Woody Allen
(born Allen Stewart Konigsberg
; December 1, 1935) is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, comedian, writer, musician, and playwright.
Allen's distinctive films, which run the gamut from dramas to screwball sex comedies, have made him one of the most respected living American directors. He is also distinguished by his rapid rate of production and his very large body of work. [1] Allen writes and directs his movies and has also acted in the majority of them. For inspiration, Allen draws heavily on literature, sexuality, philosophy, psychology, Ancient Greece, Jewish identity, European cinema and New York City, where he was born and has lived his entire life.
Allen is also a jazz clarinetist. What began as a teenage avocation has led to regular public performances at various small venues in his Manhattan hometown, with occasional appearances at various jazz festivals. Allen joined the Preservation Hall Jazz Band and the New Orleans Funeral Ragtime Orchestra in performances that provided the film score for his 1973 comedy Sleeper
, and a rare European tour in 1996 featuring Allen was the subject of the documentary Wild Man Blues
.
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WOODY ALLEN TICKETS
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Early years
Allen was born and raised in
New York City, the son of Nettie (
née Cherrie; November 8, 1906 - January 27, 2002), a
bookkeeper at her family's
delicatessen, and Martin Konigsberg (December 25, 1900 - January 13, 2001), a jewelry engraver and waiter.
[2] His family was
Jewish and his grandparents were
Yiddish- and
German-speaking immigrants.
Allen has a sister,
Letty (born 1943), and was raised in
Midwood,
Brooklyn.
[3] His parents were both born and raised on the
Lower East Side of
Manhattan.
[4] His childhood wasn't particularly happy. His parents didn't get along, and he had a rocky relationship with his stern, temperamental mother.
[5] Allen spoke Yiddish during his early years and, after attending
Hebrew school for eight years, went to Public School 99 and to
Midwood High School.
[6] During that time, he lived in an apartment at 1402 Avenue K, between East 14th and 15th Streets. He impressed students with his extraordinary talent at card and
magic tricks.
[7]
To raise money he began writing
gags for the agent
David O. Alber, who sold them to newspaper
columnists. According to Allen, his first published joke read: "Woody Allen says he ate at a restaurant that had O.P.S. prices—over people's salaries."
[8]
Milt Kamen got Allen his first writing job at the age of 16 with
Sid Caesar. He began to call himself Woody Allen. He was a highly gifted young comedian and would later joke that when he was young he was sent to inter-faith
summer camp, where he was "savagely beaten by children of all races and creeds."
After high school, he went to
New York University (NYU), where he studied communication and film. He was never committed as a student, so he failed a film course, and was eventually expelled.
[9] He later briefly attended
City College of New York.
Comedy writer and playwright
After his false starts at NYU and City College, he became a full-time writer for
Herb Shriner, earning $75 a week at first.
At age 17, he started writing scripts for
The Ed Sullivan Show
,
The Tonight Show
,
Caesar's Hour
and other television shows.
[10] By the time he was working for
Sid Caesar, he was making $1500 a week; with Caesar he worked alongside
Danny Simon, whom Allen credits for helping him to structure his writing style.
[11]
In 1961, he started a new career as a
stand-up comedian, debuting in a
Greenwich Village club called the Duplex.
Examples of Allen's standup act can be heard on the albums
Standup Comic
and
Nightclub Years 1964-1968
(including his classic routine entitled "The Moose").
[12]
He began writing for the popular
Candid Camera
television show, even appearing in some episodes. Together with his managers, Allen turned his weaknesses into his strengths, developing his neurotic, nervous, and intellectual persona. He quickly became a successful comedian, and appeared frequently in nightclubs and on television. Allen was popular enough to appear on the cover of
Life
in 1969.
Allen started writing short stories and cartoon captions for magazines such as
The New Yorker
. He also became a successful
Broadway playwright and wrote
Don't Drink the Water
in 1966. It starred
Lou Jacobi,
Kay Medford,
Anita Gillette and Allen's future movie co-star
Anthony Roberts. A film adaptation of the play, directed by Howard Morris, was released in 1969 starring
Jackie Gleason. In 1994 Allen directed and starred in a
third version for television with
Michael J. Fox and
Mayim Bialik.
The next Broadway hit that he wrote was
Play It Again, Sam
; he also starred in it. It opened on February 12, 1969, and ran for 453 performances. It also featured
Diane Keaton and Anthony Roberts. Allen, Keaton and Roberts would reprise their roles in the film version of the play, directed by
Herbert Ross.
Allen is also an accomplished author having published four collections of his short pieces and plays. These are
Getting Even,
Without Feathers
,
Side Effects
and
Mere Anarchy.
His early comic fiction was heavily influenced by the zany, pun-ridden humour of
S.J. Perelman.
