Diane Keaton RIP

I cannot, do not, want to think about a world where Diane Keaton isn't in it. Sadly she is now gone at the age of 79.

Diane Keaton was more than just a great actress, she was a cultural icon and a cinematic legend, an actress who could deeply impact you with her dramatic work, and make you laugh out loud with her comedica performances.

Diane Keaton's acting showed that she could do anything -- and it didn't look like she was acting at all.

Her filmography is oustanding: all three Godfather movies; many Woody Allen classics like Sleeper, Love & Death, Annie Hall (her Oscar), Manhattan; other movies like Looking for Mr Goodbar, Shoot the Moon, Marvin's Room, Father of the Bride, Something's Gotta Give, and, more recently, bizarre and brilliant The Young Pope series. 

Keaton was from and mostly lived in California but her 1970s classics -- The Godfather, Annie Hall and Manhattan -- remain something of the greatest movies and New York City movies ever made. One is the most classic NYC crime story ever told and the others are the two most classic NYC romantic comedies ever made. Her leading men were Al Pacino and Woody Allen -- how cool is that?

RIP Diane. We'll never see your like again. La di da. 

Here is the Mr NYC Diane Keaton archive. 

Manhattan - Woody Allen

Woody Allen's 1979 classic Manhattan is 30 years old this year and it certainly hasten lost any of its luster over time. It's as funny and poignant as ever. Before Seinfeld, before When Harry met Sally, before Friends, before Sex and the City, before all those TV shows and movies about yuppie life in NYC, Manhattan defined and influenced the sophisticated urban comedy. If you've never seen it, Manhattan revolves around TV writer Ike Davis (Woody) who quits his job to write a book. Meanwhile he's dating a 17 year old high school student (Mariel Hemingway, foreshadowing Soon-Yi) and getting involved with Mary (Diane Keaton) the mistress of his married best friend Yale (Michael Murphy). To make matters worse, his now lesbian ex-wife (Meryl Streep) is writing a tell-all book about their failed marriage. People lie, cheat, and steal each others hearts. While a very funny movie, Manhattan is, above all, a morality tale about how the way you treat people will eventually come back to haunt you (so people should treat each other well). Manhattan was Woody's first comedy after the Oscar-winning Annie Hall, and a lot of people consider it to be the superior film. In many ways, this was a daring film for its day. In 1979, New York City was in terrible economic shape and crime was exploding (as referenced in this opening from the movie). To make a movie celebrating NYC at the time wasn't a particularly cool thing to do. unlike n ow. Also, gay characters didn't appear in a whole lot of movies then, particularly gay people who were unapologetically "out" and happy about it. Not to the mention that Manhattan was shot in black and white which wasn't exactly something that set the box office on fire, then or now. Still, it's one of the most beautiful movies Woody has ever made and was actually one of his biggest hits ever. Woody Allen co-wrote Manhattan with Marshall Brickman (both had won Oscars for co-writing Annie Hall). Marshall Brickman would go on to write other movies and he's one of the writers of the big Broadway musical hit Jersey Boys. It was the last movie they would write together until 1993 when they co-wrote Manhattan Murder Mystery. Coincidentally enough, Manhattan is also the last movie that Woody and Diane Keaton made until Manhattan Murder Mystery. (After Manhattan, Diane Keaton moved to California and her next big movie was Reds in 1981). Sadly, this great triumvirate hasn't made a movie since 1993 and probably never will again but that's okay ... we'll always have Manhattan.

Review: "Manhattan Murder Mystery" (1993)

Of the fifty-something movies that Woody Allen has made over half-century, some are great classics, some are really good, some are just okay,  and some are entirely forgettable. 

One of my favorite of his movies that is often overlooked in his oeuvre is Manhattan Murder Mystery in 1993. It's actually really good. 

The story concerns a middle-aged, empty-nest couple named Larry  (Woody) and Carol (Diane Keaton) who live a good quiet Manhattan life with friends and work and culture and all that you could want from marriage and NYC. But Carol is bored -- and when she suspects that their neighbor might have murdered his wife, she takes it upon herself to investigate the "crime", dragging a very reluctant Larry along the way. What starts out as a lark becomes something much, more darker.

And, in the meantime, they talk a lot about the state of their marriage. 

