Table Of ContentReferentiality and the Films of Woody Allen
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Referentiality and the
Films of Woody Allen
Editedby
Klara Stephanie Szlezák
PassauUniversity,Germany
D. E. Wynter
CaliforniaStateUniversity,Northridge,USA
Selection,introductionandeditorialmatter©KlaraStephanieSzlezák
andD.E.Wynter2015
Individualchapters©Respectiveauthors2015
Foreword©DavidDesser2015
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-51546-9
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ReferentialityandthefilmsofWoodyAllen/[editedby]KlaraStephanie
Szlezák,UniversityofPassau,Germany;D.E.Wynter,
CaliforniaStateUniversityNorthridge,USA.
pages. cm
Summary:“ReferentialityandtheFilmsofWoodyAllenisascholarlycollection
thatprovidesexpansiveexplorationoftheauteur’suseofintertexuality,
referentiality,andfusionofmediaforms.ItsscopeisframedbyAllen’s
intermedialphasebeginningin1983withZeligandhismostrecentfilm.
Whilemanychaptersinthevolumedealwithtexts,severaldelveintoAllen’s
processofreferentiality,hisaccessingnon-textualworks,materialobjects,
andabstractconceptsintheformationofhiscinematicworks.Theseobjects
andconceptsincludeavastarrayofphenomena,suchassexualorientation,
historicalevents,timeandspace,geographiclocation,architecture,religion,
philosophy,visualimages,music,magicandotherperformanceart.
Characterizedbyinternational,interdisciplinaryperspectives,thiscollection
elucidatespointsofdeparturewithinaswellasoutsideofAllen’sownoeuvre
totracebothartisticlineagesandidiosyncratic!
creationsinAllen’soverallfilmicwork.”—Providedbypublisher.
1. Allen,Woody—Criticismandinterpretation. I. Szlezák,Klara
Stephanie,1980–editor. II. Wynter,D.E.,1959–editor.
PN1998.3.A45R442015
791.4302(cid:2)3392—dc23 2015021816
Contents
ForewordbyDavidDesser vii
NotesonContributors x
Introduction 1
KlaraStephanieSzlezákandD.E.Wynter
Part I IntermedialityandForm
1 Zelig:ASimulatedLife 13
BrittaFeyerabend
2 WoodyAllen’sBlueJasmine:ASeductivelyScentedFlower
PerforminginaTheatricalBubble 31
NassimWinnieBalestrini
Part II EuropeanArt-CinemaandtheAuteur
3 “ThankGodtheFrenchexist”:ExploringtheReferentiality
oftheFormalElementsofFilminDeconstructingHarry 51
MartinR.Hall
4 TwoandaHalf:Nostalgia,ModernParody,andFelliniin
StardustMemories,RadioDays,andToRomewithLove 68
GiacomoBoitani
Part III GreekMythologyRevisited
5 OedipusortheWrecksoftheWASPDisguise 87
NaamaHarel
6 WoodyAllenandtheAbsurdityofHumanExistence:
Origin,Legacy,andHumanAgencyinGodandMighty
Aphrodite 100
MichaelFuchs
v
vi Contents
Part IV LiteraryMastersofNineteenth-Century
Realism
7 “Afullmealwithavitaminpillandextrawheatgerm”:
WoodyAllen,Dostoevsky,andExistentialMorality 119
ZacharyT.Ingle
8 “Darling,haveyouseenmyStrindbergbook?”:Dialogism
asSocialDiscourseinMatchPoint 137
D.E.Wynter
Part V ReferentialityandTransculturalImmersion
9 GuitarandCulturalTrespassinVickyCristinaBarcelona 159
AllanHavis
10 “HiMr.Hemingway”:TimeandSpace,Travel,andLiterary
HeritageinMidnightinParis 173
KlaraStephanieSzlezák
Part VI Identity:Conceptualizationand
Performance
11 Woodyand“Woody”:TheMakingofaPersona 193
WielandSchwanebeck
12 MagicalTricksandIngmarBergman:Referentialityin
MagicintheMoonlight 210
MariaElenadelasCarreras-Kuntz
Index 227
Foreword
Itishighlylikelythatfew,ifany,audiencesoutsideofJapanwouldknow
Kokusai himitsu keisatsu: Kayaku no taru (1964) were it not for Woody
Allen’sWhat’sUp,TigerLily?(1966).Amodesthit,especiallyamidstthe
doldrums of mid-60s American cinema, the film convinced the former
gagwriterandsuccessfulstand-upcomediantocontinuetoworkincin-
ema.YetonehardlyknowswhattocallAllen’seffortintakingaJapanese
spythrillerandevacuatingitsdialoguetrackinfavorofanabsurdplot
and jokey repartee. Right at the start of his career Allen takes concepts
of referentiality, intermediality, intertextuality, and collaboration to a
placetheseterms,somenotyetinscholarlydiscourse,werenevermeant
to go. Did Allen have Bakhtin in mind with his quite literal “dialogic
imagination”vis-a-vistheJapaneseoriginal?Whilepostmoderntheory
has it that every text is an intertext and the French nouvelle vague
produced countless examples of great cinema out of pastiche, parody,
homage,referentiality,andreflexivity,Allen’sprojectoverthecourseof
somesixdecadesandalmost50filmshasbeensomethingdifferent:to
createanoeuvreatoncecinematicallysophisticatedandphilosophically
rigorous while retaining some basis in mainstream popularity. Numer-
ous Academy Award wins and nominations, a number of box office
hits, and a shelf-full of both academic and popular writings attest to
theperhapsunprecedentedsuccessofhisefforts.
