Woody Allen, Point Blank

The world's most neurotic filmmaker comes to Harvard May 10. We spoke to him about his latest film.

Every actor salivates at the thought of working with Woody Allen. For the past thirty five years, Allen has been the one force of consistency in a medium that is starting to lend itself to more and more adulterated studio projects each year. But every twelve months, we get a movie that's 100% Woody-his writing, his directing, his singular vision. There's no question that Woody Allen is a comic genius, the type of artist that we take for granted because he is so prolific. Woody, of course, disagrees. His modesty isn't an act. He genuinely believes that he is, in fact, a "failed artist."

I sat down with Woody this past weekend at the posh Regency Hotel in New York City to discuss his new film, Small Time Crooks-a fun, fluffy caper that he's taking to colleges around the country for question and answer sessions with the students. He'll visit Harvard's Film Archive on Tuesday night.

WA: Excuse me, I have a cold. But don't worry. I won't get you sick. It sounds worse than it is.

THC: It's hard to think of your films as anything but your own distinctively original creations. But this one has some familiar hints of other movies - even something like Mastroanni's Big Deal on Madonna Street?

WA: It's funny you mention that because that film wasn't an influence on this particular film, but it was one of the favorite films of my young manhood and it was a delightful film when it came out. This film was influenced really by two things - first, the Lubic kind of film because he's my favorite comic film director and also by Jackie Gleason. I'm such a great fan of the Honeymooners.

You know, to be honest, the one thing I can play - or really, the one thing I'm believable as - is the literate character. I'm not overly literate, but because of my glasses, my small frame, I appear to be more literate than I actually am. [smiles for a moment] So I can play a teacher, a psychiatrist, but I can also play a lowlife. Like in Broadway Danny Rose or the character in Take the Money and Run - and I've always wanted to play and I always will take advantage of the opportunity to play a lowlife.

THC: To compound that desire, of course, is the fact that you've said that you dreamed of being a small time crook growing up. It's a strange statement to make until we actually see this film. This is your fantasy being acted out.

WA: Absolutely. A lot of my films have been vicarious living out of things that for one reason or another, I couldn't realistically live out in my life. You know, when I do a film - wait, let me start this earlier. When I was a kid, having the same miserable life that every kid has, I could go into the movies and see a double feature - and instantly, I would be transported from a poor, lower middle class existence to penthouses and pirates. It was really amazing. And when I got older, I realized I could do this by making films - and so every year, I get to live with whatever creatures I've created and their various lives. When I was young, I wanted to be a crook because I didn't want an ordinary life. I wanted an interesting life. And I didn't know if I was talented in any way - I was a magician as a kid and then I went from that to being a gambler. I went from card tricks and hat tricks to cheating at cards and dice. And from that, I thought, it's just a short step to being an artist or a crook. It would be an interesting life for me. But things didn't work out. [smiles and hangs his head]

You know, I became a comedian. But now, whenever I get the chance to be able to play someone who's a crook or a lowlife, I love it. It's something I have an affection for, an empathy towards. It's just something that I feel at home with. I can vicariously be a criminal and do those things that I fantasized about when I was younger - in this movie, I get to tunnel under store to get to a bank vault. It's such a pleasure for me to live out my year making that kind of a film.

THC: So it's fantasy, but why does that make it a "silly" film, as you've called it? You never seem to give yourself any credit. You've said that your work isn't art - what about your films places them outside the realm of art and you outside the definition of an artist?

WA: [pauses] You know, I see this kind of film - well, I see my work in general - as "failed art." I don't see this film as failed art, though. This film I just sort of had a funny idea for and I did it. But I'm from the "no pain, no gain" school. If a film is enjoyable to make and fun and comes easy to me, then I feel that it can't be worth much. I won't put a value on it until I've suffered through the film's making - until I've been full of anxiety. If I was trying to make a more serious film, it would have been much harder to do. In general, if the films very serious, then they're extremely difficult and if they're half comedy, half serious, then they're also really harder than what I did with this. A comic film is easy for me. I'm not saying that they're all good films, but they come easy. So I don't trust it when I find myself showing up at work and seeing Tracy Ullman and enjoying it - I go home at night and think, "Well, gee. There's something I wrong here. I shouldn't be enjoying myself. This won't be of any value. It's too pleasurable."

