112 Facts About Woody Allen

Heywood Allen was born on Allan Stewart Konigsberg; November 30,1935 and is an American filmmaker, actor, and comedian whose career spans more than six decades.

Woody Allen has received many accolades, including the most nominations for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Woody Allen has won four Academy Awards, ten BAFTA Awards, two Golden Globe Awards and a Grammy Award, as well as nominations for a Emmy Award and a Tony Award.

Woody Allen began his career writing material for television in the 1950s, alongside Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Larry Gelbart, and Neil Simon.

Woody Allen published several books of short stories and wrote humor pieces for The New Yorker.

Woody Allen has directed many films set in New York City, including Manhattan, Hannah and Her Sisters, and Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Woody Allen continued to garner acclaim, making a film almost every year, and is often identified as part of the New Hollywood wave of auteur filmmakers whose work has been influenced by European art cinema.

Woody Allen's films include Interiors, Stardust Memories, Zelig, Broadway Danny Rose, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Radio Days, Husbands and Wives, Bullets Over Broadway, Deconstructing Harry, Match Point, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Midnight in Paris, and Blue Jasmine.

From 1980 to 1992, Woody Allen had a professional and personal relationship with actress Mia Farrow.

Woody Allen married Previn in 1997 and they have adopted two children.

Woody Allen was born Allan Stewart Konigsberg at Mount Eden Hospital in Bronx, New York City, on November 30,1935, to Nettie, a bookkeeper at her family's delicatessen, and Martin Konigsberg, a jewelry engraver and waiter.

Woody Allen's grandparents were Jewish immigrants to the US from Austria and Panevezys, Lithuania.

Woody Allen's parents did not get along, and he had an estranged relationship with his mother.

Woody Allen impressed students with his talent for cards and magic tricks.

Woody Allen briefly attended City College of New York in 1954, dropping out during his first semester.

Woody Allen taught himself rather than studying in the classroom.

Woody Allen later taught at The New School and studied with writing teacher Lajos Egri.

Woody Allen began writing short jokes when he was 15, and the next year began offering them to various Broadway writers for sale.

Woody Allen began writing scripts for The Ed Sullivan Show, The Tonight Show, specials for Sid Caesar post-Caesar's Hour, and other television shows.

Woody Allen worked alongside Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Larry Gelbart, and Neil Simon.

Woody Allen worked with Danny Simon, whom Allen credits for helping form his writing style.

Woody Allen had this tricky little mind and he'd surprise you, which is the trick of being a good comedy writer.

Woody Allen wrote for Candid Camera and appeared in several episodes.

Woody Allen wrote jokes for the Buddy Hackett sitcom Stanley and The Pat Boone Chevy Showroom, and in 1958 he co-wrote a few Sid Caesar specials with Larry Gelbart.

Woody Allen was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album.

Comedian Milton Berle claims to have suggested to Woody Allen to go into standup comedy and even introduced him at the Village Vanguard.

Woody Allen first appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson on November 1,1963, and over nine years his guest appearances included 17 in the host's chair.

In 1965, Allen filmed a half-hour standup special in England for Granada Television, titled The Woody Allen Show in the UK and Woody Allen: Standup Comic in the US It is the only complete standup show of Allen's on film.

In 1966, Woody Allen wrote an hour-long musical comedy television special for CBS, Gene Kelly in New York City.

In 1967, Allen hosted a TV special for NBC, Woody Allen Looks at 1967.

Woody Allen performed standup comedy on other series, including The Andy Williams Show and The Perry Como Show, where he interacted with other guests and occasionally sang.

That same year, Woody Allen wrote the play Don't Drink the Water, starring Lou Jacobi, Kay Medford, Anita Gillette, and Woody Allen's future movie co-star Tony Roberts.

In 1994 Allen directed and starred in a second version for television, with Michael J Fox and Mayim Bialik.

The next play Woody Allen wrote for Broadway was Play It Again, Sam, which opened on February 12,1969, starring Woody Allen, Diane Keaton and Roberts.

In 1969, Woody Allen directed, starred in, and co-wrote with Mickey Rose the mockumentary crime comedy Take the Money and Run, in which he plays the low-level thief Virgil Starkwell.

Woody Allen reunited with Keaton in Sleeper, the first of four screenplays co-written by Woody Allen and Marshall Brickman.

Woody Allen collaborated again with Keaton in the comedy Love and Death, set during the Napoleonic era and a satire of Russian literature and film.

In 1976, Woody Allen starred as cashier Howard Prince in the Hollywood blacklist comedy-drama The Front, directed by Martin Ritt and co-starring Zero Mostel.

In 1977 Woody Allen wrote, directed, and starred in the romantic comedy film Annie Hall, which became his seminal and most personal work.

Woody Allen played Alvy Singer, a comic evaluating his past relationship with Annie Hall, portrayed by Diane Keaton.

In Stardust Memories, Woody Allen's character says, "I don't want to make funny movies anymore" and a running gag has various people telling him that they appreciate his films, "especially the early, funny ones".

