Diane Keaton, one of the best-loved film stars of the past 50 years, has died at the age of 79 in California.
The news was confirmed by People magazine. Further details are not available at this time and her loved ones have asked for privacy, according to a family spokesperson.
Keaton’s death came as a shock across Hollywood and the rest of the world. The actor had not been in the public eye for some months, but no illness had been announced.
People quotes a source close to the actor saying that Keaton’s health had “declined very suddenly” over the past months, adding that even many of her longtime friends “weren’t fully aware of what was happening”.
Her frequent co-star De Niro told the Hollywood Reporter: “I am very sad to hear of Diane’s passing. I was very fond of her and the news of her leaving us has taken me totally by surprise. I was not expecting her to leave us. She will be missed. May she rest in peace.”
In a statement shared with the Guardian, Meryl Streep, who starred alongside her in Marvin’s Room, called Keaton: “Our American treasure: indelible singular girl and brilliant artist. Crushing news that she is gone, but her smile and her style and antic spirit will live on film and in our hearts forever.”
Leonardo DiCaprio, who acted alongside both women in the film, called Keaton “brilliant, funny, and unapologetically herself” on Instagram stories. “A legend, an icon, and a truly kind human being.”
Bette Midler, Keaton’s co-star in The First Wives Club, said on Instagram: “The brilliant, beautiful, extraordinary Diane Keaton has died. I cannot tell you how unbearably sad this makes me. She was hilarious, 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!”
Mary Steenburgen told Deadline that her co-star in the Book Club films was “magic. There was no one, nor will there ever be, anyone like her. I loved her and felt blessed to be her friend.”
Fellow Book Club star Jane Fonda, meanwhile, posted that she found it “hard to believe … or accept … that Diane has passed. She was always a spark of life and light, constantly giggling at her own foibles, being limitlessly creative … in her acting, her wardrobe, her books, her friends, her homes, her library, her worldview.
“Unique is what she was. And, though she didn’t know it or wouldn’t admit it, man she was a fine actress!”
Keaton directed two music videos for the singer Belinda Carlisle, who wrote on X that she was “kind and eccentric and I was blessed to know her”.
Also posting on X, the actor Ben Stiller called Keaton “One of the greatest film actors ever. An icon of style, humor and comedy. Brilliant. What a person.” Director Paul Feig posted that he was “so honored to call Diane Keaton a friend. She was an amazingly kind and creative person who also just happened to be a Hollywood legend. She has been taken from us far too soon.”
Nancy Sinatra said on X: “Diane Keaton has left us and I can’t tell you how profoundly sad that makes me. I adored her — idolised her. She was a very special person and an incredibly gifted actor, who made each of her roles unforgettable.”
Viola Davis, meanwhile, who did not share a screen credit with Keaton, although they were both originally slated to star in 2019’s Otherhood, posted to Instagram: “No!! No!!! No!! God, not yet, NO!!! Man… you defined womanhood. The pathos, humor, levity, your ever-present youthfulness and vulnerability — you tattooed your SOUL into every role, making it impossible to imagine anyone else inhabiting them. You were undeniably, unapologetically YOU!!! Loved you. Man… rest well. God bless your family, and I know angels are flying you home.”
An enduring and singular icon of cinema since her Oscar-winning turn in 1977’s Annie Hall – which her director, writer, co-star and former boyfriend Woody Allen based heavily on her own life – Keaton starred in some of the key movies of the last half century.
Her keen self-deprecation, gift for comedy and distinctive dress sense – rarely seen without a hat, turtleneck or man’s tie and wide trousers – made her both highly distinctive and impossible to emulate.
Her first major film role was opposite Al Pacino in Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather – she reprised the role of Michael Corleone’s wife in the two sequels. Other Oscar nominations were earned for her performances in Reds (1981), Marvin’s Room (1996) and Something’s Gotta Give (2003).
Meanwhile, dramas such as Looking for Mr Goodbar, Shoot the Moon and The Good Mother established her as an actor unafraid of playing difficult and unlikable women.
Keaton and Allen first collaborated on the stage version of Play It Again, Sam, for which she was Tony nominated in 1971, before going on to work together for eight films, including Sleeper (1973), Love and Death (1975) and Manhattan (1979).
In 1993, Keaton took on the role written for Mia Farrow in Manhattan Murder Mystery and remained a staunch supporter of Allen after the accusation by Farrow that he had abused their adopted daughter, Dylan.
Writing on Instagram in the wake of Keaton’s death, both of Allen’s adopted daughters with his wife, Soon-Yi Allen, posted their tributes to the actor, with Manzie saying she was “absolutely heartbroken”.
Keaton went on to make a remarkable number of other popular and landmark comedies as well as those with Allen, including Baby Boom, Father of the Bride (and its sequels), The First Wives Club and Book Club.
The sequel to that film, Book Club: The Next Chapter, released in 2023, looks set to be one of the last projects featuring Keaton. Speaking to the Guardian to promote it, she addressed why she chose to remain so prolific, making seven films since the start of the pandemic.
“It gives me an opportunity to get to know more people in a different realm,” she said. “I love it. It’s all interesting. It’s never dull, ever, life.”
She also explained her love for photographing doors and abandoned shops, which she said she found poignant “because life is haunting! You have an idea in your mind of what it is, or what it should be, or what it could be. But it’s not that at all! It’s just things going up and down!”
In 1996, Keaton adopted a daughter, Dexter (named after Cary Grant’s character in The Philadelphia Story), and, four years later, a son, Duke. “Motherhood has completely changed me,” she said. “It’s just about like the most completely humbling experience that I’ve ever had.” Despite well-publicised relationships with some of her co-stars including Pacino and Warren Beatty, she remained unmarried.
Keaton cared for her own mother from her diagnosis with Alzheimer’s in 1993 until her death in 2008, and devoted much of her own autobiographies to recounting her mother’s life and publishing her diaries.
“She was everything to me,” she said of her mother. “She was wonderful. She was my example for what you can do with life. She was the heart of everything that was best.”
Keaton was also the chief care-giver to her brother, Randy, who died in 2021, after years of mental-health problems.
As well as acting primarily for the big screen, Keaton did some TV work, including as a scheming nun in Jude Law TV series The Young Pope. She also had a sideline flipping properties in the US, as well as lending her name and creativity to ranges of homeware, clothing, glasses and wine.
In 2017, she was given a lifetime achievement award by the American Film Institute, in which she thanked her collaborators and sang Seems Like Old Times, the song her character sings in Annie Hall.
In 2022, she paid tribute to her parents while putting her hands into cement to be immortalised on the Hollywood walk of Fame, saying she was “still that little Dianey” who dreamed of being a movie star.
“As a girl growing up in Orange County, the mere thought of Hollywood Boulevard seemed like a mysterious dream that would never come true,” she said.
In December 2024, in what seems likely to be her final performance shared with the public, Keaton released her first single, a festive song called First Christmas, posting the video to Instagram. An enthusiastic adopter of social media, her last post was in April to mark National Pet Day, and featured a photograph of the actor with her beloved golden retriever, Reggie.
She is survived by her two younger sisters, Dorrie and Robin, as well as by Dexter, 29, and Duke, 25.