Diane Keaton, Oscar-winning star of ‘Annie Hall’ and ‘The Godfather,’
dies at 79
[October 13, 2025]
By LINDSEY BAHR
Diane Keaton, the Oscar-winning star of “Annie Hall,” “The Godfather”
films and “Father of the Bride,” whose quirky, vibrant manner and depth
made her one of the most singular actors of a generation, has died. She
was 79.
A family member told The Associated Press that Keaton died in California
with loved ones. People magazine first reported the death on Saturday,
noting that her health had suddenly declined. No other details were
immediately available and representatives did not respond to request for
comment.
The unexpected news was met with shock around the world.
Francis Ford Coppola, who cast her in “The Godfather,” wrote on
Instagram that, “Words can’t express the wonder and talent of Diane
Keaton. Endlessly intelligent, so beautiful...Everything about Diane was
creativity personified.”
Bette Midler, who she costarred with Keaton in “The First Wives Club,"
wrote, “She was hilarious, a complete original, and completely without
guile, or any of the competitiveness one would have expected from such a
star. What you saw was who she was…oh, la, lala!"
Leonardo DiCaprio, who played her nephew in “Marvin's Room" when he was
18, wrote on Instagram that she was “one of a kind. Brilliant, funny and
unapologetically herself...she will be deeply missed."
Keaton was the kind of actor who helped make films iconic and timeless,
from her “La-dee-da, la-dee-da” phrasing as Annie Hall, bedecked in that
necktie, bowler hat, vest and khakis, to her heartbreaking turn as Kay
Adams, the woman unfortunate enough to join the Corleone family.
Her star-making performances in the 1970s, many of which were in Woody
Allen films, were not a flash in the pan either, and she would continue
to charm new generations for decades thanks in part to a longstanding
collaboration with filmmaker Nancy Meyers.
She played a businessperson who unexpectedly inherits an infant in “Baby
Boom,” the mother of the bride in the beloved remake of “Father of the
Bride,” a newly single woman in “The First Wives Club,” and a divorced
playwright who gets involved with Jack Nicholson's music executive in
“Something's Gotta Give.”
Keaton won an Oscar for “Annie Hall” and would go on to be nominated
three more times, for “Reds,” playing the journalist and suffragist
Louise Bryant, “Marvin's Room," as a caregiver who suddenly needs care
herself, and “Something's Gotta Give," as a middle-aged divorcee who is
the object of several men's affections.
In her very Keaton way, upon accepting her Oscar in 1978 she laughed and
said, “This is something.”
A child of Hollywood breaks through in New York
Keaton was born Diane Hall in January 1946 in Los Angeles, though her
family was not part of the film industry she would find herself in. Her
mother was a homemaker and photographer, and her father was in real
estate and civil engineering, and both would inspire her love in the
arts, from fashion to architecture.
Keaton was drawn to theater and singing while in school in Santa Ana,
California, and she dropped out of college after a year to make a go of
it in Manhattan. Actors’ Equity already had a Diane Hall in their ranks,
and she took Keaton, her mother’s maiden name, as her own.
She studied under Sanford Meisner in New York and has credited him with
giving her the freedom to “chart the complex terrain of human behavior
within the safety of his guidance. It made playing with fire fun.”
“More than anything, Sanford Meisner helped me learn to appreciate the
darker side of behavior,” she wrote in her 2012 memoir, “Then Again.” “I
always had a knack for sensing it but not yet the courage to delve into
such dangerous, illuminating territory.”
She started on the stage as an understudy in the Broadway production for
“Hair,” and in Allen’ s “Play It Again, Sam” in 1968, for which she
would receive a Tony nomination. And yet she remained deeply
self-conscious about her appearance and battled bulimia in her 20s.
Becoming a star with “The Godfather” and Woody Allen
Keaton made her film debut in the 1970 romantic comedy “Lovers and Other
Strangers,” but her big breakthrough would come a few years later when
she was cast in Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather,” which won best
picture and become one of the most beloved films of all time. And yet
even she hesitated to return for the sequel, though after reading the
script she decided otherwise.
She summed up her role as Kay, a role she never related to even though
she savored memories of acting with Al Pacino.
The 1970s were an incredibly fruitful time for Keaton thanks in part to
her ongoing collaboration with Allen in both comedic and dramatic roles.
She appeared in “Sleeper,” “Love and Death,” “Interiors,” Manhattan,”
and the film version of “Play it Again, Sam.” The 1977 crime-drama
“Looking for Mr. Goodbar” also earned her raves.
