Diane Keaton discusses new Christmas movie "Love the Coopers"

One of Diane Keaton's first movies, the Woody Allen classic "Annie Hall," was just named funniest screenplay ever.

I was at a movie set watching Ed Helms film a scene when I had to bolt to take a call from Diane Keaton. She advised me to spin right back around and get some intel from Helms.

“Get him to give you anecdotes!” she instructed.

I was watching Ed Helms (in the white shirt) film a movie when I had to take a call from Diane Keaton who told me to talk to Ed Helms. Photo: Jennifer Brett

Helms was in Marietta, conveniently around the corner from my house, filming a scene for the comedy “Bastards” with Owen Wilson, when the call came in. He and Keaton both star in “Love the Coopers,” a sardonic holiday sort-of comedy, mostly drama, opening Friday.

Keaton plays Charlotte, a perfectionist mom of two divergently dysfunctional adult children and a basket case of a sister - Hank, Eleanor and Emma (Helms, Olivia Wilde and  Marisa Tomei ). She and her longtime husband, Sam (John Goodman), are holding the threads of their fraying marriage together just long enough for one last holiday together. Little do they know their kids all have painful secrets of their own.

“She’s living in a fantasy of what Christmas is,” Keaton said of her character. “I love her comeuppance. It forced her to become deeper and understand what other people are feeling instead of missing out on what people are feeling.”

Diane Keaton in LOVE THE COOPERS to be released by CBS Films and Lionsgate.

The movie, directed by Jessie Nelson from Steven Rogers’ screenplay, is told in intersecting segments, “Love Actually” style.

“It’s really fun to delve into all those stories,” Keaton said. “It just reminds me of my own life.”

This is the moment when I thought she’d have some tales of Christmases past to share. She didn’t but apparently Helms, an Atlanta native, does.

“He’s a really funny guy,” she said.

Speaking of funny, one of Keaton’s first films, the Woody Allen classic “Annie Hall,” was just named funniest screenplay ever written, by the Writers Guild of America. (See the video clip above).

I was way too cool to tell Keaton that I have a screenshot from “Annie Hall” as my Facebook profile photo, but I did ask if she felt that her seminal roles in relationship-heavy movies have provided guidance to women over the years. She was too modest to take any credit.

“Me, Diane? No,” she said. “I’ve been in movies that I think have been well written and well directed. I’m just a player.”

Our time was almost up. I was off to book club, where coincidentally one of my fellow members happened to be the homeowner whose house Wilson and Helms were filming in, and Keaton was off to her next interview, but not before she gave me one final piece of advice regarding Helms: “Get him to talk to you!”

I didn't bring this up. That would have been lame.