By the time Woody made this movie, he had been directing movies for almost 25 years and was already wildly successful and acclaimed. And he was still challenging himself -- he shoots this movie in a documentary, fly-on-the-wall way. He manages to make the filming look casual but there's a steady intention to each shot, a real vision at work, and it's one of my favorite of his movies as matter of pure directing style. 

Then there's the cast -- Keaton, reuniting with Woody over a decade since Manhattan, is brilliant and Alan Alda and Angelica Huston, who had appeared, seperately, in Crimes & Misdemeanors a few years earlier, are excellent. And the movie manages to be both an intriguing mystery yarn while also a meditation on getting older and what you want out of the rest of your life.

And it's funny! Woody has made lots of funny movies but this might be one of his best. The humor is so understated that, when a joke arrives, it lands softly and firmly and really tickles your funny bone: "I can't listen to that much Wagner, I get this sudden urge to conquer Poland!" 

This movie was also a bit of a turning point in Woody's life and career. When he made it, he was going through his nasty custody battle with Mia Farrow, and that's why Diane Keaton replaced her in the movie (although Farrow, weirdly, after accussing Woody of child abuse, then showed up ready to work; Woody understandable didn't want to work with someone trying to put him in jail). He also wrote the script with his old partner, the recently deceased Marshall Brickman and their magic chemistry shows. 

Right after this Woody would make the classic Bullets Over Broadway and then begin an uneven series of movies until the triumph of Midnight in Paris in 2011. 

So I highly recommend this often forgotten Woody classic. It's not just a good movie, it's a balm. 

Diane Keaton on "The Tonight Show" -- December 28, 1972

On this night at the end of 1972, just months after The Godfather and Play It Again, Sam had been released, and The Tonight Show had moved to the West Coast, a very young, very nervous, very funny Diane Keaton spoke with Johnny Carson. 

They talked about a lot of things, including living in NYC. What a golden moment!

Brooklyn is Still Not Expanding: "Annie Hall" at 30

This past week will go down in history as one of the most awful in recent memory - campus and work-place shootings, an exploding death toll in a misbegotten war, a lying attorney general, an out of control celebrity - oy vey! as we say here. Madone. However, on a more pleasant note, this week also brings us the 30th anniversary of Woody Allen's masterwork "Annie Hall" -- winner of the 1977 Academy Award for Best Picture and an-all time classic.

It's the ultimate New York movie, and a flick that helps us appreciate the perpetual madness of relationships. Why do we keep entering into them when we know we are just setting ourselves up for heartbreak And what is it about the city that's so enduringly romantic? Woody doesn't give us any answers, and he doesn't claim to understand why. Instead, the brilliance of the movie is its appreciation of a part of human nature that we will never understand but will always keep trying to. "Annie Hall" is truly timeless, a movie that makes us love being in love.

Of course, the New York of 2007 is a much different place than that of 1977. We are no longer, as Diane Keaton said in the movie, "a dying city", but instead a thriving metropolis. Crime is way down and real estate prices are way up. We've gone from Democratic unionists Mayors to Republican billionaire Mayors. People are no longer fleeing New York but arriving in their millions. Much has improved but also some things have been lost. We've gone from rent-controlled apartments, mom-and-pop stores, and automats to Starbucks and Duane Reads on every corner and "Got Milk?" ad campaigns in the subways.

Got eggs?

Woody's Oscars

You know I love Woody Allen and his movies. As someone who pretentiously calls himself Mr NYC, it would be a crime not to.

So Penelope Cruz just won an Oscar for her turn in Woody's Vicky Christina Barcelona. She makes the sixth performance to win an Oscar in a Woody movie. The other winners?

Diane Keaton for Annie Hall (1977)
Michael Caine for Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
Dianne Wiest for Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) and Bullets Over Broadway (1994)
Mira Sorvino for Mighty Aphrodite (1995)

The number of actors and actresses nominated for Oscars in Woody movies is also huge. Woody himself for Annie Hall, Maureen Stapleton and Geraldine Page for Interiors (1978), Mariel Hemingway for Manhattan (1979), Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), Judy Davis for Husbands and Wives (1992), Chazz Palminteri and Jennifer Tilly in Bullets Over Broadway, and Sean Penn and Samantha Morton in Sweet and Lowdown (1999).