Woody Allen has written several off-Broadway one-act plays, including Riverside Drive, Old Saybrook, and A Second Hand Memory.

Woody Allen has a very good range, and can play serious to comic roles.

Woody Allen next directed Zelig, in which he starred as a man whose appearance transforms to match that of those around him.

Radio Days, a film about his childhood in Brooklyn and the importance of the radio, co-starred Farrow in a part Woody Allen wrote for her.

Woody Allen has called it one of his three best films, with Stardust Memories and Match Point.

Woody Allen's 1991 film Shadows and Fog is a black-and-white homage to the German expressionists and features the music of Kurt Weill.

Woody Allen then made his critically acclaimed comedy-drama Husbands and Wives, which received two Oscar nominations: Best Supporting Actress for Judy Davis and Best Original Screenplay for Woody Allen.

Woody Allen returned to lighter fare such as the showbiz comedy involving mobsters Bullets Over Broadway, which earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Director, followed by a musical, Everyone Says I Love You.

Woody Allen's 1999 jazz-based comedy-drama Sweet and Lowdown was nominated for two Academy Awards, for Sean Penn and Samantha Morton.

In contrast to these lighter movies, Woody Allen veered into darker satire toward the end of the decade with Deconstructing Harry and Celebrity.

Woody Allen provided the voice of Z in DreamWorks' first animated film, Antz, which featured many actors he had worked with; Allen's character was similar to his earlier roles.

Woody Allen never commented on whether this was deliberate or if his film was in any way inspired by it.

Woody Allen's reputation is not a dead shark but an albatross, which with admirable economy Allen has arranged for the critics to carry around their own necks.

In Match Point Woody Allen shifts focus from the intellectual upper class of New York to the moneyed upper class of London.

Woody Allen reached an agreement to film Vicky Cristina Barcelona in Aviles, Barcelona, and Oviedo, Spain, where shooting started on July 9,2007.

Woody Allen wrote Whatever Works in the 1970s, and David's character was written for Zero Mostel, who died the year Annie Hall came out.

Woody Allen was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2001.

Woody Allen announced that his next film would be titled Midnight in Paris, starring Owen Wilson, Marion Cotillard, Rachel McAdams, Michael Sheen, Corey Stoll, Allison Pill, Tom Hiddleston, Adrien Brody, Kathy Bates, and Carla Bruni, the First Lady of France at the time of production.

Woody Allen said he wanted to "show the city emotionally" during the press conference.

Woody Allen's next film, To Rome with Love, is a Rome-set comedy starring Jesse Eisenberg, Elliot Page, Alec Baldwin, Penelope Cruz, Greta Gerwig, and Judy Davis.

Woody Allen co-starred with John Turturro in Fading Gigolo, written and directed by Turturro, which premiered in September 2013.

Also in 2013, Woody Allen shot the romantic comedy Magic in the Moonlight with Emma Stone and Colin Firth in Nice, France.

In July and August 2014, Woody Allen filmed the mystery drama Irrational Man in Newport, Rhode Island, with Joaquin Phoenix, Emma Stone, Parker Posey and Jamie Blackley.

Woody Allen said that this film, as well as the next three he had planned, had the financing and full support of Sony Pictures Classics.

On January 14,2015, Amazon Studios announced a full-season order for a half-hour Amazon Prime Instant Video series that Woody Allen would write and direct, marking the first time he has developed a television show.

The film is distributed by Amazon Studios, and opened the 2016 Cannes Film Festival on May 11,2016, the third time Woody Allen has opened the festival.

Woody Allen brings it all together in his closing moments which conjure something unexpectedly melancholy and shrewdly judged.

In September 2016 Woody Allen started filming the drama film Wonder Wheel, set in the 1950s in Coney Island, and starring Kate Winslet, Justin Timberlake, Juno Temple, and Jim Belushi.

Woody Allen returned to filming in New York City with the romantic film A Rainy Day in New York, starring Timothee Chalamet, Selena Gomez, Elle Fanning, Jude Law, Diego Luna, Liev Schreiber and Rebecca Hall.

Woody Allen filed a lawsuit for $68 million, alleging Amazon gave "vague reasons" to terminate the contract, dropped the film over "a 25-year old, baseless allegation", and did not make payments.

Woody Allen writes of his relationships with family, friends, and the loves of his life.

In June 2020, Woody Allen appeared on Alec Baldwin's podcast Here's the Thing and talked about his career as a standup comedian, comedy writer, and filmmaker, and his life during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In September 2022, Woody Allen suggested that he might retire from filmmaking after the release of his next film.

Woody Allen said he was thinking about not making films, as making films that go straight or very quickly to streaming platforms is not so enjoyable for him, as he is a great lover of the cinema experience.

Woody Allen has made 50 feature films to date, with his latest film, Coup de chance, a domestic thriller set in Paris.

Woody Allen's success continued with Play It Again, Sam, which opened in 1969, starring Allen and Diane Keaton.

