Diane
Keaton wishes she had
married – but was
never asked
She is on the Today Show right now discussing her book. She point blank said she wishes she had married but none of the men she dated ever asked. She was very interesting and honest about her sense of beauty, relationships, Woody Allen, and fame.
Here is another interview: Diane Keaton on Woody Allen’s feet, Al Pacino’s nose
Actress Diane Keaton, 68, explores aging, beauty and the men in her life in her new book, Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty (Random House). She discussed it, along with Al Pacino’s nose, Woody Allen’s feet and life as a single mom, with USA TODAY’s Bob Minzesheimer.
Q: Can you explain the book’s title?
A: It’s a phrase I used in so many aspects of my life. It wasn’t pretty. It started when I was about 10 and looked in the mirror and it wasn’t pretty (laughs). It was the first time I recognized I wasn’t going to be so pretty. The main flaw I saw was my nose. I wouldn’t say it was a W.C. Fields nose. It wasn’t that bulbous, but it was bulbous. And my **** seemed larger than I thought. That became a way of seeing who I was and what I wanted and feeling disappointed. I think this is a dilemma many women go through. I don’t think many men have that reaction to their faces or bodies. But as I got older, I was able to define the differences between pretty and beauty.
Q: Which is what?
A: Pretty is a self-serving situation in which it’s all about you. People who were pretty were superficial, but they were not beautiful. Beauty requires more depth. Like in the book, I mention Natalie Wood who had this aspect of sadness, something more going
Q: Whose idea was the book cover, where you’re hiding behind a hat.
A: Mine. I thought I’d have hard time selling that photograph. But it says, "How much can you hide?" It grabs your eyes.
Q: But you’re not hiding on the back cover.
A: And I like that. It looks like me and I look happy.
Q: In the book, you ask but don’t exactly answer a question: "Is it authentic for me to seek out attention by wearing ‘eccentric’ clothes with a lifetime of hats?"
A: Well, what’s authentic? I think everyone has a choice. Whatever they want to do, that’s authentic.
Q: And how many hats do you have?
A: The hat I’m wearing I’ve had for about 20 years, so it’s not like they change around a lot. But I have been interested in a variety of hats – bowler hats and ****ball caps. Just **** it, I own it. Maybe 50.
Q: And shoes, which you advise saving?
A: I do believe in saving shoes. But that does not make me a hoarder. I am not a hoarder. But why not save them? Styles come back. Platforms did. I probably have more shoes than hats. At least 55 pairs of shoes.
Q: You also write about your "Spock-like" ears. Really?
A: They’re big, but not Bing Crosby big. And I haven’t pinned them back – yet.
Q: Moving on to hair, you quote a former boyfriend, Warren Beatty,that hair is "60percent of good looks." You agree?
A: You know he made the movie Shampoo? It depends on how obsessed you are with hair. In my case, I do think about it in the 60 percentile. I do think about my thinning hair.
Q: You write about living near an ocean-front cliff in Los Angeles despite your father’s advice, "Don’t buy near a landside area. Don’t live in the hills. Don’t marry a bum."
A: I don’t live on the bluff. I am a block away from the buff. But I didn’t always take my father’s advice…
Q: You write about your friendships and romances with several co-stars, including Woody Allen, who didn’t like to go barefoot, even while strolling on a beach, which you found hilarious. How so?
A: I grew in Southern California and we camped out and had our feet in the sand. We were people of the earth, but I never knew anyone quite like Woody. He was not accustomed to putting his feet in the sand. I loved laughing at him, but he did more than his fair share of laughing at me. Which made life fun with Woody. I write in the book about how he said to me, "You’re beautiful even if you were wearing a beekeeper’s hat." (laughs) I mean really? Come on, that’s genius.
Q: What do you say to people who don’t know whether to believe Woody or his adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow,who’s accused him of child abuse?
A: I’m his friend, so I believe Woody.
Q: You also write about Al Pacino…
A: Let’s talk about his nose. The best nose I’ve ever seen. Bar none. I wouldn’t mind taking a look at that nose again.
Q: What did you mean when you write about "the lure of Al" and "losing a man I’d never had."
A: (Laughs.) How do you lose something you never had? There’s probably no end to the ways you could try to properly seduce him into becoming something you want in your mind — that he would commit to me. It was probably never going to happen. Many people told me at the time, but I wouldn’t hear it. That shows my pig-headedness, just like my Grammy Hall.
Q: You write you will never marry. You sure?
A: Getting married at age 68? I wouldn’t bet on it. For anyone – for the first time? It takes a lot to marry someone and by the time you’re 68, you pretty much know what your limitations are. I could see being a companion with someone. Maybe a dog.
Q: Don’t you have a dog?
A: Maybe a few more.
Q: You became a single mother at 50. (Keaton has two adopted kids: daughter Dexter, is 18; son Duke in 13.) How’s that going at 68?
A : (Laughs). I think the growth of the brain is a slow process. I think about choices I made and how immature I was. It just gets more complex as time goes on. But you do change and the more you accept change and embrace change, the better. I do see all these changes in them. It’s been fun, but it would be nice if they had had a father.
Q: Do they ask you about that?
A: No. They’re not curious enough or they’re curious but afraid to confront the issues of being adopted. I don’t think that’s a walk in the park. I do think a male presence would be a good addition. But to be a single woman, and not being privileged like I am, and you have to work and you’re just getting by? Oh, God, I think, how do they do it?
Q: Your next movie, And So It Goes (opening July 11), is your first with Michael Douglas. How was that?
A: He’s such a pro, but a bit of a mystery. I don’t know him well, but he doesn’t mind being teased. Which is good for me because when I’m opposite a man in a romantic movie, I like to loosen it up a bit.
Q: No plans to retire?
A: Never. Why? By retire, I don’t know what that means. Some people say they’re retired and it means they have time to do things they want to do. I have always had the privilege to engage in my hobbies as if they were work. And they are. So hobbies are work, but work that you want to do; they are play. Retirement? That sounds like you’re going to passively walk into the sunset and disappear. The sooner the better because what are you doing? Nothing! Although for some people, maybe just sitting and relaxing is another exploration. So what do I know?