If there are any others, I don't remember. But that's a hell of a list. (And that doesn't take into account all of Woody's writing and directing Oscars and nominations, which I certainly can't remember).

So that's six wins in thirty-one years, or a win roughly every 5.17 years. Considering that there are hundreds of movies released each year and a couple dozen nominated for Oscars every year, that makes his track record all that more impressive.

Remembering Mercedes de Acosta

Many years ago Howard Stern was interviewing movie icon Warren Beatty and got right to the point: "You make great movies," the King of All Media told the legendary Hollywood actor/director/Lothario, "if you didn't bang all those broads ... we'd talk about the movies, but the broads get in the way." (Then Stern told Beatty something about smelling his hand and the interview was over.)

Howard spoke the truth.

No matter how great a film icon Mr. Beatty is, no matter how many great movies he's directed and starred in, he'll best be remembered for his other great "productions": Natalie Wood, Joan Collins, Julie Christie, Goldie Hawn, Diane Keaton, Madonna, and many others. 

So was the case of Mercedes de Acosta.

Born in NYC in 1893 to affluent Cuban immigrants, Mercedes was a playwright, poet, and novelist. Her career trajectory was a little less Warren Beatty and a little more Llewyn Davis -- professionally, she was a failure, her work forgotten, her career unsuccessful. But she's remembered nonetheless. Why? Well, personally, she had some very successful "productions": Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Tallulah Bankhead, and many others.

Even though she married a man, Mercedes was a notorious, unashamed lesbian at a time when this could literally land you in jail. She made lovemaking into an art form, her skills became as legendary as any movie or work of literature. Most of all, she had a boundless, rapacious spirit. Mercedes was someone the world wanted to classify one way -- a boring married lady who did nothing -- and she refused to stay in her lane. Instead, she travelled the world, wrote prolifically, and seduced many women. She's probably best remembered for the quote: "I can get any woman away from any man." 

Fearless! 

Mercedes lived the life she wanted, even if it didn't always bring her happiness. (Maybe the "broads" got in the way of her having a more successful career but, honestly, I'd rather be remembered for "productions" like Mercedes de Acosta and Warren Beatty than any play or movie.) Sadly, Mercedes died in poverty in 1968, taking her legendary skills into the afterlife. In many ways, her life was sad but she was brave, she was courageous, and -- if sometimes a little fearless and irresponsible -- she lived her truth until the end.

How many of us can say that?

Review: "You're a Big Boy Now" (1966)

Next year will mark the 50th anniversary of the classic movie The Godfather which made its cast (Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Robert Duvall, James Caan, and others) into huge stars (and cemented Marlon Brando's cinematic comeback). It also made its director, Francis Ford Coppola, into a household name.

Prior to The Godfather -- which became the highest grossest movie of all time when it was released in 1972 -- Coppola had only directed a few movies (Finian's Rainbow, The Rain People), none of which were successful. But prior to his Mafia classic, Coppola made his first movie in 1966, and it's actually one of his best: You're a Big Boy Now. 

Set in NYC during the psychedelic '60s, the movie is about a young man named Bernard (Peter Kastner) who lives under the thumb of his controlling parents (Rip Torn and Geraldine Page) and works at the New York Public Library. Bernard and other library flunkies move around the stacks looking for books and documents on roller skates and daydream about leading more exciting lives. Bernard decides to move out of his parents home on Long Island and into an apartment in Manhattan. Naive, virginal, innocent and sincere, Peter roams around Times Square and the city, finding temptation around every corner. He falls for a go-go dancer and actress named Barbara Darling (Elizabeth Hartman) who teases him constantly, all the while being pursued by a sweet girl named Amy (Karen Black), a former classmate of his. Many hijinks ensue including with a rooster that attacks attractive women (!) and that take young Bernard from the streets of the city into walk-up apartments, off-off-Broadway theaters, Central Park, and adult stores. 

But, fear not, true love prevails. 

You're a Big Boy Now is what I'd call a "romp": there are many wacky surreal scenes that would be annoying if it wasn't for the fact that we really like Bernard and are rooting for him. The characters are all very unique and well-drawn, and all of the acting is first-rate. Most of all, this is a very stylishly-directed film -- unlike Coppola's later slowing-moving, epic films, You're a Big Boy Now is fast-moving with lots of quick cuts, clearly influenced by the French New Wave and rock'n'roll spirit of the times (music by The Lovin' Spoonful plays throughout the movie). 