THC: Has the spate of critical press about you over the past few years affected the amount of autobiographical material you put into your films? How far ahead do you actually plan the films?

WA: I don't have enough control to strategize where I'm going with the films at all. I wish I did, but the truth of the matter is when I'm finished with a film, I have to come up with a new idea to make the next film. And if that idea is a light idea like Small Time Crooks, then I go with it. If it's a heavy idea like Interiors, then fine, I'll go with that. It doesn't have anything to do with my outside life, though - it doesn't really involve anything but survival in the room that I write. I'm just so thrilled to have an idea to write and not be empty - if the next idea was a broad comedy, I'd do it. But if it was a comedy about death and famine, by all means, I'd do that too. It's much less thought out than you would think.

THC: Once the characters get their money in the film, I didn't see a change in the moral composition of their characters. Essentially, they're never bad people - they're just good people trying to handle their load of cash. Why, then, do you have to punish them by making them go bankrupt?

WA: Let me first say more generally that I don't think that people change - what happens is that when you get a lot of money in life, who you really are comes out uninhibitedly. When I started in show business, the people that were nice stayed nice when they hit it big. The ones that weren't so nice gave free play to who they were when they got their wealth. The Winklers in this film are basically decent people. When they make their money, it really doesn't change them. They are who they are and it comes out with less inhibition. They don't feel the need to circumscribe themselves or censor themselves. At the end, the comic thrust of the story dictates that they go back to where they started - that's all I cared about. But it would never be that the Winklers make their money and then Frenchy turns into a louse - as my wife, she was always nice, but she has her weakness.

THC: This is the third time you've worked with Tracy Ullman - fans will only remember Bullets Over Broadway as the other collaboration, but you had to cut her out of Everyone Says I Love You. You bring her back here as the lead - does her comedy naturally work with your style?

WA: Well, years ago, we both shared the same agent, Sam Cohen, and he kept badgering me to look at this girl, Tracy Ullman. I wasn't working at the time, I was between films and I kept saying, "I have no interest in looking right now, but when I'm casting..." And he kept sending me tapes and letters and I put it off and put it off and then one day I was home and I put the tape on. I was just amazed and I called in friends and they were like, "Sure, she's on television. You're not current on anything. We all know her and she's great." I was like, "she's amazing," and I've always looked for a place to use her.

And at first, I found a place to use her in a movie in a small way. And then I used her in Everyone Says I Love You and I cut her out of the picture - not because of her, but I had to lose 20 minutes of it and the only way to do it was to lose her character because then I wouldn't have to do awkward surgery on the movie. It cut together very nicely without her. I've always been looking for some way to use her but when I wrote this, I didn't have her in mind. I had Elaine May in mind for the other role, but not Tracy Ullman. And then I was talking to Juliet Taylor about the casting and her name came up and I said, "My God, she'd be perfect." She'd get the laughs, she's a solid actress - and then I panicked. I worried I wouldn't get her - but we were lucky to get her. She has a choppy schedule because of her show.

THC: So we're all excited about you coming to the Harvard Film Archive on Tuesday. Why travel with this particular movie and was it your decision to hit the college market?

WA: Why this movie? [pauses, stammers for a second] It wasn't my idea. Dreamworks puts together a promotional package and in a big meeting they ask me, "What are you willing to do? Would you do Letterman or Leno..." And I'm like, "I don't want to do television." Then they say, "Well Hugh Grant is doing things and Tracy Ullman's doing things so you have to do something. Then they said, "Why don't we do a few colleges" and I said, "Sure, if it's helpful for the film." They'll show the movie, I'll answer some question from the students - it should be fun.