#comediennes

“The talented young actresses in I Never Promised You a Rose Garden and Outrageous! are made to suffer from lyrical schizophrenia (which is the very worst kind). Diane Keaton has been much luckier. In her Woody Allen comedies, her specialty has been lyrical neurosis—which can be deliriously reassuring to the nervous wrecks in the audience. As Annie Hall, Keaton redeemed the flustered confusion of urban misfits—who fits in this city?—and made it romantic. In her more conventional roles in Lovers and Other Strangers and I Will, I Will…for Now, she seemed a graceful, highly competent comedienne, in a fresh, very American manner. In Woody Allen pictures, this competence is replaced by something more distinctive: she seems helplessly aware of the ineffability of her feelings. She's the mildest form of crazy lady, not threatening to anybody, just bewildered about herself. When the hero loses her in Annie Hall, it isn't really a loss, because she isn't quite there; she's disconnected from the start. The amateurish, self-conscious looseness that Keaton has with Allen works for her. She seems not an actress but a girl trying to act, and this wavering, unsure quality gives her a Marilyn Monroe-like appeal. She turns apologetic self-doubt into a style. When she sings, she lacks a rhythmic sense, but she flirts her way through a song, rolling her clear eyes and acting out the suggestiveness of the lyrics. She becomes a consciously naughty little girl. And all the time she emanates warmth—miraculously, naturally. It's in her long-legged softness, in her coloring, her flesh tones, her sunny, broad smile.”