The movie came out a year before The Graduate and shares, in plot and tone, much in common with You're a Big Boy Now. But whereas the 1967 California-based movie is a very mainstream, straight-forward telling of a young man's coming of age, this 1966 NYC-based flick is an odd, eccentric, art movie about the same subject. 

So, to sum up: You're a Big Boy Now is a very  good, very 1960's, very NYC movie about moving into adulthood, and, since it's the debut film of one cinema's greatest directors, it's a must-see.  

P.S. This was the first movie made under the Mayor's Office of Film and Television. I remember, years ago, seeing an old clip of Mayor John Lindsay giving a press conference, announcing the creation of this office and this movie being shortly going into production. Standing right behind him was a young, fully-bearded Francis Ford Coppola which Lindsay pronounced "Cap-polla." 

Woody and Mia: The Aftermath

Woody Allen is one of the greatest artists that America has ever produced. As a comedian, actor, author, playwright, screenwriter, and film director, he has produced an amazing body of work, including comedy albums, books of essays, plays, and movies that have influenced generations of writers and directors and will stand the test of time. His work has always had a distinct New York persona, a neurotic nebbishy voice in a country full of sell-satisfied swagger.

That said, Woody Allen doesn't sound like a very nice person.

From everything I've read and heard, he's narcissistic and selfish. He's cold and aloof and, as wonderful as his work is, he doesn't sound like he'd be so wonderful to hang out with. And, in 1992, he shocked the world by dumping his long term partner Mia Farrow for her adoptive daughter Soon Yi Previn. People were understandably upset that the great Woody-Mia artistic and personal collaboration had collapsed -- and, more to the point, they found the Woody-Soon Yi relationship creepy. But that relationship -- now marriage -- has lasted for more than twenty years. It seems to be loving and, in its odd way, meant to be. As the pope might say, who are we to judge?

But judging Woody Allen seems to be all the rage this day.

Twenty-years ago, Woody and Mia went through a grueling, almost two year custody battle over their children, both adoptive and natural. Eventually Mia won custody of the kids and cut them off from Woody. But, most horrifyingly, Mia Farrow accused Woody Allen of molesting their adoptive daughter Dylan at her Connecticut home. This awful accusation was investigated fully and Woody Allen was never charged.

That seems to have been the end of it, at least for the next two decades. Woody remained with Soon Yi and kept making movies. Mia Farrow acted here and there and did great humanitarian work. While Woody and Mia's families never reconciled, at least they seemed to have maintained a peaceful distance, the wounds slowly healing if never completely.

Well, now the scabs have been flicked off.

It began late last year, when Mia Farrow gave a long interview to Vanity Fair, demonizing Woody Allen all over again. And a now grown-up Dylan Farrow, in the same article, gave details of the alledged sexual abuse she supposedly suffered at Woody's hands. It was shocking stuff, like going back to an old nightmare. If true, then Woody is a child molester who should have been charged and gone to jail a long time ago. But, if false, it's a totally malicious smear. In a situation like this, there is no middle ground. Someone is lying and we can never know who.

The article created some hubbub, not just for the allegations but also for Mia Farrow's bizarre claim that Ronan, the son that she and Woody Allen had in the mid-1980s, might actually be Frank Sinatra's (you can't make this stuff up). Then, in January, the Golden Globes gave Woody Allen a lifetime achievement award (as usual, Woody wasn't there, so Diane Keaton, Ms. Annie Hall herself, accepted it for him). During this segment of the show, Ronan sent out a nasty Tweet while also re-posting the damning Vanity Fair article. Sometime thereafter, Mia Farrow Tweeted the same article and condemned the award as an insult to all survivors of sexual abuse. And now, Dylan Farrow has released a letter, really a blog post, to the New York Times, re-alleging the abuse.

Hmmm?