Film career
Early films
His first movie production was
What's New, Pussycat?
in 1965, for which he wrote the initial screenplay. He was hired by
Warren Beatty to re-write a script, and to appear in a small part in the movie. Over the course of the re-write, Beatty's part grew smaller and Allen's grew larger. Beatty was upset and quit the production.
Peter O'Toole was hired for the Beatty role, and
Peter Sellers was brought in as well; Sellers was a big enough star to demand many of Woody Allen's best lines/scenes, prompting hasty re-writes.
Allen's first directorial effort was
What's Up, Tiger Lily?
(1966 co-written with Mickey Rose), in which an existing
Japanese spy movie
(Kokusai himitsu keisatsu: Kagi no kagi
[1965] — "International Secret Police: Key of Keys") was redubbed in
English by Allen and his friends with completely new, comic dialogue.
He appeared only as an actor in the James Bond spoof,
Casino Royale
(1967). It was not a starring role, and he did not direct.
1960s and 1970s
Allen directed
Take the Money and Run
(1969), and then
Bananas
,
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask)
,
Sleeper
, and
Love and Death
.
Take the Money and Run
and
Bananas
were both co-written by his childhood friend,
Mickey Rose.
In 1972, he starred in the film version of
Play It Again, Sam
, which was directed by
Herbert Ross. All of Allen's early films were pure comedies that relied heavily on
slapstick, inventive
sight gags, and non-stop
one-liners. Among the many notable influences on these films are
Bob Hope,
Groucho Marx (as well as, to some extent,
Harpo Marx) and
Humphrey Bogart. In 1976, he starred in, but did not direct,
The Front
(that task was handled by
Martin Ritt), a humorous and poignant account of
Hollywood blacklisting during the 1950s.
Annie Hall
won four Academy Awards in 1977, including Best Picture and Best Actress in a Leading Role for Diane Keaton.
Annie Hall
set the standard for modern romantic comedy, and also started a minor fashion trend with the unique clothes worn by
Diane Keaton in the film (the offbeat, masculine clothing, such as ties with cardigans, was actually Keaton's own). While in production, its working title was "
Anhedonia," a term that means the inability to feel pleasure, and its plot revolved around a murder mystery. Apparently, as filmed, the murder mystery plot did not work (and was later used in his 1993
Manhattan Murder Mystery
), so Allen re-edited and re-cut the movie after production ended to focus on the romantic comedy between Allen's character, Alvy Singer, and Keaton's character, Annie Hall. The new version, retitled
Annie Hall
(named after Keaton, Hall being her given last name and Annie a nickname), still deals with the theme of the inability to feel pleasure. Ranked at No. 35 on the ''
American Film Institute s "100 Best Movies" and at No. 4 on the AFI list of "100 Best Comedies,"
Annie Hall'' is considered to be among Allen's best.
Manhattan,
released in 1979, is a black-and-white film that can be viewed as an homage to New York City, which has been described as the true "main character" of the movie. As in many other Allen films, the main characters are upper-class academics. Even though it makes fun of pretentious intellectuals, the story is packed with obscure references which makes it less accessible to a general audience. The love-hate opinion of cerebral persons found in
Manhattan
is characteristic of many of Allen's movies including
Crimes and Misdemeanors
and
Annie Hall.
Manhattan
focuses on the complicated relationship between a middle-aged Isaac Davis (Allen) and a 17-year-old Tracy (
Mariel Hemingway).
Between
Annie Hall
and
Manhattan
, Allen wrote and directed the gloomy drama
Interiors
(1978), in the style of the late
Swedish director
Ingmar Bergman, one of Allen's major influences.
Interiors
represented a significant departure from Allen's "earlier, funnier comedies" (a line from 1980s
Stardust Memories
).
1980s
Allen's 1980s films, even the comedies, have somber and philosophical undertones. Some, like
September
and
Stardust Memories
, are heavily influenced by the works of European directors, most notably
Ingmar Bergman and
Federico Fellini.
Stardust Memories
features as a main character Sandy Bates, a successful filmmaker played by Allen, who expresses resentment and scorn for his fans. Overcome by the recent death of a friend from illness, the character states, "I don't want to make funny movies any more," and a running gag throughout the film has various people (including a group of visiting space aliens) telling Bates that they appreciate his films, "especially the early, funny ones."
[13] To this day, Allen believes this to be one of his very best films.
[14]
However, by the mid-1980s, Allen had begun to combine tragic and comic elements with the release of such films as
Hannah and Her Sisters
and
Crimes and Misdemeanors
, in which he tells two different stories that connect at the end. He also produced a vividly idiosyncratic tragi-comical parody of documentary, titled
Zelig
.
He also made three films about show business. The first is
Broadway Danny Rose
, in which he plays a New York show business agent; the second is
The Purple Rose of Cairo
, a movie that shows the importance of the cinema during the Depression through the character of the naive Cecilia. Lastly, Allen made
Radio Days
, which is a film about his childhood in Brooklyn, and the importance of the radio.
