The Unruly Life Of Woody Allen

“A psychologically nuanced, tough-minded portrait” of the New York filmmaker and his relationships with Mia Farrow and Soon-Yi Previn (Publishers Weekly). Writer, director, actor, humorist. Woody Allen stands as one of our era’s most celebrated artists. Starting in the 1950s, Allen began crafting a larger‐than‐life neurotic persona that has since entertained and enlightened millions. In his films, widely thought to be autobiographical explorations of his own comic fears and fixations, Allen carefully controlled the public’s view of him as a lovable scamp. But that all came crashing down the day Mia Farrow found a Polaroid on her mantle. What followed was a flurry of sensational headlines and legal battles. His relationship with Soon‐Yi Previn, thirty-four years his junior and the step‐daughter of his longtime girlfriend, caused shockwaves in the public’s perception of the director, yet few biographers and journalists have explored what happened and why. In this, the first deep investigation of Allen’s life and the events surrounding his split with Farrow, biographer Marion Meade tracks down dozens of friends, actors, neighbors, and film historians. They open up with insights and details rare in the world of wealth and celebrity. What results is a fascinating portrait of a flawed genius, as adept at constructing his own image as he is at crafting films. Rereleased and updated, this is an unauthorized biography that neither Woody Allen’s fans nor his detractors will be able to put down. The revised and updated edition was reviewed in the Wall Street Journal in 2013 by Carl Rollyson, in a roundup of the five best Hollywood biographies.

Woody always distrusted biographers because he felt that this would destroy his public persona. But in 1992, when his stormy private life turned into sensational headlines, the cracks in the familiar persona appeared. Meade has tracked down scores of people in Allen's life who have never before spoken to an Allen biographer: boyhood pals; Brooklyn neighbors & teachers; colleagues Buddy Hackett & Mel Brooks from his early career as a TV writer; actors Maureen Stapleton, Max von Sydow, & Bob Hope; director Sydney Pollack; & the film reviewers who have followed his career. Details the numerous examples of art imitating life in Allen's films, particularly the saga behind his marriage to the adopted daughter of his lover, Mia Farrow.

A complete look at the extensive, ageless, unparalleled filmography of Woody Allen. Writer, actor, director, comedian, author, and musician, Woody Allen is one of the most culturally and cinematically influential filmmakers of all time. His films - he has over 45 writing and directing credits to his name - range from slapstick to tragedy, farce to fantasy. As one of history's most prolific moviemakers, his style and comic sensibility have been imitated, but never replicated, by countless other filmmakers over the years. In The Ultimate Woody Allen Film Companion, film writer Jason Bailey profiles every one of Allen's films: from his debut feature, What's Up, Tiger Lily, through slapstick classics such as Take the Money and Run and Sleeper; Academy Award-winning films such as Annie Hall and Hannah and Her Sisters; and recent gems such as Midnight in Paris and Blue Jasmine. Bailey also includes essays on the fascinating themes that color Allen's works, from death and Freud to music and New York City. Getting up close and personal with the actors and actresses that have brought the iconic films to life, this book's behind-the-scenes stories span the entire career of a man whose catalog has grown into a timeless cornerstone of American pop culture. Complete with full cast lists, production details, and full-color images and artwork, The Ultimate Woody Allen Film Companion is the ultimate, indispensable reference to one of cinema's most beloved and important figures.

For more than five decades, Woody Allen has been one of the most critically acclaimed talents in American cinema. Allen has been nominated for best director seven times by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences—winning for his 1977 film Annie Hall—and he has received more Oscar nominations for best screenplay than any other individual. But Allen’s accomplishments are not limited to the big screen. In addition to writing and directing nearly fifty films—many of which he starred in—Allen has been a television writer, a stand-up comedian, a playwright, and the author of several short stories. TheWoody Allen Encyclopedia is a compendium of information and commentary about every aspect of Allen as an artist. In this volume, Thomas S. Hischak details all of Allen’s works for the cinema, television, and the stage, as well as all of his fiction; his comedy albums; his performances in other directors’ movies; and even documentaries about him. In addition to such critically acclaimed films as Sleeper, Manhattan, Hannah and Her Sisters, Zelig, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Match Point, and Midnight in Paris, entries in this volume feature many of his collaborators, including actors, actresses, cinematographers, editors, designers, producers, and cowriters. This resource also highlights themes in Allen’s work, the music he utilizes in his films, and his working methods, as well as box-office figures and awards. An extensive and comprehensive overview of this artist’s remarkable career, The Woody Allen Encyclopedia is a must-have for film aficionados and will be of great interest to all readers, from professors and students to Allen’s most devoted fans.

