Woody Allen (b.1935,) born Allen Stewart Konigsberg, legally Heywood Allen, is an American film director, writer, actor, and occasional jazz clarinetist. Allen is one of America’s most prominent filmmakers—his very personal films humorously explore themes that have always obsessed him: neurosis, sexual inadequacy, death, and the meaning of life. He once stated that his one regret in life is that he is not someone else.
Born in Brooklyn, New York City, Allen got expelled from both New York University and City College. He turned to a professional writing career, at first for television and comedians. In 1964, he decided to become a stand-up comedian himself. Performing in clubs and on television, he developed the persona of a neurotic eccentric in a sophisticated world. He made his film début scripting and acting in the popular What’s New, Pussycat? (1965.)
Allen’s movie projects were vehicles for his stand-up routines: Take the Money and Run (1969,) Bananas (1971,) Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Sex … But Were Afraid to Ask (1972,) Sleeper (1973,) and Love and Death (1975.)
Allen gained distinction with Annie Hall (1977,) which won Academy Awards for Best Director, Best Script, and Best Picture, and Manhattan (1979.) His subsequent films include Stardust Memories (1980,) Broadway Danny Rose (1984,) Hannah and Her Sisters (1986,) Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989,) Alice (1990,) Bullets over Broadway (1994,) Mighty Aphrodite (1995,) Everyone Says I Love You (1996,) and Midnight in Paris (2011.)
Allen’s celebrity extended to his off-screen life as well. He has been married two times previously, and had romantic relationships with actresses Stacey Nelkin, Diane Keaton, and Mia Farrow. In 1992, reports emerged that the 57-year-old Allen was having an affair with Farrow’s 21-year-old adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn—she became Allen’s third and current wife.
Allen’s notable works include Getting Even (1971,) The Complete Prose of Woody Allen (1992,) and Insanity Defense (2007.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Woody Allen
If my films make one more person miserable, I’ll feel I have done my job.
—Woody Allen
I am thankful for laughter, except when milk comes out of my nose.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Laughter
I don’t believe in an after life, although I am bringing a change of underwear.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Dying, Death
I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work; I want to achieve immortality through not dying. I don’t want to live on in the hearts of my countrymen; I want to live on in my apartment.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Immortality, Fame, Accomplishment, Achievement
My education was dismal. I went to a series of schools for mentally disturbed teachers
—Woody Allen
Topics: School
To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering, one must not love. But then, one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy, one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Unhappiness
When we lose twenty pounds… we may be losing the twenty best pounds we have! We may be losing the pounds that contain our genius, our humanity, our love and honesty.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Diet, Weight
Sentence structure is innate but whining is acquired.
—Woody Allen
My one regret in life is that I’m not someone else.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Remorse, Disappointment, Regret
The talent for being happy is appreciating and liking what you have, instead of what you don’t have.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Talent, Gratitude, Blessings, Appreciation
A “Bay Area Bisexual” told me I didn’t quite coincide with either of her desires.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Sex
What if nothing exists and we’re all in somebody’s dream? Or what’s worse, what if only that fat guy in the third row exists?
—Woody Allen
Topics: Dreams
Sex is the most fun you can have without laughing.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Sex, Humankind
I don’t think my parents liked me. They put a live teddy bear in my crib.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Parents
It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones slept better… while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much more.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Sleep, Goodness, Vice
I’m very proud of my gold pocket watch. My grandfather, on his deathbed, sold me this watch.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Gold
Marriage is the death of hope.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Marriage
She wore a short skirt and a tight sweater and her figure described a set of parabolas that could cause cardiac arrest in a yak.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Women
If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank.
—Woody Allen
Topics: God, Give, Doubt, Skepticism, Money
If you don’t fail now and again, it’s a sign you’re playing it safe.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Risk
When we played softball, I’d steal second base, feel guilty and go back
—Woody Allen
Topics: Baseball
Eternity is really long, especially near the end
—Woody Allen
Topics: Eternity
Summing up, it is clear the future holds great opportunities. It also holds pitfalls. The trick will be to avoid the pitfalls, seize the opportunities, and get back home by six o’clock.
—Woody Allen
I was thrown out of N.Y.U. my freshman year for cheating on my metaphysics final. You know, I looked within the soul of the boy sitting next to me.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Philosophy
Eighty percent of success is showing up.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Success & Failure, Inaction, Success, Procrastination, Getting Going
Sex alleviates tension. Love causes it.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Love, Feelings
Sex without love is an empty experience, but as empty experiences go it’s one of the best.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Sex
Interestingly, according to modern astronomers, space is finite. This is a very comforting thought—particularly for people who can never remember where they have left things.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Science, Space
Confidence is what you have before you understand the problem.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Confidence
I think being funny is not anyone’s first choice.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Comedy, Art
Comedy just pokes at problems, rarely confronts them squarely. Drama is like a plate of meat and potatoes; comedy is rather the dessert, a bit like meringue.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Humor, Comedy
A fast word about oral contraception. I asked a girl to go to bed with me, she said ‘no’.
—Woody Allen
Sex relieves tension – love causes it.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Sex
I was nauseous and tingly all over. I was either in love or I had smallpox.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Love
Showing up is 80 percent of life.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Time Management, Value of Time
More than at any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.
I speak, by the way, not with any sense of futility, but with a panicky conviction of the absolute meaninglessness of existence which could easily be misinterpreted as pessimism. It is not. It is merely a healthy concern for the predicament of modern man.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Choice
I’ve never been an intellectual but I have this look.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Intellectuals, Intelligence
More than any time in history mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly.
—Woody Allen
Topics: History
If you’re not failing every now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything very innovative.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Innovation, Failure
I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead—not sick, not wounded—dead.
—Woody Allen
Topics: Eating, Food
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