Said Woody Allen.
ADDED: He's "never done any drugs whatsoever... I can barely bring myself to take two Extra Strength Excedrin... and I don't even have the curiosity."
People say all the time, "Aren't you curious?" But I'm not a curious person. I'm not curious to travel, but I do because my wife likes it. I'm not curious to see other places, I'm not curious to try new things. I go to the same restaurants all the time, and my wife is always saying, "Let's try something new!" I don't enjoy that. When Elaine's was open in New York, I ate every dinner, seven nights a week, for 10 [to] 12 years.
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I like him more now than I did before I read that.
I bring up Woody Allen in my two comments yesterday regarding Mia Farrow and Woody's photography and now she is posting about Woody Allen.
I think Althouse is playing games with me.
I am Laslo.
I'm half his age and I can relate. The older I get the more aversion I have for any kind of disturbance in my day to day life. When you get to be his age I suppose changing anything, whether it's a daily routine or behavior or it's traveling more, is probably almost a traumatic experience.
Holy crap, he is.....me.
First, perhaps he was brought up middle class, but he's wealthy in a 0.01% sort of way. Secondly, he also has the power of position and fame, when he chooses to use it.
But this incuriosity startles me, because I made the right call in the mid-80's when I'd seen his entire output and said he was boring and only capable of making one movie over and over.
-XC
Self deprecation can be charming but with Woody Allen it's an annoying schtick.
Ah a geezer "set in his ways". Well, except like the song goes about "faster horses, older whiskey, younger women, more money", he's settled on just one thing--younger women.
Whatever, it works for him. And finding out what works for you is the key to a successful and happy life.
Forget crazy. He's full-on bonkers -- stark raving mad -- if he's not at all curious to know what it would be like to give an orgasm to Scarlett Johansson or Emma Stone.
He is insane. He refused to marry his long time lover Diane Keaton.
He is not normal. He's ancient and he's still getting kids off to school?
(At least he added to school there).
He's middle class and his movies are pedestrian.
If he is such a creature of habit, does that mean he will start dating Bechet Domain (his adopted daughter) in another five years when she is 21.
I always liked Woody Allen. I thought he had wisdom and sanity. Maybe that's why I felt so betrayed by the Soon Yi scandal. People with a great deal of sanity and wisdom don't get involved in scandals like that. I don't know the truth about the other charges, but they are credible. I still like Woody Allen, but there's a huge asterisk after his name........Which is better than Bill Cosby who gets eradicated from the public record........Allen's crimes and misdemeanors were at considerable variance with his public image and perhaps even with who he truly is. There's also quite a variance with Cosby's mask and who he truly was. Perhaps Allen's ugliness is due to bad lighting, but Cosby's sins are truly who he is.
It would be so great if God existed and after death you could find out who was really,really bad and who was just misunderstood. I've never been in jail, bankruptcy, or rehab. So far as I know I haven't irreparably screwed up anyone's life, but for all that I don't have a clue as to whether I would join the elect in heaven.
I identified with a good bit of what he said, especially about travel.
Eric the Fruit Bat said...
...-- if he's not at all curious to know what it would be like to give an orgasm to Scarlett Johansson or Emma Stone.
Eric fires up the Laslo signal.
And we wait...
Is he trying to rehabilitate his image?
My favorite WA quote: "80% of success is showing up." That's a very workmanlike statement. And very true.
Had some friends over for my 13th Birthday, and we were watching "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, But Were Afraid to Ask" in my parents' basement. We just got cable TV in 1982 and it was on HBO or Showtime. My buddies and I thought it was hilarious.
My mom came down when the giant boob was chasing Woody around a field squirting milk at him. She turned it off and took the parental lock key that used to be connected to the cable boxes.
My Dad made her turn it back on for us five minutes later.
He doesn't really have to try anymore. Most films are so heavily insured, the manufacture of it is secondary. As long as the Hollywood Jews are happy, he's able to continue on.
It has nothing to do with his home life.
(Shades of the play Springtime for Hitler and Germany come to mind)...
He hasn't made a decent flick since "Play With It Again, Soon-Yi." Oops, I mean....
