Woody Allen : a biography /

There is no dearth of books on Woody Allen, but Baxter's is the first to appear since Allen's split with Mia Farrow because of his affair with her adopted daughter, whom he later married. Some of Allen's diehard fans may be taken aback by Baxter's combination of tolerance of Allen's peccadilloes, including his unconventional love life, and unstinting criticism of such subpar films as Celebrity. Baxter details the development of Allen's nebbishy onscreen persona, showing how drastically it differs from the real-life Woody, and he demonstrates how closely Allen's art has paralleled his life, from sardonic gags about his wife in early stand-up routines to the character of the demon-plagued, creatively blocked protagonist of Deconstructing Harry (1997). Scandal and creative doldrums notwithstanding, Allen retains a sizable following likely to eagerly read a nonsycophantic account of him that is judgmental about his films rather than his life. --Gordon Flagg

Given the maelstrom of Allen's recent life, this engaging new biography is welcome, even if not definitive. Baxter (The Hollywood Exiles) follows Allen's tangled amours and artistic discoveries from his childhood in Brooklyn through his stint as a 1950s comedy writer and onward, exhaustively detailing the making of movie after movie, from What's New, Pussycat? to Deconstructing Harry. Fair-minded but harsher than Eric Lax was in Woody Allen (1991), Baxter has done yeoman work in canvassing the published record (he lacked Lax's access to Allen and his peers). While Baxter unearths eerie tidbits about Allen's relations with two teenage girls, his psychologizing often rests on others' judgments, such as film theorist Maurice Yacowar's views on sex and death, and Allen's ex-partner Mia Farrow's take on the gap between nebbish persona and hard-nosed auteur. He considers Allen's affair with Farrow's adoptive daughter Soon-Yi more a lapse of taste than an indictable offense. Cinephiles will particularly enjoy Baxter's discussions of Allen's influences: he finds an early debt to Jules Feiffer, hears echoes of Fellini in Annie Hall and describes the brief involvement in Stardust Memories of French student radical Daniel Cohn-Bendit. (As a critic, Baxter likes the comedies more than the dramas.) Allen finds real happiness, Baxter concludes, not in his messy private life but in his work. Though the reader might wish for a broader attempt to sum up Allen's prodigious output and place in American culture, this book remains the most detailed look at an AmericanÄnay, New YorkÄoriginal. Photos not seen by PW. (Dec.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Woody Allen is one of the few truly independent directors working today. Baxter, who has previously published studies of filmmakers Bu¤uel, Fellini, and Kubrick, here weaves a narrative about Allen's life and work. He describes Allen's insecurities, phobias, and melancholy; his ambivalent views toward women, sex, and his Jewish identity; and his general neuroticismÄa recurrent motif in his films (Allen originally planned to title Annie Hall "Anhedonia," which means the inability to experience pleasure). He also chronicles the filmmaker's early academic and social failures and his escape to Manhattan (where he wrote for Sid Caesar before turning to stand-up comedy and then film directing). Some new information can be gleaned hereÄreaders might be surprised to learn that Allen looked to Bob Hope as a role model, for exampleÄbut a fair amount of Baxter's material is marginal, second-hand, or overly familiar, particularly coverage of the Soon-Yi Previn scandal. This likely results from Baxter's being denied access to Allen and most of his colleagues. In the end, Allen comes across as a cold, aloof character who nevertheless helped shape 20th-century filmmaking. Useful mostly for large film collections.ÄStephen Rees, Levittown Regional Lib., PA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

The biographer of Steven Spielberg (1997) and Stanley Kubrick sets his sights on one of the cinema's great comic minds. Born Allen Stewart Konigsberg, the filmmaker grew up in wartime Brooklyn, a period and neighborhood to which he returned in such films as Radio Days. Baxter contends that his father's unstable job situation and the family's constant shuffling between relatives early in his life left Allen with a long-standing resentment of his parents and his religion. He mines the films for examples, noting for instance that the parents of the characters Allen plays are masked when they appear onscreen. Baxter is not the first person to find Allen's personal life in his films, a hobby that has grown since scandal enveloped Allen's personal life when he left longtime partner Mia Farrow for her adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn, his current wife. But he suffers more than most biographers from an inability to distinguish the man from the artist. Peering into every one of Allen's films, he analyzes the repeated use of prostitutes, the references to Judaism, the jokes about therapy. For Baxter, a joke is never just a joke, but a desperate cry for help. When he does move away from a minatory pseudoanalysis, as when he describes Allen's early career as a comedy writer, his tale is at its most entertaining. Baxter tells of Danny Simon, Neil Simon's brother, who gave Allen one of his first jobs; of Allen's partnership with Larry Gelbart, who years later would create M*A*S*H; and of Allen's break writing for Buddy Hackett's series, ``Stanley.'' Such episodes, set during the heady initial days of TV, offer Allen anecdotes new even to diehard fans. Unfortunately, these are among the only chapters that offer anything fresh or unbiased. Most of Baxter's digging has a desperate, leftover look. Allen's fans, who are presumably Baxter's target audience, will prefer to let his films do the talking.