NYTimes Book Review: Woody Allen’s “Apropos of Nothing” is Sometimes Funny... and Tone Deaf and Banal

This isn’t going to be a verdict piece on Allen’s morality. There have been a lot of verdict pieces. But so we’re on the same page, I’ll tell you where I stood before my editor emailed me a PDF of “Apropos of Nothing.”

I believe Allen’s sexual relationship with Soon-Yi Previn, the adopted daughter of his longtime partner Mia Farrow, which began when Previn was 21, was obviously the perverse act of a man whose brain salts are dangerously out of balance. He was nearly pushed out the door of American culture, only to sneak back in through a window. There’s queasy-making evidence of his sexual pursuit of other teenage girls. If these acts make you want to scrub his movies permanently from your Netflix queue, scrub.

The accusation that in 1992 he molested his adopted daughter, the 7-year-old Dylan Farrow, is a charge of another magnitude. I believe that the less you’ve read about this case, the easier it is to render judgment on it.

I believe that Hachette, the publishing house that acquired and then canceled “Apropos of Nothing,” behaved cravenly. I wish Nat Hentoff, the free speech absolutist whose columns in The Village Voice made me want to go into journalism in the first place, were still around to write a 25,000-word essay about publishing writ large circa 2020 that would run under the sardonic title “Profiles in Courage.”

So kill me now or come along, there’s a book to talk about.

Here’s Allen’s first sentence: “Like Holden, I don’t feel like going into all that David Copperfield kind of crap, although in my case, a little about my parents you may find more interesting than reading about me.”

Anyone who’s read Allen’s previous books — “Without Feathers,” “Side Effects,” “Getting Even” — knows he has an authentic and easygoing voice on the page. That’s true in “Apropos of Nothing,” too, at least for a while. Later on this book begins to make the clicking sound cars do when the battery has expired.

Allen takes us from his childhood in Brooklyn (his father was a bookmaker who held a variety of menial jobs, his mother worked for a flower shop) through his early days submitting jokes to newspaper columnists. He was quick, funny, hard to top. He was hired young as a comedy writer for television shows, including some of Sid Caesar’s, before becoming a stand-up comic and beginning to direct movies. He had two early marriages, to Harlene Rosen and Louise Lasser.

There were two surprises, for me, in this early material. Most memoirists exaggerate their sense of outsidership when young. Conversely, Allen writes that while you might presume he was a lonely nebbish in high school, he was in truth very popular and adept at many sports, especially baseball.

The second surprise is how hard he pushes back at the notion that he is any kind of intellectual. He presents lists of the authors he hasn’t read, the movies he hasn’t seen.

“I have no insights, no lofty thoughts, no understanding of most poems that do not begin, ‘Roses are red, violets are blue,’” he writes. “What I do have, however, is a pair of black-rimmed glasses, and I propose that it is these specs, combined with a flair for appropriating snippets from erudite sources too deep for me to grasp but which can be utilized in my work to give the deceptive impression of knowing more than I do that keeps this fairy tale afloat.”

Like many of our fathers and grandfathers, Allen is a 20th-century man in a 21st-century world. His friends should have warned him that “Apropos of Nothing” is incredibly, unbelievably tone deaf on the subject of women.

This tone deafness starts before the book has even properly begun. On the dedication page, he writes, “For Soon-Yi, the best. I had her eating out of my hand and then I noticed my arm was missing.” I had to rub my eyes with my freshly sanitized fingers and read that second sentence again.

Nearly every time a woman is mentioned, there’s a gratuitous pronouncement on her looks. Early on, he chases “delectable bohemian little kumquats” in New York City. While in London filming “Casino Royale” (1967), a James Bond spoof, he writes, “one could stroll on the Kings Road and pick up the most adorable birds in their miniskirts.” Birds? I kept waiting for him to sail to Australia to scoop up a basket of “Sheilas.”

The heavy breathing gets more intense as the book moves on. Little pats of butter are deposited. Christina Ricci “was plenty desirable.” Léa Seydoux “was a 10 plus.” Rachel McAdams “looks like a million bucks from any angle.” He can sound like our current president.

“When you meet her you have to fight your way through the pheromones,” he writes about Scarlett Johansson, 19 when he first worked with her. “Not only was she gifted and beautiful, but sexually she was radioactive.” He manages to get Penélope Cruz into a movie with Johansson, which “caused each woman’s erotic valence to cube itself.”