For five decades, no American filmmaker has been as prolific—or as paradoxical—as Woody Allen. From Play It Again, Sam (1972) to Midnight in Paris (2011) and Blue Jasmine (2013), Allen has produced an average of one film a year; yet in many of these movies Allen reveals a progressively skeptical attitude toward both the value of art and the cultural contributions of artists. In this second edition Peter J. Bailey extends his classic study to consider Allen's work during the twenty-first century. He illuminates how the director's decision to leave New York to shoot in European cities such as London, Paris, Rome, and Barcelona has affected his craft. He also explores Allen's shift toward younger actors and interprets the evolving critical reaction to his films—authoritatively demonstrating why the director's lifelong project of moviemaking remains endlessly deserving of careful attention.

From the author of the best-selling biography Woody Allen—the most informative, revealing, and entertaining conversations from his thirty-six years of interviewing the great comedian and filmmaker. For more than three decades, Woody Allen has been talking regularly and candidly with Eric Lax, and has given him singular and unfettered access to his film sets, his editing room, and his thoughts and observations. In discussions that begin in 1971 and continue into 2007, Allen discusses every facet of moviemaking through the prism of his own films and the work of directors he admires. In doing so, he reveals an artist’s development over the course of his career to date, from joke writer to standup comedian to world-acclaimed filmmaker. Woody talks about the seeds of his ideas and the writing of his screenplays; about casting and acting, shooting and directing, editing and scoring. He tells how he reworks screenplays even while filming them. He describes the problems he has had casting American men, and he explains why he admires the acting of (among many others) Alan Alda, Marlon Brando, Michael Caine, John Cusack, Judy Davis, Robert De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mia Farrow, Gene Hackman, Scarlett Johansson, Julie Kavner, Liam Neeson, Jack Nicholson, Charlize Theron, Tracey Ullman, Sam Waterston, and Dianne Wiest. He places Diane Keaton second only to Judy Holliday in the pantheon of great screen comediennes. He discusses his favorite films (Citizen Kane is the lone American movie on his list of sixteen “best films ever made”; Duck Soup and Airplane! are two of his preferred “comedian’s films”; Trouble in Paradise and Born Yesterday among his favorite “talking plot comedies”). He describes himself as a boy in Brooklyn enthralled by the joke-laden movies of Bob Hope and the sophisticated film stories of Manhattan. As a director, he tells us what he appreciates about Bergman, De Sica, Fellini, Welles, Kurosawa, John Huston, and Jean Renoir. Throughout he shows himself to be thoughtful, honest, self–deprecating, witty, and often hilarious. Conversations with Woody Allen is essential reading for everyone interested in the art of moviemaking and for everyone who has enjoyed the films of Woody Allen.

The comic archetype of the Little Man--a "nobody" who stands up to unfairness--is central to the films of Woody Allen and Charlie Chaplin. Portraying the alienation of life in an indifferent world with a mix of pathos, irony and slapstick, both adopted absurdist personas--Chaplin's bumbling yet clever Tramp with his shabby clothes, and Allen's fool with his metaphysical witticisms and proclivity to fall in love too quickly. Both men were auteurs who managed to retain creative control of their work and achieve worldwide popularity. Both suffered from scandals regarding their attraction to younger women. Drawing on psychoanalysis and gender studies, this book explores their films as barometers of their respective historical moments, marking cultural shifts from modernism to postmodernism.