closet. >> and he crawled to the neighbors to tell them that one the killers was the 16-year-old boyfriend of their daughter. terry said he wanted to die until he was told that erin was alive. >> then i had some hope, something to live for. >> but the hope was quickly extingui extinguished. police arrested erin for plotting the murderers and two others. what was your reaction?

>> i can remember raising up in the hospital bed screaming out, no, no, not erin. >> why would erin do such a thing? the answer was simple and complex, for love. two nights before the murders they had forbidden her to see him again. >> i was very angry. not only was i angry at god. but i was angry at my daughter. these two young men. the other men that drove the getaway car. i was angry. >> but he said god showed him another way. what is most remarkable is what happened next. terry forgave them all. asking that they be spared the death penalty. >> there are a lot of people sitting at home saying how could you. doesn't it dishonor your dead boys, your dead wife by forgiving? >> when you forgive, you're not just doing it for the other person, you're doing it for yourself. because when you hold on to that

unforgiveness. they own you. you relive it over 'over. it wasn't until i forgive that i could experience that. >> he visits erin in prison every few months, and yet for all the smiles, sadness is never far away. you'll never walk her down the aisle. i mean all of those things that fathers look forward to with their little girls. >> yes. >> so you've lost those things, too. >> that's a hard thing there. that's a daddy's dream, to walk the little girl down the aisle and hand her off. >> have you talked about what happened with her? >> i have. she's very remorseful. we both have sit and cried over this. >> so she's acknowledged to you her role? >> she has. even though she didn't actually

come in and commit the crime, she knows her responsibility, she could have stopped it. she didn't. >> because the others say it was her idea. >> uh-huh. >> does she admit to that? >> no, she always stated that charlie was the first one to initiate the conversation. >> prosecutors believe she did plot the crime and she won't be eligible for parole until she's 59 years old. by then, terry will be well into his 80s. >> do you want her to be released? >> i do. >> my prayer is i'll live long enough, i want to go and get erin, i want us to walk away arm in arm and never look back. >> terry cappey's book "terror by night" is in stores now. it airs right here tomorrow night on abc. tomorrow, tune in for an interview with charlie sheen. good night, america. "jimmy kimmel live" next.