It was Mia Farrow’s looks, her “drop-dead punim,” that blinded him to the fact that she was, in his view, mentally unstable, he writes. The Farrow, Soon-Yi and Dylan material takes up about a third of this memoir, and entirely drains it of oxygen.

Allen writes about dysfunction in Farrow’s own family. One of her brothers was a suicide; another was imprisoned for child sex abuse. He suggests she visited dysfunction on her own children, adopted or otherwise.

“Mia enjoyed adopting, loved the excitement, like one buys a new toy,” he writes. “She liked the saintly reputation, the admiring publicity, but she didn’t like raising the kids and didn’t really look after them.” He alleges some pretty horrific parental misbehavior and neglect on Farrow’s part.

Farrow discovered Allen was sleeping with Soon-Yi after finding erotic Polaroids of her adopted daughter in Allen’s apartment. “Of course I understand her shock, her dismay, her rage, everything,” he writes. “It was the correct reaction.” It’s Allen’s contention that, in her rage, Farrow decided to frame him for molestation.

He speaks about two investigations that did not lead to criminal charges. He says he passed a polygraph test while Farrow refused to take one. About the notion that we should simply believe all women, he writes: “I mean, tell it to the Scottsboro Boys.”

At this book’s nadir, he broaches the idea that Farrow may have slept with a state judge and a state attorney in order to try and influence their opinions during a custody battle. (“I find that hard to believe, but I tend to be naïve in such matters,” he coyly writes.)

Together Allen and Farrow had a biological son, Satchel, who now goes by Ronan. “Despite her suggesting Satchel was Frank Sinatra’s child, I think he’s mine,” Allen writes, “though I’ll never really know.”

Allen suggests that Ronan was groomed by Farrow to despise him. He alleges that Farrow had Ronan undergo cosmetic surgery to add a few inches to his height, which required the breaking and rebreaking of his legs. He calls this “barbarism.”

Ronan Farrow has of course grown up to become a journalist, a determined and righteous exposer of the evil that powerful men do. Allen writes that he would still like to have a relationship with Ronan, but he cites instances of what he considers to be his son’s hypocrisy. About one such instance, he writes: “Ronan Farrow always publicly urged women to speak out, but when Soon-Yi did tell her story, he did not like what he heard.”

There’s a lot more in this book that there’s no room to talk about here: Allen’s relationship with Diane Keaton; details about the making of many of his films; tours with his jazz band; what it was like to know Mel Brooks and Pauline Kael and Norman Mailer and eat a lot of meals at Elaine’s. He remembers to thank many, many people who were generous to him over the years.

The final third of this book falls apart dreadfully. It’s a rolling of credits, a handing out of goody bags. Alan Alda is “a wonderfully gifted actor.” Owen Wilson is “wonderful and a pleasure to direct.” Goldie Hawn is “a major, major talent.” Multiply these banalities by a hundred.

He’s been married to Soon-Yi now for more than 20 years. They have two adopted daughters who are now college-age. The upside of being a pariah, he writes, is that he doesn’t have to blurb any more books or sit on any more panels.

He can live with being reviled by many, he says, because he doesn’t read the articles. He lives in a bubble. He’s making a new movie.

Near the end of this sometimes appealing, occasionally funny, sad and somewhat tawdry book, he writes: “I’m 84; my life is almost half over. At my age, I’m playing with house money. Not believing in a hereafter, I really can’t see any practical difference if people remember me as a film director or a pedophile or at all. All that I ask is my ashes be scattered close to a pharmacy.”

Jews are such blathering navel gazers.

Shocking that a book written by an 85-year-old man doesn’t conform to modern day sensitivities.

generously complementing a woman’s looks is now considered taboo? Even as a gay millennial I don’t get it.

I’ll always love his wit.

[quote]I believe that Hachette, the publishing house that acquired and then canceled “Apropos of Nothing,” behaved cravenly.

It's worth pointing out that Hachette dropped the book because of an internal revolt among its employees regarding their publishing of it. They weren't thinking of the public when they did it.

[quote]generously complementing a woman’s looks is now considered taboo? Even as a gay millennial I don’t get it.

No, apparently you don't. 'Tone deaf' indeed.

R14 please spare me. You’re on a website that is bitchy to men and women alike. Praising a man or woman’s appearance does not equal harassment or assault. Attractiveness is a commodity which both men and women used to their advantage. No amount of fake moralizing will amount to anything in the long run.

It's an interesting review. Thanks for posting it in full, OP.