My Dad made her turn it back on for us five minutes later.
Your mother was the intelligent one.
Never seen a Woody Allen flick. Never had the urge to. If I were to indulge, what's a good one that can give me (and the wife, I guess) a good idea of what he's about?
Woody Allen is an acquired taste.
"Blogger Kyzernick said...
Never seen a Woody Allen flick. Never had the urge to. If I were to indulge, what's a good one that can give me (and the wife, I guess) a good idea of what he's about?"
Blue Jasmine is out on DVD. It is a near-perfect Aristotelian tragedy. You can go down a checklist of the elements that make an Aristotelian tragedy and check them off, one by one.
Basically the movie is about a wealthy, pretty woman who has fallen on hard times. In the course of the film you see, through a series of flashbacks and revealing scenes, how the same attributes that had made her rise from humble beginnings inevitably caused her downfall -- and she is still in freefall as the last scene of the film closes.
Kyzernick said...
Never seen a Woody Allen flick. Never had the urge to. If I were to indulge, what's a good one that can give me (and the wife, I guess) a good idea of what he's about?
Try Midnight in Paris from 2011. It's fun and interesting.
The film opened to critical acclaim and has commonly been cited as one of Allen's best films in recent years. In 2012, the film won both the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and the Golden Globe Awards for Best Screenplay; and was nominated for three other Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Art Direction.[6]
If you're a Hemmingway or Fitzgerald fan, so much the better.
@Terry
Yes, Blue Jasmine was good too.
Those two together would give a good taste of Allen.
@Kyzernick
"Never seen a Woody Allen flick. Never had the urge to. If I were to indulge, what's a good one that can give me (and the wife, I guess) a good idea of what he's about?"
Crimes and Misdemeanors is funny and excellent. Woody has a supporting role, not the main one.
Thanks guys. He's a guy that I only know about through his public scandals. I look forward to seeing what made him famous enough to have scandals in the first place.
I like him more now than I did before I read that.
Heh! That was my first reaction as well.
I'm not a big fan of his movies, but one he did called "Radio Days" was kind of a wacky autobiography set when he was a kid. I thought it was one of the funniest movies I've ever seen.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093818/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
Definitely Crimes and Misdemeanors
I am Laslo wrote:
"I think Althouse is playing games with me."
I think it confirms my theory that Althouse has undergone a mental breakdown and Laslo is her Id.
Kyzernick said...
Never seen a Woody Allen flick. Never had the urge to. If I were to indulge, what's a good one that can give me (and the wife, I guess) a good idea of what he's about?
Annie Hall
Bullets Over Broadway
Manhattan
Radio Days
A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Hannah and Her Sisters
I'm fan of his movies. The one's above are all good. I think the guy is hilarious. He's his own genre.
"Annie Hall
Bullets Over Broadway
Manhattan
Radio Days
A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Hannah and Her Sisters"
I'd add a few:
What's Up, Tiger Lilly?
Play it Again, Sam
Bananas
Take the Money and Run
He's had his misfires of course, but he's had a great influence on modern comedy and has put together some excellent movies.
"I'm not curious about things, other than what it would be like to start having sex with the adopted daughter of my wife when she turns 18. I mean, that's gotta be pretty great, right?"
Love and Death
Didn't Allen also direct "Honey, I Shtupped the Kids!"?
"Blue Jasmine" plot - Oh, that's Lily Bart in "House of Mirth". Could it possibly be better than Edith Wharton?
LOL @jelink
Hey Coupe,
GFY.
Or, if you're ever in midtown, drop by the Exxon Building and say that to my face.
Actually I shouldn't be upset. Like somebody said, you seem to have some brain damage. If earned honorably in service to this country, I will apologize and wish you well. Or, you could be old enough to be senile.
Otherwise, GFY.
Kaczynski, try Scenes From a Mall. It's the best Allen film EVER, because he only acted in it, but didn't write, direct or produce it.
Sounds to me like he ought to do drugs.
