Bette Midler did her first interview since the shock passing of her former First Wives Club castmate Diane Keaton last Saturday from undisclosed causes at age 79.
‘She was such a genius,’ the 79-year-old Divine Miss M recalled on Tuesday’s The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
‘There was something about her that was utterly magical…she was completely her own person and inimitable. She was so authentically herself.’
Bette and the eccentric Oscar winner memorably sang and danced alongside Goldie Hawn in Hugh Wilson’s 1996 divorce comedy The First Wives Club, which amassed $181M at the global box office.
In fact, Midler was so disappointed when the proposed sequel Family Jewels ‘never took off.’
‘I have a great memory of her with Goldie,’ The Fabulous Four actress said.
Bette Midler did her first interview since the shock passing of her former First Wives Club castmate Diane Keaton (L, pictured in 1996) last Saturday from undisclosed causes at age 79
‘She was such a genius,’ the 79-year-old Divine Miss M recalled on Tuesday’s The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
‘I had never worked or met them before, and we sat down in a cafe…at a round table and I was so intimidated. I was a little bit of a newbie.
‘So, we sat there and they started telling stories, and I’ll tell you, I never laughed harder in my whole life. It was brilliant and magical!’
Bette’s grieving comments came three days after she shared a touching tribute to ‘the brilliant, beautiful, and extraordinary’ Diane with her 1.6M Instagram followers.
‘I cannot tell you how unbearably sad this makes me. She was hilarious, a complete original, and completely without guile, or any of the competitiveness one would have expected from such a star. What you saw was who she was…oh, la, lala!’ Midler wrote.
Keaton (born Hall) reportedly left behind a $100M fortune and she’s survived by her two adult children – daughter Dexter, 29; and son Duke, 25 – whom she adopted in 1996 and 2001.
The Fashion First author had someone with her when she was taken to a local hospital by ambulance around 8:08am on Saturday morning after the LAFD received a 911 call reporting a ‘person down’ at her residence – according to TMZ.
‘I saw her two or three weeks ago, and she was very thin. She had lost so much weight,’ Carole Bayer Sager – who wrote Diane’s debut single First Christmas – told People on Sunday.
‘She had to go to Palm Springs because her house had been damaged inside, and they had to clean everything. She was down there for a while, and when she came back, I was kind of stunned by how much weight she’d lost.’
This Thursday, the Honolulu-born belter will make her debut on Bravo’s boozy talk show, Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen.
She continued: ‘There was something about her that was utterly magical…she was completely her own person and inimitable. She was so authentically herself’
Bette and the eccentric Oscar winner memorably sang and danced alongside Goldie Hawn (M) in Hugh Wilson’s 1996 divorce comedy The First Wives Club, which amassed $181M at the global box officeÂ
In fact, Midler was so disappointed when the proposed sequel Family Jewels ‘never took off’ (pictured in 1996)
The Fabulous Four actress said: ‘I have a great memory of her with Goldie. I had never worked or met them before, and we sat down in a cafe…at a round table and I was so intimidated’
Bette’s grieving comments came three days after she shared a touching tribute to ‘the brilliant, beautiful, and extraordinary’ Diane with her 1.6M Instagram followers
Keaton reportedly left behind a $100M fortune and she’s survived by her two adult children – daughter Dexter, 29; and son Duke, 25 – whom she adopted in 1996 and 2001 (pictured in 2022)
On October 24, Bette’s charity New York Restoration Project will honor her with a special award at the 30th anniversary Hulaween bash happening at Cipriani South Street in Lower Manhattan.
Tickets/tables range between $3K-$100K for the benefit featuring honorees like Andy Cohen as well as host Busy Philipps and guests Sandra Bernhard and Ben Platt.
Midler and her husband of 41 years – performance artist Martin von Haselberg – will then celebrate their daughter Sophie’s 38th birthday on November 14.
The silver-haired triple threat – who’s only an Oscar away from EGOT status – will next portray Kristen Wiig and Jonah Hill’s wealthy mother in his directorial effort Cut Off, which hits US theaters July 17.