Two things were mentioned that I've been going on about: Woody is creepy about young, nubile women (not children) and Ronan wants us to listen to Dylan but not to Soon-Yi.

TLDR. Marked for later reading who wrote the piece, this admirer of Nat hentoff

I know a lot of us are having a hard time finding toilet paper. These pages will do just fine.

R18, unfortunately for the Farrows the first print run was already sold out. It makes me laugh knowing how furious Ronan and Mia must be.

R10 hasn't died painfully from coronavirus yet?

r14 is just so woke!

Friends of a friend of mine agreed to let their daughter undergo the leg-lengthening surgeries Allen says Ronan Farrow had. I think Allen is right to call it barbaric.

Even Allan's supporters or vague well-wishers are calling the book a bore.

I think sales will drop fast.

It was written for the wrong reason.

[quote]Praising a man or woman’s appearance does not equal harassment or assault.

R15, I didn't say it was. But don't even pretend that Allen would talk that way about male actors he's worked with, rating their looks on a scale of 1 to 10 and going on about how hot they are and how attractive he finds them. Sexist as fuck. Like the review says - tone deaf.

And go fuck yourself, R21.

Satchel needs to start a support group with Blanket.

Every New York and LA highbrow, arts lover, film fan, media personality, showbiz/cultural creative will be reading this book...WITHOUT EXCEPTION...while lying to friends and public at large that they are appalled by Woody and will boycott it out of woke solidarity.

Woody Allen is "highbrow," R27?

Go know.

[quote] the perverse act of a man whose brain salts are dangerously out of balance

Heh. Also, Previn probably wasn't 21 when she started sleeping with Allen, but that wiggle room in her age gives a lot of people justification for some creepy things.

[quote] he broaches the idea that Farrow may have slept with a state judge and a state attorney in order to try and influence their opinions during a custody battle

The fuck?

[quote]He alleges that Farrow had Ronan undergo cosmetic surgery to add a few inches to his height, which required the breaking and rebreaking of his legs.

That was not surgically possible until about 7 or 8 years ago, and the surgery has quite a few complications. We'd have noticed if Ronan went through distraction osteogenesis and he'd probably have a noticeably uneven gait if he had.

But Allen also thinks brainwashing is a real thing, so.

Tawdry and petty. He’s worse than we thought.

Tawdry and petty. He’s worse than we thought.

Tawdry and petty. He’s worse than we thought.

[quote] Heh. Also, Previn probably wasn't 21 when she started sleeping with Allen, but that wiggle room in her age gives a lot of people justification for some creepy things.

If she was over 18 it's not really anyone's business what she did. Or are you claiming women should stay virgin until they are 21?

[quote]That was not surgically possible until about 7 or 8 years ago, and the surgery has quite a few complications. We'd have noticed if Ronan went through distraction osteogenesis and he'd probably have a noticeably uneven gait if he had.

R29, quick googling tells that leg lengthening by breaking the bone has been done for over 100 years. And how the hell would 'we' have noticed anything about the way he walks? Have you been stalking him his whole life?

And Mia Farrow fucking a judge and a state attorney? Well, never underestimate the lure of getting to fuck a Hollywood star. Granted she wasn't exactly a gorgeous young thing anymore at that point but you never know, especially knowing she did cheat on Allen at least with Sinatra. She's pretty much admitted that herself. Knowing her previous behavior I'd tend to believe Allen when he said he suspects she was sleeping around with multiple men during their relationship. I've seen mentions of a possibly weird fawning over Farrow by the judge who dealt with the Dylan abuse case. Allen was e.g. blamed to not have listened to Farrow's belly when she was pregnant with Satchel. This is what Woody Allen had to say about Justice Wilk.

[italic]"Justice Wilk was quite rough on me and never approved of my relationship with Soon-Yi, Mia’s adopted daughter, who was then in her early 20s. He thought of me as an older man exploiting a much younger woman, which outraged Mia as improper despite the fact she had dated a much older Frank Sinatra when she was 19. In fairness to Justice Wilk, the public felt the same dismay over Soon-Yi and myself, but despite what it looked like our feelings were authentic and we’ve been happily married for 16 years with two great kids, both adopted. (Incidentally, coming on the heels of the media circus and false accusations, Soon-Yi and I were extra carefully scrutinized by both the adoption agency and adoption courts, and everyone blessed our adoptions.)"[/italic]

There are so many people in the arts who either definitely or almost certainly did morally questionable things in their lives, but I choose to separate them from their work. I still admire Polanski films. I still sing along to Michael Jackson songs. I look forward to reading Woody’s autobiography, if it’s ever published, because I still love at least a dozen of his films. (I also think at least a dozen of his films were completely unnecessary.)

