I was in a taxi with Woody (Allen) on Manhattan’s Madison Avenue. The cab was stuck in traffic. The driver said the city was digging up the street at Fifty-Ninth. “The Mayor’s boy lost his ball,” Woody remarked.
I’ve known Woody all my adult life, and clearly I love him. He’s hilarious and brilliant. What can I say? There are few people you get to know that well in life. That’s why I feel privileged to be in that rarified world of people who’re old news. I’ve been around forever, I’m someone he’s known forever. He can’t get rid of me. I’ll always be his friend, and that’s never going to go away.
Is he distracted by adverse publicity? He’s never distracted when he works. After all, how many years has he been doing it? Thirty? He’s very disciplined. I believe that if you lean on your disciplines, they’ll help get you through life. It’s true of a lot of people. Francis Coppola had a horrible tragedy when his son was killed, but he continued to work. I’ve never known anyone to become hysterical while working
as a director. It’s just too much responsibility. You don’t have time to let your personal
life interfere.
When I went back to do his movie Manhattan Murder Mystery, after a very long period of not having worked with him, I realized what a truly remarkable filmmaker he is. There’s nobody like him in the world. And he’s deceptive, because a lot of the time you feel like you’re not even being directed.
People are excited to work with him because obviously he’s one of the greatest filmmakers America’s ever produced. Everybody wants to be in a quality product, and they trust him, so he’s done very well with actors.
Not that he’s easy to work with. The process is difficult, the expectations are very high, and it can be very nerve – wracking. After ten years, of course, I was anxious, very nervous. It’s like going back and seeing your family again. But after a week it felt like old times.
Jack Tewksbury