Nancy Meyers Says Diane Keaton ‘Changed Her Life’: ‘She Was Always Destined for Stardom’

“We all search for that some­one who real­ly gets us, right? Well, with Diane, I believe we mutu­al­ly had that,” the direc­tor wrote

Nan­cy Mey­ers and Diane Keaton in Bev­er­ly Hills, Cal­i­for­nia, on Feb. 1, 2020.

• Nan­cy Mey­ers paid trib­ute to her “bril­liant” friend and long­time col­lab­o­ra­tor Diane Keaton on Insta­gram Mon­day, Oct. 13, two days after her death at 79
• “As a woman, I lost a friend of almost 40 years — at times over those years, she felt like a sis­ter because we shared so many tru­ly mem­o­rable expe­ri­ences,” the direc­tor wrote
• Mey­ers worked with Keaton on movies like Baby Boom (1987), Father of the Bride (1991) and Some­thing’s Got­ta Give (2003)

The writer-direc­tor — who worked with Keaton on movies like Baby Boom (1987), Father of the Bride (1991)and Some­thing’s Got­ta Give (2003) — paid trib­ute to the late Oscar win­ner in an Insta­gram post on Mon­day, Oct. 13, along­side a pho­to of Keaton in the lat­ter film.

These past 48 hours have not been easy,” Mey­ers, 75, began her cap­tion. “See­ing all of your trib­utes to Diane has been a com­fort. As a movie lover, I’m with you all — we have lost a giant. A bril­liant actress who time and again laid her­self bare to tell our sto­ries.”

Aside from Keaton’s screen lega­cy, “As a woman, I lost a friend of almost 40 years — at times over those years, she felt like a sis­ter because we shared so many tru­ly mem­o­rable expe­ri­ences,” Mey­ers con­tin­ued. “As a film­mak­er, I’ve lost a con­nec­tion with an actress that one can only dream of.”

“We all search for that some­one who real­ly gets us, right? Well, with Diane, I believe we mutu­al­ly had that,” she added.

Mey­ers went on to say that Keaton “real­ly got” her, “so writ­ing for her made me bet­ter because I felt so secure in her hands.”

“I knew how vul­ner­a­ble she could be. And I knew how hilar­i­ous she could be, not only with dia­logue (which she said word for word as writ­ten but man­aged to always make it sound impro­vised) but she could be fun­ny sit­ting at a din­ner table or just walk­ing into a room,” the direc­tor con­tin­ued.

But Keaton’s abil­i­ty to con­nect with her direc­tor did­n’t just extend to Mey­ers, she wrote, explain­ing that the late actress “did exact­ly the same for” Woody Allen and War­ren Beat­ty “because that is what she does. She goes deep.”

“I know those who have worked with her know what I know … she made every­thing bet­ter,” Mey­ers con­tin­ued. “Every set up, every day, in every movie, I watched her give it her all. When I need­ed her to cry in scene after scene in Something’s Got­ta Give she went at it hard and then some­how made it fun­ny. And I remem­ber she would some­times spin in a kind of goofy cir­cle before a take to pur­pose­ly get her­self off bal­ance or what­ev­er she need­ed to shed so she could be in the moment.”

Mey­ers con­clud­ed, “She was fear­less, she was like nobody ever, she was born to be a movie star, her laugh could make your day and for me, know­ing her and work­ing with her — changed my life. Thank you Di. I’ll miss you for­ev­er.”

While accept­ing her Gold­en Globe win for Best Actress in a Com­e­dy in 2004, Keaton cred­it­ed Mey­ers for “redis­cov­er­ing” her with her role in Something’s Got­ta Give

I sure as hell wasn’t pre­pared to be redis­cov­ered by Nan­cy Mey­ers,” she began her speech at the time. “Let’s face it: Get­ting to play a woman to love at 57 is like reach­ing for the stars with a step lad­der. But I know I got lucky.”

“And isn’t it iron­ic that all my luck was to have Nan­cy give me a chance to play a woman to love one more bit­ter­sweet time?” Keaton added.