I've loved Woody Allen movies ever since I started loving movies. I don't believe the child molestation charge primarily because the son who got away from his crazy ass mother said it was all bullshit and secondarily, because it just never has rang true to me. Mia Farrow tweeted out the lion killing dentist's address, I saw in a headline somewhere today. Sounds about right.
Blue Jasmine was excellent and probably is now my favorite although I loved Manhattan, Love and Death, Husbands and Wives, Hannah and Her Sisters, and several others. I laughed at parts of Small Time Crooks as much as anything he has done.
I liked the old, funny Woody Allen. "My parents' values were God and carpeting." he once started a piece in the New Yorker with "the question is not whether the afterlife exists, but how late is it open and how long does it take to get there from Midtown?"
And my wife and I still quote to each other the line from "Everything you wanted to know..." where Woody is hidden under the queen's skirts when the king walks in. Woody says, "you always said the next time i was in town I should look up your wife."
elite liberals always say they are middle class
Wow that is interesting that Woody Allen never uses drugs! Another thing that is very interesting about drugs is that digoxin is often injected into the heart of a fetus to induce a heart attack, allowing a late term abortion while avoiding the partial-birth procedure, and presenting the organs intact. Fascinating! There must be an embargo on abortion discussion at Althouse blog, because I haven't seen one in two weeks. Not even a legal discussion, like video taping and restraining orders. One wonders....
Going to Elaine's everyday for ten years is hardly a typical, non-crazy middle class activity. Quite the opposite.
Likewise, I bet that most middle class folks wish they could travel and relax more. Especially, if they had the chance to partake in the private jet-set stuff Woody likely does. The work associated with middle class vacationing probably cancels out a lot (most?) of the benefits.
He doesn't have a middle class pov, he's a functioning, productive weirdo--middle class folks certainly don't have that luxury.
Woody sounds more eccentric than middle class.
He is insane. He refused to marry his long time lover Diane Keaton.
How is that a sign of insanity?
Part of this secret is that Allen has the best casts. That has to say something about him as a screenwriter and director, that so many terrific actors want to work for him year after year despite his tiny budgets and idiosyncracies (like not giving them complete screenplays).
Aren't all middle-class people millionaire Manhattanites?
I reckon Woody is comparing himself to people he knows socially, who are mostly highly paid performers and wealthy business people who live in Manhattan. Compared to them his habits may very well pass for middle-class.
I love this disconnect by Woody.
1. "I'm middle class"-- blah, blah, blah
2. "When Elaine's was open in New York, I ate every dinner, seven nights a week, for 10 [to] 12 years."
How many middle class folks dine out at hip restaurant 365 days/year?
He's a talented neurotic filmmaker and writer. Annie is an untalented neurotic govt. bureaucrat. and fading blogger.
Bay Area Guy - Elaine's was not hip. Far from it. Very comfortable neighborhood place that attracted a lot of NY actors/writers for some reason.
It's not middle class, it's "creature of habit." Many people find routine comforting.
I like many of his movies. Someone above mentioned Take the Money and Run. Forgot that one. I believe that included a scene where he played the cello in the school marching band. I was six or so when I saw that on TV and thought that ridiculous scene was so funny. I also forgot What's up Tiger Lily.
My recent favorite is Match Point which was a departure for him as a non-comedy/suspense movie.
Elaine's seems pretty hip to me. From Wiki:
Established in 1963,[2] Elaine's is famed both for the writers and other prominent New Yorkers such as Woody Allen, William J. Bratton, Mia Farrow, Clay Felker, Helen Frankenthaler, Joseph Heller, Norman Mailer, Peter Maas, Robert Motherwell, Chris Noth, George Plimpton, Mario Puzo, Sally Quinn, Mark Simone, Gay Talese, Tom Wolfe, and Sidney Zion, who had been regulars over the years, and for its late chain-smoking namesake and proprietress Elaine Kaufman, who ran the restaurant for over four decades. Other visitors to the establishment included Leonard Bernstein, Michael Caine, Kirk Douglas, Clint Eastwood, Mick Jagger, Willie Nelson, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Luciano Pavarotti, Elaine Stritch and Eli Wallach.