R34, it was just published a few days ago.

Sorry, but I'm Team Woody.

He's a significant American cultural figure and I'd take it for granted that any major publisher would agree to bring out his memoirs, no question. What seems questionable to me is Woody's initial decision to go with Ronan Farrow's publisher, and then scream like a bitch when they changed their mind. It seems to me that kind of malicious shit-stirring says more about who Woody really is than anything in the book.

R37 Finally, someone with a little sense

Distraction osteogenesis was awful and lead to major health complications until recently, and even now you can find plenty of recent studies showing a host of complications in most (if not all) people who underwent the surgery. It was not commonly used for elective, vanity surgery until recently. Elective surgery is what Allen is talking about. DO was a huge fad in China in about the mid 2000s, and it famously lead to a lot of deformities until it was banned in China in 2006, temporarily I believe, but there was a big dust-up about it.

Mentioning someone else's medical history, including elective surgery, in this context is just trolling anyway.

[quote]What seems questionable to me is Woody's initial decision to go with Ronan Farrow's publisher, and then scream like a bitch when they changed their mind. It seems to me that kind of malicious shit-stirring says more about who Woody really is than anything in the book.

Agreed, especially considering what we've read of the book's content. Very much seems like he was just poking at open wounds.

[quote]Woody is creepy about young, nubile women (not children)

He watched the movie "Lipstick" and saw a 14 year-old Mariel Hemingway and thoughts, "YUM! I want to cast her as my girlfriend in Manhattan!"

Sounds like a nasty piece of crap, with, occasionally, a few laughs. Why in the world would anyone want to read it--no matter which "team" you're on???

R37, you're seriously blaming Woody Allen for Ronan's attack? The only screaming bitch was Ronan Farrow who threw a bitch fit to get Allen's book cancelled. I read in a recent article that it's quite weird for a journalist to try to silence someone else's words. I've said it before but I suspect the whole Allen case will end up making a serious dent on Ronan's career. The way he behaves doesn't make him look like an objective journalist, then again no idea if he even wants to be seen as one. Let's not forget Ronan himself wrote in an article where he attacked Woody Allen that he asked only a soft question about Bill Cosby's rape allegations in an interview with a Cosby biography author before dozens of witnesses came forward. I suspect he's so forceful about Allen now because he's scared to be seen as being wrong again and he's jumped on the hate wagon fully and can't jump off anymore, even if he might suspect nothing sinister ever took place. It must be very powerful to be able to enrage the masses with tweets and articles, and to get someone's book cancelled. Especially if it's your own estranged father.

Let's not forget this is a guy who most probably witnessed the abuse some of his siblings had to go through by his mom, and yet he's been absolutely silent about it.

I like that the review singled out the dedication as cringy -- as did DL long beforehand.

Starting a book with a reference to Catcher in the Rye is so cringey.

R43: That's because he is not acting like a journalist in this case (and he is not pretending to be objective either), he is acting like a brother who believes his sister was abused by his father.

By the way i read that Allen is extremely bitchy with Timothee Chalamet on the book and mocks his efforts to get an oscar

Ronan didn't get any book cancelled. The employees of the publishing house walked out in protest, they were the ones who got the book cancelled.

And by "cancelled" we mean "Allen had to go to another publisher" and was not actually cancelled at all.

Well Ronan was absolutely trying to get it cancelled. I have a feeling his constant badgering about Allen is one of the biggest reasons the employees walked out. Who knows, he might've been arranging the walkout himself.

[quote][R43]: That's because he is not acting like a journalist in this case (and he is not pretending to be objective either), he is acting like a brother who believes his sister was abused by his father.

It doesn't go like that. Everything he does publically will affect his reputation as a serious journalist. Especially since he's using the platform to attack Allen constantly.

Re Woody & Timmee

Team Mia!

R25 Comparing someone positively gushing about someone’s appearance to someone accused of sexual assault is tone deaf. I wouldn’t expect Allen or any other straight men to say the same thing about any man, but on a gay forum we do it all the time, even when the person is straight. Being a Hollywood star means a great number of people will admire you for your looks . In the era of social media, even those with zero talent have tried to market themselves using their looks.