Purple Rose
was named by
Time Magazine
as one of the 100 best films of all time, and Allen has described it as one of his three best films, along with
Stardust Memories
and
Match Point.
[15] (Allen defines them as "best" not in terms of quality, but because they came out the closest to his original vision.)
Before the end of the '80s, he made other movies that were strongly inspired by
Ingmar Bergman's films.
September
resembles
Autumn Sonata
, and Allen uses many elements from
Wild Strawberries
[16] in
Another Woman
. Similarly, the
Federico Fellini classic
Amarcord
strongly inspired
Radio Days
.
[17]
1990s
His 1992 film
Shadows and Fog
is a black-and-white homage to
German expressionists and features the music of
Kurt Weill. Allen then made his critically acclaimed drama
Husbands and Wives
(1992), which received two Oscar nominations: Best Supporting Actress for
Judy Davis and Best Original Screenplay for Allen. His film
Manhattan Murder Mystery
(1993) combined suspense with dark comedy, and marked the return of
Diane Keaton,
Alan Alda and
Anjelica Huston.
Next, he returned to lighter movies, such as
Bullets Over Broadway
(1994), which earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Director, followed by a musical,
Everyone Says I Love You
(1996). The singing and dancing scenes in
Everyone Says I Love You
are similar to many musicals starring
Fred Astaire and
Ginger Rogers, and the plot is no less comical than those in which they starred. The comedy
Mighty Aphrodite
(1995), in which the Greek drama plays a large role, won an
Academy Award for
Mira Sorvino. Allen's 1999 jazz-based comedy-drama
Sweet and Lowdown
was also nominated for two Academy Awards for
Sean Penn (Best Actor) and
Samantha Morton (Best Supporting Actress). In contrast to these lighter movies, Allen veered into darker satire towards the end of the decade with
Deconstructing Harry
(1997) and
Celebrity
(1998).
Allen made his only
sitcom "appearance" to date (2009) via telephone on the show
Just Shoot Me!,
in a 1997 episode, "My Dinner with Woody," which paid tribute to several of his films. Allen also provided the lead voice in the 1998 animated film
Antz
, which featured many actors he had previously worked with and had Allen play a character that was very similar to his earlier neurotic roles, only as an insect.
2000s
Small Time Crooks
(2000) was his first film with
DreamWorks SKG studio and represented a change in direction: Allen began giving more interviews and made an apparent attempt to return to his slapstick comedy roots.
Small Time Crooks
was a relative success, grossing over $17 million domestically, but Allen's next four films foundered at the box office, including Allen's most expensive film to date,
The Curse of the Jade Scorpion
(with a budget of $33 million).
Hollywood Ending
,
Anything Else
, and
Melinda and Melinda
were given "rotten" ratings from film-review website
Rotten Tomatoes and each earned less than $5 million domestically.
[18] Some critics claimed that Allen's films since 1999's
Sweet and Lowdown
were subpar and expressed concern that Allen's best years were now behind him.
[19] Woody gave his godson, Quincy Rose, a small part in
Melinda & Melinda
.
thumb, 2006
Match Point
(2005) was one of Allen's most successful films in the past 10 years and generally received very positive reviews. Set in
London, it starred
Jonathan Rhys-Meyers and
Scarlett Johansson. It is also markedly darker than Allen's first four films under the DreamWorks SKG banner. In
Match Point
, Allen shifts his focus from the intellectual upper class of New York to the moneyed upper class of London. While different from Allen's many critical satires,
Match Point
still has undertones of social critique. This is clearest in the theme of luck which works on several levels in the film.
Match Point
earned more than $23 million domestically (more than any of his films in nearly 20 years) and earned over $62 million in international box office sales.
[20] Match Point
earned Allen his first Academy Award nomination since 1998 for Best Writing - Original Screenplay and also earned directing and writing nominations at the Golden Globes, his first Globe nominations since 1987. In an interview with
Premiere Magazine
, Allen stated this was the best film he has ever made.
Allen returned to London to film
Scoop
, which also starred Johansson, as well as
Hugh Jackman,
Ian McShane and
Kevin McNally. The film was released on July 28, 2006, and received mixed reviews. He has also filmed
Cassandra's Dream
in London.
Cassandra's Dream
stars
Colin Farrell,
Ewan McGregor, and
Tom Wilkinson and was released in November 2007.
After finishing his third London film, Allen headed to
Spain. He reached an agreement to film
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
in
Avilés,
Barcelona and
Oviedo, where shooting started on July 9, 2007. The movie stars international actors and actresses, including
Scarlett Johansson,
Javier Bardem,
Rebecca Hall, and
Penélope Cruz.
[21] [22] Speaking of his experience there, Allen said: "I'm delighted at being able to work with Mediapro and make a film in Spain, a country which has become so special to me."
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
was well received, winning "Best Musical or Comedy" at the Golden Globe awards. Penélope Cruz received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the film.