In 1995, after a long hiatus from the stage, Woody Allen returned to theater with the one-act Central Park West, an installment in an evening of theater, Death Defying Acts, that included new work by David Mamet and Elaine May.

In 2003, Woody Allen returned to the stage with Writer's Block, an evening of two one-acts, Old Saybrook and Riverside Drive, that played Off-Broadways Atlantic Theatre.

Woody Allen is a passionate fan of jazz, which appears often in the soundtracks to his films.

Woody Allen began playing clarinet as a child and took his stage name from clarinetist Woody Herman.

Woody Allen has performed publicly at least since the late 1960s, including with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band on the soundtrack of Sleeper.

Woody Allen plays songs by Sidney Bechet, George Lewis, Johnny Dodds, Jimmie Noone, and Louis Armstrong.

Woody Allen was an actor who came on the scene and changed the history of acting.

In 1987, Woody Allen joined Ginger Rogers, Sydney Pollack, and Milos Forman at a Senate Judiciary committee hearing where they testified against Ted Turner's and other companies' colorizing films without the artists' consent.

Woody Allen spoke about his decisions to make films in black and white, such as Manhattan, Stardust Memories, Broadway Danny Rose, and Zelig.

Woody Allen was part of the founding and sat on the foundation's original board of directors alongside Martin Scorsese, Robert Altman, Francis Ford Coppola, Clint Eastwood, Stanley Kubrick, George Lucas, Sydney Pollack, Robert Redford, and Steven Spielberg.

Over his more than 50-year film career, Woody Allen has received many award nominations.

Woody Allen holds the record for most Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay, with 16 nominations and three wins.

Woody Allen has been nominated for Best Director seven times and won for Annie Hall.

Three of Woody Allen's films have been nominated for Academy Award for Best Picture, Annie Hall, Hannah and Her Sisters, and Midnight in Paris.

Woody Allen has received numerous honors, including an Honorary Golden Palm from the Cannes Film Festival in 2002 and a Career Golden Lion from the Venice International Film Festival in 1995.

Woody Allen received a BAFTA Fellowship in 1997, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Directors Guild of America and a Golden Globe Cecil B DeMille Award in 2014.

Woody Allen was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society in 2010.

Woody Allen has been married three times: to Harlene Rosen from 1956 to 1959, Louise Lasser from 1966 to 1970, and Soon-Yi Previn since 1997.

Woody Allen had a 12-year relationship with actress Mia Farrow and relationships with Stacey Nelkin and Diane Keaton.

Rosen, whom Woody Allen called "the Dread Mrs Woody Allen" in his standup act, sued him for defamation as a result of comments he made during a television appearance shortly after their divorce.

In December 2018 The Hollywood Reporter interviewed Babi Christina Engelhardt, who said she had an eight-year affair with Woody Allen that began in 1976 when she was 17 years old, and that she believes the character of Tracy in Manhattan is a composite of any number of Woody Allen's presumed other real-life young paramours from that period, not necessarily Nelkin or Engelhardt.

In 1968, Woody Allen cast Diane Keaton in his Broadway show Play It Again, Sam.

Woody Allen then starred in Interiors as a poet, followed by Manhattan.

In 1984, she and Woody Allen tried to conceive a child together; Woody Allen agreed to this on the understanding that he need not be involved in the child's care.

Woody Allen was not involved in the adoption, but when Dylan arrived he assumed a parental role toward her and began spending more time in Farrow's home.

Eric Lax, Woody Allen's biographer, wrote in The New York Times that Woody Allen was "there before they [the children] wake up in the morning, he sees them during the day and he helps put them to bed at night".

The next day, that friend's babysitter told her employer that she had seen that "Dylan was sitting on the sofa, and Woody Allen was kneeling on the floor, facing her, with his head in her lap".

When Farrow asked Dylan about it, Dylan allegedly said that Woody Allen had touched Dylan's "private part" while they were alone together in the attic.

Woody Allen then began proceedings in New York Supreme Court for sole custody of his and Farrow's son Satchel, as well as Dylan and Moses, their two adopted children.

In 2014, when Allen received a Golden Globe Cecil B DeMille Award for Lifetime Achievement, the issue returned to the forefront of media attention, with Mia Farrow and Ronan Farrow making disparaging remarks about Allen on Twitter.

On February 1,2014, New York Times journalist Nicholas Kristof, with Dylan's permission, published a column that included excerpts from a letter Dylan had written to Kristof restating the allegation against Woody Allen, and called out fellow actors who have continued to work in his films.

Woody Allen responded to the allegation in an open letter, in The New York Times, strongly denying it.

Some defended Dylan's allegation, while others vouched for Woody Allen's innocence, citing potential extortion from Farrow as a result of Woody Allen and Soon-Yi's courtship.

In 2003, a life-size bronze statue of Woody Allen was installed in Oviedo, Spain.

Woody Allen had visited the city the previous year to accept a Prince of Asturias Award.