Allen and the late Marshall Brickman gave Keaton one of her most iconic
roles in “Annie Hall,” the infectious woman from Chippewa Falls whom
Allen’s Alvy Singer cannot get over. The film is considered one of the
great romantic comedies of all time, with Keaton’s eccentric,
self-deprecating Annie at its heart.
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Oscar winners Charles H. Joffe, winner of best picture for "Annie
Hall," left, and Diane Keaton, winner of best actress for "Annie
Hall," poses with presenter Jack Nicholson, and producer Jack
Rollins at the Academy Awards in Los Angeles on April 3, 1978. (AP
Photo, File)
In the New York Times, critic Vincent Canby wrote, “As Annie Hall, Miss
Keaton emerges as Woody Allen’s Liv Ullman. His camera finds beauty and
emotional resources that somehow escape the notice of other directors.
Her Annie Hall is a marvelous nut.”
She acknowledged parallels between Annie Hall and real life, while also
downplaying them.
“My last name is Hall. Woody and I did share a significant romance,
according to me, anyway,” she wrote. “I did want to be a singer. I was
insecure, and I did grope for words."
Keaton and Allen were also in a romantic relationship, from about 1968,
when she met him while auditioning for his play, until about 1974.
Afterward they remained collaborators and friends. She later appeared in
“Radio Days,” in 1987, and “Manhattan Murder Mystery," in 1993.
“He was so hip, with his thick glasses and cool suits,” Keaton wrote in
her memoir. “But it was his manner that got me, his way of gesturing,
his hands, his coughing and looking down in a self-deprecating way while
he told jokes.”
She was also romantically linked to Pacino, who played her husband in
“The Godfather,” and Warren Beatty who directed her and whom she
co-starred with in “Reds.” She never married but did adopt two children
when she was in her 50s: a daughter, Dexter, and a son, Duke.
“I figured the only way to realize my number-one dream of becoming an
actual Broadway musical comedy star was to remain an adoring daughter.
Loving a man, a man, and becoming a wife, would have to be put aside,”
she wrote in the memoir.
“The names changed, from Dave to Woody, then Warren, and finally Al.
Could I have made a lasting commitment to them? Hard to say.
Subconsciously I must have known it could never work, and because of
this they’d never get in the way of achieving my dreams.”
When Keaton met Nancy Meyers
Not all of Keaton’s roles were home runs, like her foray into action in
George Roy Hill’s John le Carré adaptation of “Little Drummer Girl.” But
in 1987 she’d begin another long-standing collaboration with Nancy
Meyers, which would result in four beloved films. Reviews for that first
outing, “Baby Boom,” directed by Charles Shyer, might have been mixed at
the time but Pauline Kael even described Keaton’s as a “glorious comedy
performance that rides over many of the inanities.”
Their next team-up would be in the remake of “Father of the Bride,”
which Shyer directed and co-wrote with Meyers. She and Steve Martin
played the flustered parents to the bride which would become a big hit
and spawn a sequel.
In 2003, Meyers would direct her in “Something’s Gotta Give,” a romantic
comedy in which she begins a relationship with a playboy womanizer,
played by Jack Nicholson, while also being pursued by a younger doctor,
played by Keanu Reeves. Her character Erica Barry, with her beautiful
Hamptons home and ivory outfits was a key inspiration for the recent
costal grandmother fashion trend. It earned her what would be her last
Oscar nomination and, later, she’d call it her favorite film.
She also directed occasionally, with works including an episode of “Twin
Peaks,” a Belinda Carlisle music video and the sister dramedy “Hanging
Up,” which Nora Eprhon and Delia Ephron co-wrote, and she starred in
alongside Meg Ryan and Lisa Kudrow.
Keaton continued working steadily throughout the 2000s, with notable
roles in “The Family Stone,” as a dying matriarch reluctant to give her
ring to her son, in “Morning Glory,” as a morning news anchor, and the
“Book Club” films.
She wrote several books as well, including memoirs “Then Again” and
“Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty,” and an art and design book, “The
House that Pinterest Built.”
Keaton was celebrated with an AFI Life Achievement Award in 2017,
telling the AP at the time that it was a surreal experience.
“I feel like it’s the wedding I never had, or the big gathering I never
had, or the retirement party I never had, or all these things that I
always avoided — the big bash,” she said. “It’s really a big event for
me and I’m really, deeply grateful.”
In 2022, she “cemented” her legacy with a hand and footprint ceremony
outside the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles, with her children
looking on.
“I don’t think about my film legacy," she said at the event. "I’m just
lucky to have been here at all in any way, shape or form. I’m just
fortunate. I don’t see myself anything other than that.”
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AP National Writer Hillel Italie in New York and AP reporter Ryan
Pearson in Los Angeles contributed.
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