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Numerous talented actresses have performed in rom-coms. Usually, if they want to earn an Academy Award, they must turn for weightier characters. Diane Keaton, whose recent passing occurred, charted a different course and executed it with disarmingly natural. Her initial breakout part was in The Godfather, about as serious an American masterpiece as ever produced. However, concurrently, she reprised the part of Linda, the object of a nerdy hero’s affection, in a movie version of Broadway’s Play It Again, Sam. She persistently switched serious dramas with romantic comedies throughout the ’70s, and it was the latter that secured her the Oscar for leading actress, altering the genre for good.

The Award-Winning Performance

The award was for Annie Hall, helmed and co-scripted by Woody Allen, with Keaton portraying Annie, one half of the movie’s fractured love story. The director and star dated previously before production, and continued as pals for the rest of her life; when speaking publicly, Keaton described Annie as a perfect image of herself, from Allen’s perspective. It would be easy, then, to believe her portrayal required little effort. Yet her breadth in Keaton’s work, from her Godfather role and her Allen comedies and within Annie Hall itself, to underestimate her talent with funny romances as merely exuding appeal – although she remained, of course, incredibly appealing.

A Transition in Style

Annie Hall famously served as the director’s evolution between more gag-based broad comedies and a authentic manner. As such, it has numerous jokes, fantasy sequences, and a freewheeling patchwork of a romantic memory mixed with painful truths into a ill-fated romance. In a similar vein, Diane, led an evolution in U.S. romantic comedies, playing neither the rapid-fire comic lead or the sexy scatterbrain popularized in the 1950s. Instead, she blends and combines elements from each to create something entirely new that seems current today, interrupting her own boldness with nervous pauses.

See, as an example the scene where Annie and Alvy Singer initially hit it off after a game on the courts, stumbling through reciprocal offers for a car trip (even though only a single one owns a vehicle). The dialogue is quick, but meanders unexpectedly, with Keaton navigating her unease before ending up stuck of her whimsical line, a words that embody her quirky unease. The film manifests that feeling in the subsequent moment, as she makes blasé small talk while navigating wildly through city avenues. Later, she composes herself performing the song in a nightclub.

Dimensionality and Independence

These are not instances of the character’s unpredictability. Across the film, there’s a complexity to her playful craziness – her hippie-hangover willingness to sample narcotics, her anxiety about sea creatures and insects, her resistance to control by the protagonist’s tries to turn her into someone apparently somber (in his view, that signifies focused on dying). Initially, Annie could appear like an strange pick to receive acclaim; she’s the romantic lead in a film told from a male perspective, and the central couple’s arc doesn’t lead to either changing enough to suit each other. But Annie evolves, in aspects clear and mysterious. She just doesn’t become a better match for the male lead. Numerous follow-up films borrowed the surface traits – neurotic hang-ups, eccentric styles – not fully copying Annie’s ultimate independence.

Enduring Impact and Mature Parts

Perhaps Keaton felt cautious of that tendency. Following her collaboration with Allen concluded, she stepped away from romantic comedies; Baby Boom is practically her single outing from the complete 1980s period. But during her absence, the film Annie Hall, the character perhaps moreso than the unconventional story, served as a blueprint for the genre. Actress Meg Ryan, for example, is largely indebted for her comedic roles to Keaton’s ability to embody brains and whimsy at once. This made Keaton seem like a permanent rom-com queen even as she was actually playing matrimonial parts (whether happily, as in the movie Father of the Bride, or not as much, as in that ensemble comedy) and/or mothers (see The Family Stone or that mother-daughter story) than single gals falling in love. Even during her return with the director, they’re a seasoned spouses drawn nearer by comic amateur sleuthing – and she fits the character effortlessly, gracefully.

However, Keaton also enjoyed another major rom-com hit in the year 2003 with the film Something’s Gotta Give, as a writer in love with a man who dates younger women (Jack Nicholson, naturally). The outcome? Her last Academy Award nod, and a whole subgenre of romantic tales where mature females (usually played by movie stars, but still!) reclaim their love lives. A key element her loss is so startling is that Keaton was still making such films up until recently, a frequent big-screen star. Now audiences will be pivoting from assuming her availability to understanding the huge impact she was on the romantic comedy as we know it. Is it tough to imagine present-day versions of Meg Ryan or Goldie Hawn who emulate her path, that’s likely since it’s uncommon for an actor of her caliber to commit herself to a category that’s frequently reduced to digital fare for a recent period.

A Special Contribution

Reflect: there are 10 living female actors who have been nominated multiple times. It’s rare for one of those roles to start in a light love story, especially not several, as was the situation with Diane. {Because her