Diane Keaton Cause of Death: The Untold Story of Her Eating Disorder, Skin Cancer, and More

This one lands hard.

Multiple outlets are circulating reports that Diane Keaton has died, and friends and colleagues are said to be stunned. At the time I am writing this, the cause has not been shared publicly. What we do know, because she talked about it openly for years, is that Keaton lived with a stack of health issues and still kept working, smiling, and generally being Diane Keaton through all of it.

What she shared about her health

Keaton was unusually candid about her body, her choices, and the fallout. She started dealing with skin cancer very young, then faced it again later, and in the middle of all that she battled a severe eating disorder.

"Back in my 20s, I didn’t pay attention much. I didn’t research and didn’t really care, and that was stupid because it’s dogged me my entire adult life, even recently. I didn’t start sun care until my 40s."

• Skin cancer at 21: She was first diagnosed in her early twenties and linked it to a family pattern. She talked about an aunt whose skin cancer got so bad doctors removed her nose, plus her dad had basal cell and her brother had it too. That family history is why she was adamant about sunscreen later in life.
• Two different cancers: After overcoming basal cell carcinoma in her twenties, she was later diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma. That second round required two surgeries to remove, according to her own accounts.
• Bulimia: At her worst, she said she could put away something like 20,000 calories in a night — think buckets of fried chicken, multiple orders of fries drenched in blue cheese and ketchup, TV dinners, soda by the quart, piles of candy, an entire cake, and several cream pies — and then purge. Eventually she got help and worked her way back from it.

The work: from Annie Hall to Book Club (and yes, Mack & Rita)

Keaton’s range was the real deal. She could be airy and razor-sharp in the same breath. She won an Oscar for Annie Hall, delivered warm, effortlessly funny turns in Father of the Bride, and kept headlining later in life with Book Club and Mack & Rita. If you want the textbook case for how Hollywood can let women over 50 be romantic, complicated, and actually fun, Something’s Gotta Give is right there with her name on it.

How she lived, on her own terms

Born Diane Hall in California, she did the name-change, the career reinvent, the whole thing — and then kept reinventing. She chose not to marry and instead built her family by adopting two kids, Dexter and Duke, now 29 and 25. Outside the acting bubble, she stacked up a quiet empire: architectural preservationist, photographer, author. And the clothes? The menswear-forward, black-and-white, big-hat look was not a phase — it was a thesis statement that never went out of style.

The bigger picture

Whether you met her through Woody Allen-era comedies, Nancy Meyers kitchens, or the Book Club crowd-pleasers, Keaton had that rare thing: she made difficult subjects feel human without turning them into a brand. By all accounts, she was the person who could walk into a room and lift it two feet. The loss is massive — but the blueprint she left for talent, resilience, and self-invention is even bigger.

How do you see her journey? Drop your thoughts below.