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The Curious Case of Woody Allen

September 7, 2019 | Posted by Steve Gustafson
To Rome with Love Woody Allen

Stop what you’re doing and think about Woody Allen. What is the first thing that comes to mind? His directing? His quirky personality? A movie of his? Or the accusations that have followed him for decades?

Keep that with you and let’s see how the recent headlines change or further confirm those thoughts.

A big story that’s drawing attention is Dylan Farrow criticizing Scarlett Johansson as having “a long way to go” in understanding issues of sexual assault after Johansson said she believes Allen is innocent of molesting his daughter.

Farrow has accused Allen of sexually assaulting her when she was 7 years old while the director has denied the allegation.

In response to Johansson’s defense, Farrow took to Twitter to say, “Because if we’ve learned anything from the past two years it’s that you definitely should believe male predators who ‘maintain their innocence’ without question.” “Scarlett has a long way to go in understanding the issue she claims to champion,” Farrow went on to say.

Back in December of 2017, Farrow wrote an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times focusing on Allen, with the title “Why has the #MeToo revolution spared Woody Allen?”

Fast forward and in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Johansson went on to say, “I see Woody whenever I can, and I have had a lot of conversations with him about it. I have been very direct with him, and he’s very direct with me. He maintains his innocence, and I believe him.”

Farrow included ABC’s The View in her comments, pointing out Joy Behar’s remarks that “experts” have exonerated Allen are “utterly false and a truly abhorrent mischaracterization.”

“Surprising that in discussing my case this morning no one mentioned that the prosecutor in my case, after evaluating ALL the evidence, found probable cause to press criminal charges against Woody. He chose not to only in order to spare me further trauma,” Farrow tweeted.

Now let’s flip things and take a look at Allen’s recent interview where he says he doesn’t care that parts of Hollywood and the film industry have turned their backs on him.

“I’ve worked with hundreds of actresses; not one of them has ever complained about me, not a single complaint. I’ve worked with, employed women in the top capacities, in every capacity, for years and we’ve always paid them exactly the equal of men,” Allen said in an interview with France24. “I’ve done everything that the #MeToo movement would love to achieve with everybody.”

Allen was asked if he regretted calling himself a “poster boy” for the #MeToo movement in an interview and he doubled down saying, “I should be.”

In response to the allegations, Amazon Studios shelved his A Rainy Day in New York in the US but t will still open across Europe. “To me, the movie is being released all over the world,” he said. “If people enjoy the movie, I think it will eventually be released in the U.S.”

Because money, of course.

In closing, he wasn’t troubled by how Hollywood is portraying him. “I couldn’t care less. I’ve never worked in Hollywood. I’ve always worked in New York, and it doesn’t matter to me for a second. If tomorrow nobody would finance my films and nobody would finance my theater plays or nobody would publish my books, I’d still get up and write because that’s what I do,” he said. “So I will always work. What happens to it commercially is another matter.”

In all this mess, where is the truth? Will anyone change their minds at this point?

article topics :

Woody Allen, Steve Gustafson