It just seems like yet another attempt to deny reality by policing people’s language. In these times we should be able to enjoy laughter and life’s simple pleasures.

You dont think brainwashing is real, R29? Talk to someoe who feasts only on Fox news and then get back to me.

I don’t want to eat Timmy’s ass.

Bitchy review from the Washington Post.

It seems that practically all women are totally unable to see anything wrong in Mia Farrow's actions and believe everything she said about Woody Allen. I'm glad the author of that "review" was called out in the WP comments and on her Twitter feed. If some fine day there comes irrefutable proof that Mia Farrow is a total cunt and lied about Allen I wonder what all these people who try to incite hate towards Allen will say. Probably they don't even really care what's the truth behind it all because they just see a creepy looking old man and in their minds they see him having sex with Soon-Yi. In their minds Allen is guilty of something terrible even though he's never been convicted of anything. I wonder how many of those who condemn Allen for getting together with Soon-Yi have cheated on their partners?

R55 don’t type all women that way.

R55, there are plenty of women who haven't taken Mia's side and plenty of men who have.

He slept with both of Diane Keaton’s sisters. She’s never struck me as someone with boundless self-esteem, so I guess it makes sense that she’s still friends with him.

[quote] The one relationship that seems as if it may have been healthy, with actress Diane Keaton, is swiftly spoiled when Allen reveals he slept with both her sisters. “The three Keaton sisters were all beautiful, wonderful women. Good genes in that family. Award-winning protoplasm. Great-looking mother.

[quote]The three Keaton sisters

That's her stage name; the family name is Hall. He could have just said "Diane and her two sisters."

Is he well hung? Why else would anybody be attracted to him?

Although I think he is innocent of abusing Dylan, he is definitely guilty of making morally questionable decisions when it came to dating Soon Yi On the other hand, the relationship seems to be a strong and loving one, so maybe it was the right one for him. His two daughters seem well adjusted. You can't dismiss Allen's general creepiness ,but he is talented and clever, and it was good to read about his creative process. What surprised me most about the book, though, was how badly written it was. It would have benefited from a strong editor to clean up sentences and impost proper punctuation. It very much reads like a random first draft that he meant to tighten up later. One thing about the book that bothered me is that he goes on and on about how he doesnt read reviews, yes , two pages later, he will mention a review that was helpful, or ignorant, etc. So what is it? Does he or does he not read reviews. I am not a fan --and the bad grammar bothered me a great deal -- but the book was still engrossing. If you're casual fan of his movies, you might enjoy the book.

R58 haha great genes? Has anyone seen the videos of her brother recently?

R60: stop thinking like a gay man for two seconds, will you?

[quote]You dont think brainwashing is real, [R29]? Talk to someoe who feasts only on Fox news and then get back to me.

Find me a study that shows brainwashing is real, then.

Even the U.S. Army, desperate to blame brainwashing for the fact that many American servicemen captured during the Korean War turned snitch and told their captors classified information, was obligated to announce that brainwashing wasn't real and no one had actually been converted to Communism, brainwashed, or indoctrinated.

That's why F. Lee Bailey's defense of Patty Hearst -- that she was brainwashed like those soldiers, even though the U.S. Army concluded that they hadn't been brainwashed at all -- is to this day ridiculed in the same way the Twinkie Defense is. You are aware she was found guilty and no one with any sense believes she was brainwashed, right?

You can find a lot of information about this with a simple search, and the fact that you won't even look, but instead just insist that brainwashing is real because you think it's real, is proof enough that your opinion isn't worth listening to.

I like it when people like you go around calling everyone else biased.

[quote]Nearly every time a woman is mentioned, there’s a gratuitous pronouncement on her looks. Early on, he chases “delectable bohemian little kumquats” in New York City. While in London filming “Casino Royale” (1967), a James Bond spoof, he writes, “one could stroll on the Kings Road and pick up the most adorable birds in their miniskirts.” Birds? I kept waiting for him to sail to Australia to scoop up a basket of “Sheilas.”

"Birds" in miniskirts was the London lingo of the time.

For those interested in seeing "A Rainy Day in New York": you can watch it on the website of this Dutch arthouse theater for €4.99 (and support the theater at the same time during this pandemic):

R66 -- It is hard to navigate the site because I don't speak Dutch, but it was clear that I could not access it. Are you in Europe? That could explain how you were able to see it. Or am i hitting the wrong buttons? Thanks.

R49, that makes me think less of my darling Timothee.