Diane Keaton
Born Diane Hall in Los Angeles, California, Keaton is the oldest of four children. Her father Jack Hall (1921–1990) was a civil engineer, and her mother Dorothy Keaton (b. 1921) was a homemaker and amateur photographer. Her father came from an Irish American Catholic background, and her mother came from a Methodist family. Keaton was raised a Methodist by her mother. Her first ambition to become an actor came after seeing her mother win the “Mrs. Los Angeles” pageant for homemakers. Keaton claimed that the theatricality of the event inspired her to become a stage actor. She has also credited Katharine Hepburn, whom she admires for playing strong and independent women, as one of her inspirations.
Keaton is a 1964 graduate of Santa Ana High School in Santa Ana, California. During her time there she participated in singing and acting clubs at school, and starred as Blanche DuBois in a school production of A Streetcar Named Desire. After graduation she attended Santa Ana College, and later Orange Coast College as an acting student, but dropped out after a year to pursue an entertainment career in Manhattan. Upon joining the Actors’ Equity Association she adopted the surname of Keaton, her mother’s maiden name, as there was already a registered Diane Hall. For a brief time, she also moonlighted nightclubs with a singing act. She would later revisit her nightclub act in Annie Hall (1977), and in a cameo in Radio Days (1987).
Keaton began studying acting at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City. She initially studied acting under the Meisner technique, an ensemble acting technique made popular in the 1920s by Sanford Meisner, a New York acting director. She has described her acting technique as, “[being] only as good as the person you’re acting with … As opposed to going it on my own and forging my path to create a wonderful performance without the help of anyone. I always need the help of everyone!” According to her Reds co-star Warren Beatty, “She approaches a script sort of like a play in that she has the entire script memorized before you start doing the movie, which I don’t know any other actors doing that.”
In 1968, Keaton became an understudy on the original Broadway production of Hair. She gained some notoriety for her refusal to disrobe in the portions of the musical when the entire cast performed nude, even though nudity in the production was optional for actors. (Those who performed nude received a $50 bonus.) After acting in Hair for nine months, she auditioned for a part in Woody Allen’s production of Play It Again, Sam. After nearly being passed over for being too tall (at 5 ft 8 in./1.73 m she is two inches/5 cm taller than Allen), she won the part.
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