Woody Allen’s written a remembrance of Diane Keaton which appears today in The Free Press.
Allen turns 90 on November 30th. In the last year or so he’s lost Keaton, Tony Roberts, and two close collaborators, Marshall Brickman and Doug McGrath — all much younger. It’s no fun getting old.
You can see Woody’s deep affection for Keaton in this piece. I’m told he did visit with her a few months ago when he went to Los Angeles to do Bill Maher’s TV show. But their unique partnership is one for the ages.
Here are some highlights:
“I first laid eyes on her lanky beauty at an audition and thought, If
Huckleberry Finn was a gorgeous young woman, he’d be Keaton. Fresh out of
Orange County, she flew to Manhattan to act, got a job as a coat check
girl, and was hired for a small part in the musical Hair, in which she
eventually had the lead.”
“For the first week of rehearsal we never spoke a word to one another.
She was shy, I was shy, and with two shy people things can get pretty
dull. Finally, by chance we took a break at the same moment and wound
up sharing a fast bite at some Eighth Avenue joint. That was our first
moment of personal contact. The upshot is that she was so charming,
so beautiful, so magical, that I questioned my sanity. I thought: Could I be in love so quickly?”
“As time went on I made movies for an audience of one, Diane Keaton. I
never read a single review of my work and cared only what Keaton had
to say about it. If she liked it, I counted the film as an artistic success.
“During the few years we lived together, she taught me so much.
Example: Before I met her I never heard of bulimia. We’d go to Knicks
games and after to Frankie and Johnnie’s for a steak. She’d put away a
sirloin, hash browns, marble cheesecake, and coffee. Then we’d get
home, and moments later she’d be toasting waffles or packing a huge
taco with pork. I would stand there, stunned. This slim actress ate like
Paul Bunyan. Only years later when she wrote a memoir did she
describe her eating disorder, but when I was experiencing it, I could only
think I’d never seen anyone eat like that outside of a documentary on
whales.”
“She went on to date a number of exciting men, all of them more
fascinating than I was. I went on to keep trying to make that great
masterpiece that I am still struggling with when I last looked. I kidded
Keaton that we’d wind up—she like Norma Desmond, me like Erich von
Stroheim, once her director, now her chauffeur. But the world is
constantly being redefined, and with Keaton’s passing it is redefined
once again. A few days ago the world was a place that included Diane
Keaton. Now it’s a world that does not. Hence, it’s a drearier world. Still, there are her movies. And her great laugh still echoes in my head.”