Allen has said that he "survives" on the European market. Audiences there have tended to be more receptive to Allen's films, particularly in Spain and
France, both countries where he has a large fan base (something joked about in
Hollywood Ending
). "In the United States things have changed a lot, and it's hard to make good small films now," Allen said in a 2004 interview. "The avaricious studios couldn't care less about good films – if they get a good film they're twice as happy, but money-making films are their goal. They only want these $100 million pictures that make $500
million."
[23]
In April 2008, he began filming for a movie focused more towards older audiences starring
Larry David,
Patricia Clarkson [24] and
Evan Rachel Wood.
[25] He revealed in July 2008 the title of this film, to be released in 2009:
Whatever Works
,
[26] [27]
described as a dark comedy, follows the story of a botched suicide attempt turned messy love triangle.
Whatever Works
was written by Allen in the 1970s and the character now played by Larry David was originally written for Zero Mostel, who died the year Annie Hall came out.
Allen's current project, being filmed in London, stars Antonio Banderas, Josh Brolin, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Anupam Kher, Freida Pinto and Naomi Watts. Filming started in July 2009.
Reports also suggest that Woody Allen's next two projects will be filmed in Europe, in the summers of 2010 and 2011, respectively.
[28]
The "Woody Allen" character
Allen continues to write roles for the neurotic persona he created in the 1960s and 1970s; however, as he gets older, the roles have been assumed by other actors such as
John Cusack (
Bullets Over Broadway
),
Edward Norton (
Everyone Says I Love You
),
Kenneth Branagh (
Celebrity
),
Jason Biggs (
Anything Else
), and
Will Ferrell (
Melinda and Melinda
).
Awards, nominations and distinctions
Over the course of his career, Allen has received a considerable number of
awards and distinctions in
film festivals and yearly national film awards ceremonies, saluting his work as a director, screenwriter, and actor.
When premiering his films at festivals, Allen does not screen his motion pictures in competition, thus deliberately taking them out of consideration for potential awards.
- Allen's film Annie Hall
won four Academy Awards in 1977, including best picture.
- Allen won the 1978 O. Henry Award for his short story "The Kugelmass Episode," published in The New Yorker
on May 2, 1977.
- Allen twice won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, the first in 1980 for Manhattan
and the second in 1986 for The Purple Rose of Cairo
. Seven other of his movies were nominated for the prize.
- In 1986, Allen won the Golden Globe for Best Screenplay for The Purple Rose of Cairo
, and in 2009 he won the same award for Best Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical for Vicky Christina Barcelona
. He was also nominated four times as Best Director, four times for Best Screenplay and twice for Best Actor (Comedy/musical).
- At the 1995 Venice Film Festival, Allen received a Career Golden Lion for lifetime achievement.
- In 1996, Allen received a lifetime achievement award from the Directors Guild of America.
- In 2002, Allen won the Prince of Asturias Award. Subsequently, the city of Oviedo, Spain, erected a life-size statue of Allen. [29]
- In 2002, Allen received the Palme des Palmes
, a special lifetime achievement award granted by the Cannes Festival and whose sole other recipient is Ingmar Bergman. [30]
- In a 2005 poll The Comedian's Comedian
, Allen was voted the third greatest comedy act ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.
- In June 2007, Allen received a Ph.D. degree Honoris Causa from Pompeu Fabra University (Barcelona, Spain).
Academy Awards
Woody Allen has won three Academy Awards and been nominated a total of 21 times: 14 as a screenwriter, six as a director, and one as an actor. He has more screenwriting
Academy Award nominations than any other writer; all are in the "Best Original Screenplay" category. He is tied for fifth all-time with six Best Director nominations. His actors have regularly received both nominations and Academy Awards for their work in Allen films, particularly in the Best Supporting categories.
Annie Hall
won four Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Director and Best Actress). The film received a fifth nomination, for Allen as Best Actor.
Hannah and Her Sisters
won three, for Best Screenplay and both Best Supporting Actor categories; it was nominated in four other categories, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Despite friendly recognition from the Academy, Allen has consistently refused to attend the ceremony or acknowledge his Oscar wins. He broke this pattern only once. At the
Academy Awards ceremony in 2002, Allen made an unannounced appearance, making a plea for producers to continue filming their movies in
New York City after the
9-11 attacks.
[31] He was given a standing ovation before introducing a montage of movie clips featuring
New York.