The Vanity Fair article, the Tweets during the Golden Globes, now this letter, all seem like some kind of coordinated smear campaign against Woody Allen. Again, it's very important to point out, that this matter was investigated fully at the time and Woody Allen was never charged.  Obviously, like the rest of the world, I can't claim to know the whole truth. But unlike Roman Polanski and Micheal Jackson, Woody Allen was never charged because there was no evidence. People can be accused of committing any crime but without evidence and proof beyond a reasonable doubt, they can't be charged and convicted of a crime. Even if new evidence emerged proving Dylan Farrow's claim true, the statutes of limitations expired a long time ago and Woody Allen can't be charged for it now. But Mia and Dylan Farrow haven't produced any new evidence -- just the old allegations.

If this abuse really happened, then it's tragic that Woody Allen was never punished. But Woody had never been accused before -- or since -- of child molestation, and molesters rarely only have one victim. Also, this allegation came on the heels of the Woody-Mia split, with Mia pressing hard for Woody Allen to be charged. The timing of it looked like the attempted revenge of a woman scorned and she was using her daughter as the weapon. It obviously failed.

So what's the deal now?

In her letter, Dylan Farrow rhetorically asks the various stars of Woody's movies, "What if it had been your child?" She also accuses Hollywood of "turning a blind eye" and somehow siding with Woody Allen against her. In her thinking, the fact that he still has a career is an insult to her and all victims of child abuse.

Maybe you agree -- and that's fine. But let's put this in some context.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Woody Allen easily made the best movies of his career: Bananas, Sleeper, Annie Hall, Manhattan, Zelig, Broadway Danny Rose, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Hannah and Her Sisters, Radio Days and Crimes and Misdemeanors. The ones from the 1980s also starred Mia Farrow, and she was great in them. After Woody and Mia split, for the most part, Woody went into a creative decline. Sure, in the 1990s, he made a few good ones -- Bullets over Broadway, Deconstructing Harry, Sweet and Lowdown -- but most of his films were less than great. And, in the 2000s, with the exception of Match Point, most of Woody's movies were outright clunkers and he seemed like a total has-been. However, in the last few years, Woody's career has regained steam. Vicky Christina Barcelona and more recently Midnight in Paris got great reviews and won Oscars (including Woody's first in 25 years). Midnight in Paris was also a huge box office hit. And last year's Blue Jasmine was a big success as well and the star, Cate Blanchett, appears poised to win the Best Actress Oscar. Also, in March, a Broadway musical version of Bullets over Broadway is supposed to open and has generated great buzz. 

Suddenly, at age 78, Woody Allen is cool again.

In many ways, this late career resurgence gets to the heart of Mia Farrow and her family's lingering grudge against Woody Allen: he abandoned them twenty years ago and is still successful to this day and they can't stand it. So Mia Farrow and her family are on the attack: they want to destroy him. This seems to be their wish: that no one will finance, or act in, or distribute, or watch, or give awards to, any Woody Allen movie in the future. They hope that Woody Allen, after almost 50 years in the business, will be shunned from it forever and never work again and presumably he and Soon Yi and their children will end up on the street. Really, what else could they want?

Mia Farrow and her family couldn't convict Woody Allen in a court of law so they want to convict him in the court of public opinion. Clearly, Mia Farrow is still bitter, still angry at Woody Allen. He hurt her twenty years ago and she was understandably angry -- but instead of trying to rise above it and be the better person, she's given into the anger and transferred it to her children.

As for Dylan, she's clearly in pain. She truly believes that she was a victim of abuse and the awful thing is that she just might have been -- and it will never be officially punished. One can only hope that she find peace and joy in her life and the years ahead.

But what good is this smear campaign doing? What's the point? It's just bringing up a lot of anger and hurt feelings, it's just re-litigating a matter that was settled twenty years ago and cannot be changed today. It's also unclear why Mia Farrow and her family somehow think that the entire film industry should somehow judge Woody Allen's career based on his private life and on their allegations against him. Hollywood only cares about his movies -- how good they are and how much money they make. A court of law are where people are convicted for their crimes and sent to jail -- not a crazy business based on illusion.  
 
When something awful happens to you, either you can give into the anger and bitterness, give into the rage you feel towards the person who hurt or you can show that you are stronger than the hurt, stronger than the damage done to you. You go on, regroup, live to fight another day, and show the world that you cannot be crushed. Clearly Mia Farrow and her family cannot do this. Is trying to destroy Woody Allen going to change their pasts and improve their futures? Somehow I think not.