Legendary director/actor/composer Woody Allen has a special love for the
1920's, '30's and '40's and sets many of his films in those years. His current
film The Curse of the Jade Scorpion is his combination tribute to those
1940's Maltese Falcon-style films and the great American "bantering
couple" movies best exemplified by Tracy and Hepburn or Cary Grant and Roselyn
Russell. In a recent interview, he spoke of the beginning of his career, casting
Scorpion, acting in his own films and how he uses music in his work.
Allen emphasizes that he just lives a normal "middle class lifestyle" and
the myths about his eccentricity are untrue.

Do you have any memories of your lean times?

The only lean times I had is when I was growing up but my parents shielded
me from that. By the time I was sixteen, I was working as a professional comedy
writer. My father would be driving a cab bringing home fifty dollars a week
and my mother would be making forty dollars a week working for a florist.
When I was in my late teens, I was making a thousand a week. Show business
salaries are so undeservedly exaggerated that you just have to succeed a little
bit, and you're already making more money than a more deserving college professor
who is doing a much more significant job.

We hear that you jot down ideas on anything handy and toss them in a drawer.
Was Jade Scorpion one of those?

This is a prime example of it. This was an idea that occurred to me spontaneously
on the street and I threw it in the drawer along with Small Time Crooks
and another film that I just finished shooting called Hollywood Ending.
A couple of years ago, I pulled them all out of my drawer with a political
satire idea, and now I've done three of them. I'm hoping eventually to do
the political one as well.

Is it just accidental that two films in a row are kind of "caper-type"
comedies?

That's accidental, yeah, completely. This one is different than Small
Time Crooks in that I wanted to make it a romantic bantering picture because
I grew up on those Cary Grant/Roselyn Russell or Tracy/Hepburn movies where
you knew they'd get together but you never knew how because they seemed to
hate each other so much and were always insulting and topping one another.

Hypnosis plays a big part in this film. Would you ever want to get hypnotized?

I have no interest in it whatsoever, really. It was always an exotic thing.
When I was growing up, people thought of it as half comic, half sinister but
I've never been hypnotized and don't think that I could be. I giggle.

How did you come up with the cast for this film?

Helen Hunt, to me, was an obvious choice. The second Helen's name came up,
that was it. She's got that intelligence, that authority, that great cutting
sense of humor. I've worked with a number of really great comediennes over
the years. Diane Keaton was one of them, Goldie Hawn, Tracey Ullman and Julie
Kavner. They all could have played this role but I don't think any of them
would have been the character like Helen was. Dan Aykroyd was a tougher part
to cast because that character has got to exploit Helen and is sort of a scoundrel.
(He's) blustery and a big blowhard in the office but likable and funny and
attractive enough so you could believe Helen would make a fool of herself
over him

Talk a little about Charlize Theron's character.

A staple character of those '40's movies was the spoiled heiress, young beautiful
girl spoiled by rich parents who has got to be tamed by the private eye. This
is our version of that. (My character) is able to exploit her yen for thrills
because I couldn't think of an appeal that I would have for her beyond that.
So, fortunately, she's so thrill hungry that she's attracted enough to that
relationship.

The music is a great part of Scorpion. Is it from your personal
collection?

All my movies are really from my collection. My collection is not so vast
as people think. It's jazz and classical music which is the music I like the
most, so I put it in my movies. When I finished this movie, I looked at the
scene on the screen and I put a record on. I could put a record on of Charlie
Parker or Benny Goodman or Louis Armstrong or Frank Sinatra and the one that
supports the scene the best is what I use. For this picture, Duke Ellington
was very important and "In a Persian Market". I've used that in New York
Stories.

Why did you feel this needed to be set in the 1940's? Could it have been
modern day Manhattan?

It's a 1940's style story. Hypnosis was very exotic at that time. Now it
would be much more clinical and that kind of banter between men and women
was very indigenous to that time. I love to do period films of the '20's,
'30's and '40's because I like the music and clothing styles and visuals and
the way women looked. And, I like the romance of the era. I like, in the '20's,
the gangsters with the violin cases with machine guns in them and in the '40's,
the soldiers and sailors kissing their girlfriends goodbye.

Some people are calling this "vintage Woody". How do you feel about that
label?

I can never understand any of that because, from where I sit I'm doing now
what I did in 1968 when I first started making films. I go with the idea that
I have at the time. If tomorrow, I woke up and had an idea for a very heavy
film about religion in Medieval Norway and I liked the idea, I would do it
and be aware of the fact that I'm gonna get less people in to see it. I'm
gratified when a lot of people come but I would never make a film just to
get them in.

You act in so many of your films. Do you think you're a good actor?

I'm not an actor really. I can play a few things but very, very limited things.
I can play the New York neurotic; a character close to what I am. I can play
a writer, a musician and I can play a low life. I tried to get somebody else
to play this. I would have been thrilled if Tom Hanks or Tom Cruise or Dustin
Hoffman or one of those people had been available. The next film, Hollywood
Endings, however, I'm perfect for. The lead character is a New York neurotic
filmmaker. For a ton of my stuff, any of these guys would be great and do
a better job than I do but they work 365 days a year and it's hard to get
them. It isn't usually the money but they have to be available. They're booked
up for years in advance.

So many actors say they'd die to work with you but they are intimidated
as well.

It's funny, isn't it? It's part of the mythology, pro and con about me. People
think that I'm a recluse and a formidable character. Nothing could be further
from the truth. I lead a middle-class life with my family. I practice my instrument
(clarinet). I play every Monday night. I go to the Nicks games. They think
they're going to be working with someone who (has) creative, eccentric habits
and then what they discover is that we look disorganized. I go home early.
I never work nights. Film is never my first priority. It's family or going
home on time or getting to the game or my clarinet practice. Film is just
one part of my life. I'm not a perfectionist. I don't like to rehearse because
it bores me. If I shoot a scene and there's a mistake in it, I don't do another
take because I don't have the patience. It's not only low-key but it's almost
apathetic. I hire top people and get out of their way. I give them an enormous
amount of freedom. After a couple of weeks, all the stuff that's in the press
gets completely dispelled.

Recent Filmography (as Director)

The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001)

Small Time Crooks (2000)

Sweet and Lowdown (1999)

Celebrity (1998)

Deconstructing Harry (1997)

Everyone Says I Love You (1996)

Mighty Aphrodite (1995)

Bullets Over Broadway (1994)

Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993)

Husbands and Wives (1992)

Shadows and Fog (1992)

Alice (1990)

Lynn Barker

Ms. Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter

The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion