Diane Keaton’s Then Again: La-Di-Dah Divulged

By Victoria Looseleaf

Annie Hall. Reds. The Godfather trilogy. But before those incredible flicks, there was this: Diane Keaton* was one of the only members of the original Broadway cast of Hair – to keep her clothes on. And she is not reticent to talk about bodies in her touching memoir, Then Again (Random House).

Indeed, who knew that Woody Allen had a, er, great body? Hmm. This is one of the reveals in the book that is part Diane Keaton, part valentine to her two adopted children, Dexter and Duke, and part tribute to Dorothy Hall Keaton, the actor’s mother, who died in 2008 after fading from Alzheimer’s and whose journals (below), help comprise this exquisitely rendered tome.

But back to the body: Keaton, we were surprised to learn, admits to having struggled with bulimia for a number of years. Yes, this trend-setting fashionista (ooh, the hats, the ties, the vests…), graphically chronicles the huge amounts of food she downed – only to regurgitate said comestibles – in one sitting. (Hello, hamburgers, steaks, ice cream, hot apple pie, KFC, fries with blue cheese and ketchup – we think we’ll try that dish – and more).

In so doing (not sitting, but hunched over the toilet), she tells us, she’s adding her name to an already familiar list of food abusers, one that includes Jane Fonda (click here for our interview with that legendary star), Princess Diana, Karen Carpenter and today’s waifs such as Lindsay Lohan and Mary- Kate Olsen. (We’re not much into the last two names, and think they would do better to, well, read a book on occasion; for more on body fascism, click here.)

Food binging behind her, Keaton is nothing if not sensitive (her being extremely smart goes without saying). So while we dig the above-mentioned revelations, we find that the author’s deep feelings for her mother, who excelled at collage-making and photography but never had the opportunity to be a professional (Dorothy was a dutiful wife and mother of four), are beautifully mined here. Indeed, extracts from her mother’s perceptive letters and journals are artfully arranged in patterns alongside Keaton’s own reflections on her mother’s life. (A shout-out to the design team at Random House is in order, fersure!)

And while the mother/daughter relationship courses through the book, we admit that we especially loved learning about the three main squeezes of Keaton’s life, pre-adoption, that is, in spite of the fact that none of the flames proved romantically enduring. About Woody Allen, who helped her win a well-deserved Oscar for Annie Hall, (which also featured a weird-even-then Christopher Walken, one of our favorite hoofer/actors), Keaton writes that Allen is a genius who remains “borderline repulsed by the grotesque nature of my affection.”

Although she doesn’t go into detail about Allen’s body, Keaton does cut to the heart of what she feels about her thespianism: “Without a great man writing and directing for me, I was a mediocre movie star at best.” Hah – it should be that simple. Diane, you’re far too modest.

She also takes cues from Warren, as in Beatty, who directed her in Reds and whom she describes as, “smart, lawyer-smart … a mind-blowing dream of drop-dead gorgeous.” Keaton was smitten, writing: “Once Warren chose to shine his light on you, there was no going back.” (We’re not averse to having that light shine on us some time, nor the light of his sister,  Shirley MacLaine, who joins the cast of Downton Abbey next season and is receiving an AFI Lifetime Achievement Award in June.)

But we digress: Another Keaton confession is that Al Pacino had been the love of her life, from his, “killer Roman nose” to his “Al-ness” (okay, that’s our word, not hers, but we, too, worship at the altar of Pacino, his recent bad movie, Son of No One, aside). Keaton and Pacino made the Godfather films together, beginning their affair during GF I, and resuming it years later, with Keaton’s marriage ultimatum putting the kibosh on their hearts-and-flowers’ bond. (We never interviewed director Francis Ford Coppola…some day, perhaps, but we did interview his daughter, Sofia – who made a misguided appearance in GF III – for her equally misfiring, Somewhere.) And somewhere in her book, Keaton, ever alert and open to all that life offers, acknowledges that Pacino made her “think about the difference between being an artist and being artistic. I knew where I stood. I was artistic.”

Bah. Diane Keaton has always been an artist. And still is. We loved Then Again for its charm, frankness and originality. But, then again, that is what Diane Keaton, now 66, remains, her extraordinary acting only part of the equation. Besides, anyone who gets to kiss both Keanu Reeves and Jack Nicholson at age 58 in Something’s Gotta Give, is, in our book – and hers – absolutely fabulous!

*Full disclosure: Having been a huge fan of Keaton’s, we had the pleasure of being with her on various occasions over the years, notably dinners celebrating Grace Johansen. A spitfire of an elderly lady that Keaton cast in her documentary, Heaven, Johansen died in 2000. The nonagenarian also appeared on our now-defunct cable access TV show, The Looseleaf Report, with Keaton there for moral support and Bud Cort helping conduct a wonderfully quirky interview. (Talk about quirky: Click here to read our LA Times interview with Cort and ballet superstar Vladimir Malakhov, in which they discuss a terpischorean Harold and Maude.) Carol Kane, Cort and Keaton also helped Gracie during the last years of her life, ultimately arranging a beautiful service for her at Hollywood Forever Cemetery. (Diane, at left, with her son Duke)