Diane Keaton Gave a Telling Clue to Her Relationship With Jack Nicholson Right Before Her Death: He ‘Loved Her’
Diane Keaton is the kind of actress a lot of people remember with a smile. The actress died on Saturday, October 11, at 79, and news of her death was followed by an outpouring of love and good memories from people who had worked with her, people who knew her, and even people who didn’t. And one of the people fans have been most fixated on is Jack Nicholson.
Nicholson famously starred with Keaton in the movie Something’s Gotta Give, and the two remained friends until Keaton’s last days. But did that friendship ever turn romantic? Did Keaton and Nicholson ever date?
Did Diane Keaton & Jack Nicholson Ever Date Before Her Death?
The two reportedly struck up a close friendship while filming Something’s Gotta Give, though they never dated. That friendship endured, as Keaton attended Nicholson’s birthday party this year, according to her Book Club co-star Ed Begley Jr.
“I saw her fairly recently at Jack Nicholson’s birthday party, and it was good to see her there,” Begley Jr. told People. But that’s not all Begley Jr. said. “She loved Jack Nicholson, as I do, and Jack loved her,” Begley Jr. added. “So I don’t mean to speak for him. I’m sure he’s as devastated as I am by her loss.”
He also called Keaton “a wonderful actress” and “wonderful lady,” adding, “I’m glad I knew her these many years.”
Keaton and Nicholson played a couple in the 2003 rom-com Something’s Gotta Give, directed by Nancy Meyers. The movie follows two people who fall in love later in life. Nicholson still hasn’t said anything publicly about Keaton’s death.
Meyers, however, posted a heartfelt Instagram tribute to Keaton that partly read. “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.” However, Meyers also spoke personally. “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 also told a story about the movie Keaton and Nicholson starred in together. “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. 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,” Meyers finished.
In her 2011 memoir, Then Again, Keaton wrote that she initially thought Something’s Gotta Give would be a “doomed project,” but it turned out to be her “favorite film.” She also said that a check “with a lot of zeros arrived in the mail for my back-end percentage,” for the movie. She later learned that Nicholson had given her a portion of his percentage from the film’s gross.
To this day, details of what happened to Keaton are scarce. “There are no further details available at this time, and her family has asked for privacy in this moment of great sadness,” a spokesperson said in a statement at the time. The Los Angeles Fire Department confirmed to People that they responded to a call at Keaton’s home at 8:08 a.m. PT and transported a 79-year-old woman to a local hospital.