Best Original Screenplay
- Won:
Annie Hall (1977)
- Nominated: Interiors
(1978)
- Nominated: Manhattan
(1979)
- Nominated: Broadway Danny Rose
(1984)
- Nominated: The Purple Rose of Cairo
(1985)
- Won:
Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
- Nominated: Radio Days
(1987)
- Nominated: Crimes and Misdemeanors
(1989)
- Nominated: Alice
(1990)
- Nominated: Husbands and Wives
(1992)
- Nominated: Bullets Over Broadway
(1994)
- Nominated: Mighty Aphrodite
(1995)
- Nominated: Deconstructing Harry
(1997)
- Nominated: Match Point
(2005)
|
Best Actor
- Nominated: Annie Hall
(1977)
Best Director
- Won:
Annie Hall (1977)
- Nominated: Interiors
(1978)
- Nominated: Broadway Danny Rose
(1984)
- Nominated: Hannah and Her Sisters
(1986)
- Nominated: Crimes and Misdemeanors
(1989)
- Nominated: Bullets Over Broadway
(1994)
|
- Five actors have won
six Academy Awards for their work in Allen films: Diane Keaton (Best Actress, Annie Hall
), Michael Caine (Best Supporting Actor, Hannah and Her Sisters
), Dianne Wiest (Best Supporting Actress, Hannah and Her Sisters
and Bullets Over Broadway
), Mira Sorvino (Best Supporting Actress, Mighty Aphrodite
), and Penélope Cruz (Best Supporting Actress, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
).
- Eleven actors have received Academy Award nominations
for their work in Allen films: Allen himself (Best Actor, Annie Hall
), Geraldine Page (Best Actress, Interiors
), Martin Landau (Best Supporting Actor, Crimes and Misdemeanors
), Chazz Palminteri (Best Supporting Actor, Bullets Over Broadway
), Maureen Stapleton (Best Supporting Actress, Interiors
), Mariel Hemingway (Best Supporting Actress, Manhattan
), Judy Davis (Best Supporting Actress, Husbands and Wives
), Jennifer Tilly (Best Supporting Actress, Bullets Over Broadway
), Sean Penn (Best Actor, Sweet and Lowdown
), and Samantha Morton (Best Supporting Actress, Sweet and Lowdown
).
BAFTA
Allen has won a number of
British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) awards and nominations for best picture, best director, best actor, and best screenplay. In 1997, he received the honorary BAFTA Fellowship for his work.
- 1978 — Won — Best Film — Annie Hall
- 1978 — Won — Best Screenplay — Annie Hall
(with Marshall Brickman)
- 1978 — Won — Best Direction — Annie Hall
- 1980 — Won — Best Film — Manhattan
- 1980 — Won — Best Screenplay — Manhattan
(with Marshall Brickman)
- 1985 — Won — Best Screenplay — Broadway Danny Rose
- 1986 — Won — Best Film — The Purple Rose of Cairo
- 1986 — Won — Best Screenplay — The Purple Rose of Cairo
- 1987 — Won — Best Screenplay — Hannah and Her Sisters
- 1987 — Won — Best Direction — Hannah and Her Sisters
- 1993 — Won — Best Screenplay — Husbands and Wives
- Nominated for best film for Hannah and Her Sisters
, Radio Days
, Crimes and Misdemeanors
.
- Nominated for best actor for Annie Hall
, Manhattan
, Hannah and Her Sisters
.
- Nominated for best director for Manhattan
, Crimes and Misdemeanors
.
- Nominated for best screenplay for Zelig
, Radio Days
, Crimes and Misdemeanors
, Bullets Over Broadway
(with Douglas McGrath).
Title sequences
Virtually all of Allen's films since
Annie Hall
begin with the same style of title sequence, incorporating a series of black-and-white title cards in a vintage typeface (most often
Windsor) reminiscent mostly of legendary Japanese director
Yasujiro Ozu, set to a selection of jazz music that occasionally figures prominently later in the film's story (e.g.,
Radio Days
). Additionally, the cast is placed on one such title card and listed in alphabetical order, and not in the order of the relative "star power" of the actors at the time in which the film was made. This is reminiscent of silent-era films. There is one minor variation in
Deconstructing Harry
, where the titles are weaved in with a looped shot. Another exception to this is
Manhattan
, which opens with a series of black-and-white still shots of the city set to Gershwin's "Rhapsody In Blue"; the film's title comes after the opening narration is over.
Theater
Although best known for his films, Allen has also enjoyed a very successful career in theater, starting as early as 1960 when Allen was writing sketches for the
revue From A to Z
. His first great success was
Don't Drink the Water
, which opened in 1968 and ran for 598 performances for almost two years on Broadway.
[32] His success continued with
Play it Again, Sam
, which opened in 1969, starring Allen and
Diane Keaton. The show played for 453 performances and was nominated for three
Tony Awards, although none of the nominations was for Allen's writing or acting.
[33]
In the '70s, Allen wrote a number of
one-act plays, most notably
God
and
Death
, which were published in his 1975 collection
Without Feathers
.
In 1981, Allen's play
The Floating Light Bulb
opened on Broadway. The play was a critical success but a commercial flop. Despite two
Tony Award nominations, a Tony win for the acting of
Brian Backer (who also won the 1981
Theatre World Award and a
Drama Desk Award for his work), the play only ran for 62 performances.
[34] As of January 2008, it is the last Allen work that ran on
Broadway.