The restaurant was noted for its Oscar night, where celebrities and visiting Hollywood stars congregated to watch the Academy Awards ceremony.
The quirky owner, Elaine Kaufman, was known for not mincing her words, for booting less-favored customers to seat new arrivals and for forbidding hamburgers in her joint.[1] She was once arrested after a physical altercation with a visiting Texan. Elaine also once had a fist fight with the actress Tara Tyson and then claimed that the thespian had set her ablaze with a lit cigarette.[3]
Billy Joel immortalized the establishment in his song "Big Shot" (1978), supposedly about a date gone wrong which included a stop at the eatery, with the lyrics, "they were all impressed with your Halston dress and the people that you knew at Elaine's".[1]
A scene from Woody Allen's Manhattan (1979) was filmed at the restaurant, as was a scene from his later work Celebrity (1998). There is a short sequence in the film Morning Glory (2010) of Elaine Kaufman herself at the bar of Elaine's (where the producer played by Rachel McAdams is trying to track down the television host played by Harrison Ford, and Elaine relates at what time he left). In the hit comedy Big Business (1988), to divert a mismatched set of twins (played by Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin) from upsetting an important shareholder vote, Midler's alter-ego character offers to take them to Elaine's.
Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields refers to Elaine's in "Love is Like a Bottle of Gin," from 69 Love Songs.
Elaine's is also immortalized in the Stone Barrington novels by author Stuart Woods; the first chapter always begins with "Elaine's.
So it is the mid-nineties, I'm at that NYC establishment again, and -- sure enough -- Mia Farrow is at her seat at the bar, drinking and whispering to someone only she can see.
I sit beside her, order a drink.
"You're that one who wanted to know about Woody's asshole photographs, aren't you?"
"I think you were the one who brought that up," I say, ordering a drink for myself.
"Do you know what Sharon Stone's naked asshole looks like?" she asks, lighting a cigarette.
"LIke an asshole?" I reply.
"Like a fucking asshole," she says, poking out the eyes of imaginary people with her cigarette.
"Woody's people follow me, you know. I think you might even be one of them, you sick fuck."
"I've never met Woody Allen," I answer, sipping my drink.
"So you don't know about The Box, do you?"
"No: I have no idea what you are talking about."
"Do you know how old Mariel Hemingway was when they filmed 'Manhattan''?
"Eighteen?"
"Eighteen? You really believe that shit?"
"It was just a guess."
"She was sixteen, motherfucker: six-fucking-teen."
"That was young..."
"And do you know where her panties from then are?"
"I have no idea..."
"They are in The Box, you ignorant fuck."
"The Box?"
"After filming 'Manhattan' Woody told sixteen-year-old Mariel that all costumes used in filming needed to be returned to him."
"Okay? And?"
"Panties, you dumb fuck! Panties! He made her give him every single pair of panties that sixteen-year-old girl wore during filming!"
"Oh my..."
And now they are in THE BOX. Dozens of pairs of Mariel's sixteen-year-old unwashed panties, in THE BOX."
"So what does Woody actually do with this box?"
"He fucking pulls them out and smells them, that's what the Fucker does!" she replies, lighting two cigarettes for herself simultaneously.
"He brags about how he doesn't do drugs but then he goes home and snorts Mariel's sixteen-year-old unwashed panties, one after the other."
"That's certainly wrong..."
"I never caught that Jew Cocksucker wearing them but I bet he did! I bet he wore those dirty panties and fucking danced across the room!"
"Mia, I think your limo is here..."
"It is a sick world..."
"Yes, Mia, it is..."
"Frank Sinatra wouldn't do that shit. Frank would return the panties -- every fucking pair...!"
I am Laslo.
"
robinintn said...
"Blue Jasmine" plot - Oh, that's Lily Bart in "House of Mirth". Could it possibly be better than Edith Wharton?
Just finished re-reading that, and you're right. It is an updated Lily Bart story in some ways. And for a movie version, it's quite good. Better than most.
"Never seen a Woody Allen flick. "
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Crimes and Misdemeanors
Crimes and Misdemeanors
What I tell you three times...
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