Diane Keaton 1946-2025

I’m getting to this a few days late due to being out of town, driving through a nor’easter and trying to exorcise a gremlin from the comments section, BUT…

I think we failed Diane Keaton. Or Hollywood did. Maybe both. On the film industry’s part, the actress was hard to pigeonhole, with a loose-limbed serendipity that could shine when placed next to obdurate or obtuse men but that was harder to frame in conventional leading roles. We remember her opposite Al Pacino in “The Godfather” (1972), Woody Allen in “Annie Hall” (1977), Warren Beatty in “Reds” (1981), Jack Nicholson in “Something’s Gotta Give” (2003). As an above-the-title star, Keaton is probably best remembered for “Looking for Mr. Goodbar” (1977), a nervy performance as a woman exploring her sexuality in a movie that ultimately punished her for it. (The message was that free love equals death, so take that, feminists.)