After a long hiatus from the stage, Allen returned to the theater in 1995 with the one-act
Central Park West
, an installment in an evening of theater known as
Death Defying Acts
that was also made up of new work by
David Mamet and
Elaine May.
[35]
For the next couple of years, Allen had no direct involvement with the stage, yet notable productions of his work were being staged. A production of
God
was staged at the
The Bank of Brazil Cultural Center in
Rio de Janeiro,
[36] and theatrical adaptations of Allen's films
Bullets over Broadway
[37] and
September
[38] were produced in Italy and France, respectively, without Allen's involvement. In 1997, rumors of Allen returning to the theater to write a starring role for his wife
Soon-Yi Previn turned out to be false.
[39]
In 2003, Allen finally returned to the stage with
Writer's Block
, an evening of two one-acts--
Old Saybrook
and
Riverside Drive
--that played
off-Broadway. The production marked the stage-directing debut for Allen.
[40] The production sold out its entire run.
[41]
Also that year, reports of Allen writing the book for a musical based on
Bullets over Broadway
surfaced, but no show ever formulated.
[42] In 2004, Allen's first full-length play since 1981,
A Second Hand Memory
,
[43] was directed by Allen and enjoyed an extended run off-Broadway.
In June 2007, it was announced that Allen would make two more creative debuts in the theater, directing a work that he didn't write and directing an opera – a re-interpretation of
Puccini's
Gianni Schicchi
for the
Los Angeles Opera [44] - which debuted at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on September 6, 2008.
[45] Commenting on his direction of the opera, Allen said, “I have no idea what I’m doing.” His production of the opera opened the
Festival of Two Worlds in
Spoleto, Italy, in June 2009.
[46]
Marriages and relationships
Harlene Rosen
At age 19, Allen married 16-year-old Harlene Rosen.
[47] The marriage lasted five "nettling, unsettling years," from
1954 to
1959.
Rosen, whom Allen referred to in his standup act as "the Dread Mrs. Allen," later
sued Allen for
defamation due to comments at a TV appearance shortly after their divorce. Allen tells a different story on his mid-1960s standup album
Standup Comic
. In his act, Allen said that Rosen sued him because of a joke he made in an interview. Rosen had been
sexually assaulted outside her apartment, and, according to Allen, the newspapers reported that she "had been violated." In the interview, Allen said, "Knowing my ex-wife, it probably wasn't a
moving violation." In a later interview on
The Dick Cavett Show
, Allen brought the incident up again where he repeated his comments and stated that the amount that he was being sued for was "$1 million."
Louise Lasser
Allen married
Louise Lasser in 1966. Allen and Lasser divorced in 1969, and Allen did not marry again until 1997. Lasser starred in four Allen films after the divorce--
Take the Money and Run
,
Bananas
,
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask)
and
Sleeper
--and made a brief appearance in
Stardust Memories
. Allen is alleged to have loosely based aspects of the "Harriet Harman" character in
Husbands and Wives
(the "kamikaze woman") on his relationship with Lasser.
Diane Keaton
In 1970, Allen cast
Diane Keaton in his Broadway play
Play It Again, Sam
, which had a successful run. During this time, she became romantically involved with Allen and appeared in a number of his films, including
Annie Hall
. Keaton starred in
Play It Again, Sam
as
Tony Roberts' wife. Although Allen and Keaton broke up after a year, she starred in a number of his films after their relationship had ended, including
Sleeper
as a futuristic poet and
Love and Death
as a composite character based on the novels of
Tolstoy and
Dostoevsky.
Annie Hall
was very important in Allen and Keaton's careers. Furthermore, it is said that the role was written especially for her, and even the title speaks to this as Diane Keaton's given name is Diane Hall. She then starred in
Interiors
as a poet again, followed by
Manhattan
. In 1987, she had a cameo as a night-club singer in
Radio Days
and was chosen to replace
Mia Farrow in the co-starring role for
Manhattan Murder Mystery
after Allen and Farrow began having troubles with their personal and working relationship while making this film. Keaton has not worked with Allen since
Manhattan Murder Mystery.
Stacey Nelkin
The film
Manhattan
is said to have been based on his romantic relationship with the actress
Stacey Nelkin. Her bit part in
Annie Hall
ended up on the
cutting room floor, and their relationship, though never publicly acknowledged by Allen, reportedly began when she was 17 years old and a student at New York's
Stuyvesant High School.
[48] [49] [50]
Mia Farrow
Starting around 1980, Allen began a 12-year relationship with actress
Mia Farrow, who had leading roles in several of his movies from 1982 to 1992. Farrow and Allen never married, but they
adopted two children together: Dylan Farrow (who changed her name to Eliza and is now known as Malone) and Moshe Farrow (now known as Moses); they also had one biological child, Satchel Farrow (now known as
Ronan Seamus Farrow). Allen did not adopt any of Farrow's other biological and adopted children, including Soon-Yi Farrow Previn (the adopted daughter of Farrow and
André Previn, now known as
Soon-Yi Previn). Allen and Farrow separated in 1992 after Farrow discovered nude photographs that Allen had taken of Soon-Yi. In her autobiography,
What Falls Away
(New York: Doubleday, 1997), Farrow says that Allen admitted to a relationship with Soon-Yi.
