Woody Allen: Interviews

Conversations With Filmmakers Series

by Robert E. Kapsis (Editor), Kathie Coblentz (Editor)

Woody Allen (b. 1935) is one of America's most idiosyncratic filmmakers, with an unparalleled output of nearly one film every year for over three decades. His movies are filled with rapid-fire one-liners, neurotic characters, anguished relationships, and old-time jazz music. Allen's vision of New York--whether in comedies or dramas--has shaped our perception of the city more than any other modern filmmaker. "On the screen," John Lahr wrote in the New Yorker in 1996, "Allen is a loser who makes much of his inadequacy; off-screen, he has created over the years the most wide-ranging oeuvre in American entertainment."

Woody Allen: Interviews collects over twenty-five years of interviews with the director of Manhattan, Hannah and Her Sisters, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Bullets Over Broadway, and Annie Hall, for which he won an Oscar. The book's interviews reveal a serious director, often at odds with his onscreen persona as a lovable, slap-stick loser. Allen talks frankly about his rigorous work habits; his biggest artistic influences; the attention he devotes to acting, screenwriting, and directing; and how New York fuels his filmmaking.

Along with discussing film techniques and styles, Allen opens up about his love of jazz, his Jewish heritage, and the scandal that arose when he left his longtime partner Mia Farrow for her adopted daughter. Including four interviews from European sources, three of which are now available in English for the first time, Woody Allen: Interviews is a treasure trove of conversations with one of America's most distinctive filmmakers.

Robert E. Kapsis is professor of sociology at Queens College and is the author of Hitchcock: The Making of a Reputation. His work has appeared in the Village Voice, Variety, Journal of Popular Film and Video, and Cineaste and at the Museum of Modern Art. Kathie Coblentz is special collections cataloger at the New York Public Library. Kapsis and Coblentz coedited Clint Eastwood: Interviews (University Press of Mississippi).

Genres: Film, Media Tie In, Nonfiction, Biography

258 pages, Paperback

First published April 12, 2006

Reviews

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like his philosophy anyway, it seems no matter what he says, I like the way he say it, making joke of everything, his self irony, and his idea about politic, religion and so on

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book to get into woody allen's head. As a filmmaker it teaches me that all he really is someone who wants to work forever and this enforces his work ethic. As an artist, it's brilliant as his work ethic is based around courage.

This book is one interview after many of his movies displayed cronologically. This makes it timeless yet at time redunant. The redundancy does serve well in retrospect as it become imporant to realize you just read 10 conversations over the course of 15 years about his dilema with blending comedy and drama.

[Stanislav · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've pretty much read all the Woody Allen interview books and this is hands down my favorite. Some might say that the material with Eric Lax and other, newer writers is more contemporary and gets at Woody Allen's thinking as it is today, but this book really shows Woody Allen at his hungriest. Here are a set of interviews where Woody Allen was at his freshest, most critical (in a good way), and just plain quotable. There's just not a lot of bite left to Woody these days but this book shows him in his prime and in a number of interesting contexts and situations.