Diane Keaton Once Found Kissing Keanu Reeves ‘Horribly Embarrassing’ in ‘Something’s Gotta Give’
Actors Keanu Reeves and Diane Keaton shared the screen together in the 2003 hit romance Something’s Gotta Give. The movie sees Reeves playing a doctor who’s involved in an intimate relationship with the prolific actor.
But because of the age difference, Keaton once shared she had a difficult time locking lips with her co-star.
Diane Keaton didn’t think ‘Something’s Gotta Give’ was going to be successful
Keaton didn’t have high hopes for Something’s Gotta Give when she first heard its concept. Although Keaton had Reeves as a potential love interest, the story would focus on her growing relationship with her co-star Jack Nicholson. But according to the film’s director Nancy Meyers, Keaton listed several reasons why the movie wouldn’t work.
“When I told her this idea for the movie, I took her to lunch one day. I said, ‘I have this idea for a movie. I want you, I want Jack Nicholson,’” Meyers once told American Film Institute. “And she said, she thinks I’m crazy. ‘This is never gonna happen. Nobody’s gonna make a movie about two middle-aged people that fall in love, where a man likes the older woman over the younger woman. Where a guy actually changes. And even if they did get it made, you’re never gonna get Jack. And if you get him, no one’s gonna want me.’”
But Meyers still continued to develop the project, which would end up starring both Nicholson and Keaton. The movie went on to become a critical and financial success, scoring $266 million at the box office.
Diane Keaton found kissing Keanu Reeves ‘horribly embarrassing’
The chemistry between Keaton, Reeves, and Nicholson might have been convincing enough in the movie to spark real-life dating rumors. After starring in the film, some outlets began to speculate if she and Nicholson were engaged in an actual romance. But Keaton asserted the two weren’t dating, and the intimacy they displayed in the film was actually humiliating.
“Jack and I were humiliated most of the time,” she once said in an interview with the LA Times. “There was so much kissing and all this time in bed. We felt so much terror about being so exposed, and we got to be so close because of that.”
Likewise, Keaton felt a similar humiliation was experienced when she kissed her other co-star Reeves.
“Kissing Keanu in the movie was really fun but horribly embarrassing. As soon as they said ‘cut,’ we’d both run to opposite sides of the room,” she added.
At the same time, Keaton admitted kissing Reeves wasn’t all bad, especially with how attractive she found The Matrix star.
“It was pretty embarrassing, and for Keanu, too,” Keaton once said according to the Sydney Morning Herald. “It has to do with time of life. It’s instinctive – [while kissing him] you go, ‘Uh, probably not!’ And Keanu was going, ‘Definitely not!’ He was trying to be polite. But he’s so beautiful, it’s stupefying. It was a guilty pleasure. A very guilty pleasure.”
Diane Keaton wondered why she never dated Jack Nicholson while filming ‘Something’s Gotta Give’
Although they didn’t end up in a relationship, Keaton admitted that she and Batman star Nicholson did quite a bit of bonding on set. So much so that the two actors would even talk about their past relationships on their downtime.
“Failed romances,” Keaton said. “I started right in, since I knew the way to Jack was to just be direct and say, ‘OK, did you have an affair with so-and-so?’”
While bonding with each other, Keaton wondered if the two had the similar thoughts.
“We never dated, never did. I think we both probably thought, ‘Why didn’t we?’ But it wasn’t fated to happen. It’s all timing,” she said.