After Allen and Farrow separated, a long public legal battle for the custody of their three children began. During the proceedings, Farrow alleged that Allen had sexually molested their adopted daughter Dylan, who was then seven years old. The judge eventually concluded that the sex abuse charges were inconclusive,
[51] but called Allen's conduct with Soon-Yi "grossly inappropriate." She called the report of the team that investigated the issue "sanitized and, therefore, less credible," and added that she had "reservations about the reliability of the report." Farrow ultimately won the custody battle over their children. Allen was denied visitation rights with Malone and could see Ronan only under supervision. Moses, who was then 14, chose not to see Allen.
In a 2005
Vanity Fair
interview,
[52] Allen estimated that, despite the scandal's damage to his reputation, Farrow's discovery of Allen's attraction to Soon-Yi Previn, by accidentally finding nude photographs of her, was "just one of the fortuitous events, one of the great pieces of luck in my life. [...] It was a turning point for the better." Of his relationship with Farrow, he said, "I'm sure there are things that I might have done differently. [...] Probably in retrospect I should have bowed out of that relationship much earlier than I did."
Soon-Yi Previn
thumb and Allen at the 2009
Tribeca Film Festival.
After breaking his relationship from Farrow in 1992, Allen continued his relationship with
Soon-Yi Previn. Even though Allen never married or lived with Farrow,
[53] and was never Previn's legal
stepfather, the relationship between Allen and Previn has often been referred to as a father dating his "stepdaughter,"
[54] since he had been perceived as being in the child's life in a father-like capacity since she was seven years old. For example, in 1991,
The New York Times
described Allen's family life by reporting, "Few married couples seem more married. They are constantly in touch with each other, and not many fathers spend as much time with their children as Allen does."
[53] Despite assertions from Previn that Allen was never a father-figure to her,
[56] the relationship became a cause célèbre. At the time, Allen was 56 and Previn was 22. Asked whether their age difference was conducive to "a healthy, equal relationship," Allen discounted the matter of equality and added this protestation: "The heart wants what it wants."
[56]
Allen and Previn married on December 24, 1997, in the Palazzo Cavalli in Venice, Italy. The couple has adopted two daughters, naming them Bechet and Manzie
[58] after jazz musicians
Sidney Bechet and
Manzie Johnson.
Allen and Farrow's only biological son,
Ronan Seamus Farrow, said of Allen: "He's my father married to my sister. That makes me his son and his brother-in-law. That is such a moral transgression. I cannot see him. I cannot have a relationship with my father and be morally consistent.... I lived with all these adopted children, so they are my family. To say Soon-Yi was not my sister is an insult to all adopted children."
[59]
frame and Simon Wettenhall performing at
Vienne Jazz Festival,
Vienne, France.
Clarinetist
Allen is a passionate fan of
jazz, which is often featured prominently in the soundtracks to his films. He began playing as a child and took his stage name from clarinetist
Woody Herman. He has performed publicly at least since the late 1960s, notably with the
Preservation Hall Jazz Band on the soundtrack of
Sleeper
. One of his earliest televised performances was on
The Dick Cavett Show
on October 20, 1971.
Woody Allen and his New Orleans Jazz Band play every Monday evening at Manhattan's
Carlyle Hotel, specializing in classic
New Orleans jazz from the early twentieth century.
[60] The
documentary film Wild Man Blues
(directed by
Barbara Kopple) documents a 1996 European tour by Allen and his band, as well as his relationship with Previn. The band has released two
CDs:
The Bunk Project
(1993) and the soundtrack of
Wild Man Blues
(1997).
Allen and his band played the Montreal Jazz Festival on two consecutive nights in June 2008.
Work about or inspired by Woody Allen
Apart from
Wild Man Blues
directed by
Barbara Kopple, there are a number of other documentaries featuring Woody Allen, including the 2002 cable-television documentary
Woody Allen: a Life in Film
, directed by
Time Magazine
film critic
Richard Schickel, which interlaces interviews of Allen with clips of his films, and
Meetin' WA
, a short interview of Allen by French director
Jean-Luc Godard.
Waiting for Woody Allen
is a 2004 short film, starring
Modi Rosenfeld, parodying
Samuel Beckett's
Waiting for Godot
. From 1976 to 1984, Stuart Hample wrote and drew
Inside Woody Allen
, a comic strip based on Allen's film persona.
Central Park West Stories
(Baldini Castoldi Dalai publisher, 2005) by
Glauco Della Sciucca (Italian contributor to
Columbia Journalism Review
,
The New Yorker
, and
The Jewish Week
, since September 2003) are inspired by Allen. "Death of an Interior Decorator" is a song on
Death Cab for Cutie's album
Transatlanticism
that was inspired by Woody Allen's
Interiors
. In
Love Creeps
, a novel by
Amanda Filipacchi, a group of birders in
Central Park spot Woody Allen and Soon-Yi stepping out onto their balcony and get very excited, which torments a nearby group of recovering stalkers from
Stalkaholics Anonymous, causing one of them to suddenly lose his sobriety by grabbing the binoculars from around the neck of a birder to stare at Woody Allen and Soon-Yi.
The character
George Costanza, from the sitcom
Seinfeld
, was originally performed as a caricature of Woody Allen, according to
Jason Alexander, before the actor soon realized that Costanza was based on the show's co-creator,
Larry David.
In 1998, the Spanish novel "Yo-Yo Boing!" by
Giannina Braschi features a party scene in which Woody Allen fidgets and stammers while explaining literary classics and the films of Federico Fellini.
In 2003, Keith Black wrote, directed and starred in the award-winning film
Get the Script to Woody Allen
.
[61] The feature was about a neurotic young man who is obsessed with getting his script to Woody.
While not making a case for direct influence or affinity while reviewing
American Splendor inspired by/about graphic artist
Harvey Pekar, columnist
Jaime Wolf drew attention to formal parallels between the film and subject, on one hand, and Allen,
Annie Hall
, and other Allen films, on the other.
[62]
The independent 2009 movie
Mancattan,
[63] written and directed by Phil Drinkwater and Colin Warhurst, charts the story of the two directors, playing fictional versions of themselves, flying over to
New York from their native
Manchester in order to make a documentary about Woody Allen. The film within a film is set against the backdrop of a bittersweet romantic comedy as the film cuts between events in
Manhattan and flashbacks of Manchester.
Psychoanalysis
Allen spent at least 30 years undergoing
psychoanalysis, sometimes going three days a week. Many of his films contain references to psychoanalysis. Even the film
Antz
, an animated feature in which Allen contributes the voice of lead character
Z
, opens with a classic piece of Allen analysis
shtick.
Moment Magazine
says, "It drove his self-absorbed work." John Baxter, author of
Woody Allen - A Biography
, wrote, "Allen obviously found analysis stimulating, even exciting."
[64]
Allen says he ended his psychotherapy visits around the time he began his relationship with Previn. He says he still is
claustrophobic and
agoraphobic.
[
]
Filmography
Theater works
In addition to directing, writing, and acting in films, Allen has written and performed in a number of Broadway theater productions.
Year
| Title
| Credit
| Venue
|
1960
| From A to Z
| Writer (book)
| Plymouth Theatre
|
1966
| Don't Drink the Water
| Writer
| —
|
1969
| Play It Again, Sam
| Writer, Performer (Allan Felix)
| Broadhurst Theatre [65]
|
1975
| God
| Writer
| —
|
1975
| Death
| Writer
| —
|
1981
| The Floating Light Bulb
| Writer
| Vivian Beaumont Theatre
|
1995
| Central Park West
| Writer
| Variety Arts Theatre
|
2003
| Old Sybrook
| Writer, Director
| Atlantic Theatre Company
|
2003
| Riverside Drive
| Writer, Director
| Atlantic Theatre Company
|
2004
| A Second Hand Memory
| Writer, Director
| Atlantic Theater Company
|
Bibliography
Published plays
- Don't Drink the Water: A comedy in two acts
(1967), ASIN B0006BSWBW
- Play It Again, Sam
(1969), ISBN 0-394-40663-X
- God: A comedy in one act
(1975), ISBN 0-573-62201-9
- The Floating Light Bulb
(1981)
- Three One-Act Plays: Riverside Drive / Old Saybrook / Central Park West
(2003), ISBN 0-8129-7244-9
- Writer's Block: Two One-Act Plays
(2005), ISBN 0-573-62630-8 (includes Riverside Drive
and Old Saybrook
)
- A Second Hand Memory: A drama in two acts
(2005)
- The one-act plays God
and Death
are both included in Allen's 1975 collection Without Feathers
(see below).
Short stories
- Getting Even
(1971), ISBN 0-394-47348-5
- Without Feathers
(1975), ISBN 0-394-49743-0
- Side Effects
(1980), ISBN 0-394-51104-2
- Mere Anarchy
(2007), ISBN 978-1-4000-6641-4
Anthologies
- Complete Prose of Woody Allen
(1992), ISBN 0-517-07229-7. (Collection of Allen's short stories first published in Getting Even
, Without Feathers
and Side Effects
.)
- The Insanity Defense: The Complete Prose
. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007, ISBN 978-0812978117.
Chapbook
- Lunatic's Tale
(1986), ISBN 1-55628-001-7 (Short story previously included in Side Effects
.)