Ofcourse,itdidn’tseemsoatthestart.Fewtook1969’sTaketheMoney
andRunasanythingotherthanacomicuseofdocumentaryformtotell
thestoryofalovableloser.Thedeformationofthedocumentarymodeis
centraltothecomedyofthefilmasmuchaspoorVirgil’shopelessness
at any kind of criminal competence. And so in combining form with
contentAllennotonlyengagesinhison-the-joblearningofcinematic
semblance,butalongthewayheinventsanewgenre:themockumen-
tary.Thelovableloser,theschlemiel,wouldconstituteAllen’son-screen
personaoverthecourseofanotherfourfilmsinthenextsixyears.But
behind the camera, Allen, the budding auteur, was learning his craft
through a kind of collaboration through referentiality, intertextuality,
andintermediality.Thiscollaborationwasnotonlybetweentheauteur
manqué and established masters—Bergman, of course, and Eisenstein,
Kubrick, Bob Hope, and Groucho Marx—but also with the history of
world cinema, including Hollywood film genres. Allen took an absurd
vii
viii Foreword
best-seller, David Reuben’s Everything You Always Wanted to Know about
Sex∗ .... But Were Afraid to Ask—a book intended to make mainstream
America comfortable with the sexual revolution happening all around
them as the New Left and the Counter-Culture morphed into the “Me
Generation”—and twisted it beyond all recognition. Using world cin-
ema and Hollywood genres as his model to create seven short films,
Allen turned cinephilia into a critical and commercial success. Relying
on everything from Shakespearean costume drama to Antonioni-esque
ennuitoclassichorrortohigh-glosssciencefiction,Allenspoofssexual
anxiety and ideas of perversion all the while in dialogue with some of
themostsignificantmovementsinworldcinemaandclassicHollywood.
Compare the intellectually challenging reflexivity and referentiality of
Everything toHerbertRoss’sslick,solidbutultimatelysafeadaptationof
Allen’sBroadwayhitPlayItAgain,Sam madethatsameyear.Allofthe
jokes, puns, and references to old movies are there in the play and in
Allen’s own screen adaptation. Taking nothing away from Ross—once
among the most prolific of Hollywood’s mainstream filmmakers—no
cinephilewouldpreferSamoverEverything.
With Sleeper Allen comes into his own as both a director and screen
actorofnote.Channelingthesparse,antisepticworldofKubrick’sclas-
sic2001:ASpaceOdyssey,Allen’s1973effortisanear-Swiftiansatireof
bothafuturisticdystopiaofepicincompetenceandakick-in-the-pants
of then-current pop-cultural nonsense. Seen from the vantage-point of
2015, Sleeper almost requires the kind of on-the-scene witness as the
characters in the film itself require of Miles Monroe to explain the
puzzling artifacts and faded celebrities of 1970s America. Less so with
Love and Death, the film we may fairly call Allen’s first masterpiece.
The look of the film is impeccable, its European tint perfectly molded
by cinematographer Ghislain Cloquet. For the first time Allen extends
his reach to encompass not just European models, but European tal-
ent working with the director of photography who had worked with
BressonandDemy.ThereferencestoBergmanareeasytospot:TheSev-
enthSealandPersonaarethemostobviousones.AndbothTolstoyand
Dostoyevsky make their way into this pseudo-Russian story of existen-
tialangstandthwartedlove(thefilmis,ofcourse,Allen’sfunniestwork
yet).
Manyscholars,myselfincluded,imaginedAnnieHallassomekindof
breakthroughforAllen.CertainlytheAmericanAcademyofMotionPic-
tureArtsandSciencesagreed:thefilmwonBestPicture,BestWriter,Best
DirectorandAllenwasnominatedasBestActor.NotsinceCitizenKane
and Orson Welles had someone been nominated for Picture, Writer,
Foreword ix
Director, and Actor. (It would be churlish to note that Welles’ film
failed to win anything other than Best Original Screenplay.) The little
schlemielfromBrooklynwasnowsetonacoursewherehisfilmswould
garnerOscarnominationsvirtuallyroutinelyandthenear-universalcrit-
icalrespectforhissubsequentfilmswouldrankAllenintheforefrontof
Americanfilmmakers.
Littleiswrittenaboutthesefirstfilmsanylonger—understandablein
light of the dazzling intellectual, philosophical, and cinematic matu-
rityofsomanyfilmsstartinginthelate1970sand,withaslip-uphere
and there, continuing well into the new millennium. It is clear that
these early films mark the efforts of an artist learning his craft, relying
on a consistent, recognizable persona and a reliable sense of comedy
whileexperimentingwithcinematicgrammarandstyle.Wecanseein
these budding works the shape of things to come: the roots of Zelig in
Take the Money and Run; ofStardust Memories in Everything...about Sex;
of Crimes and Misdemeanors in Love and Death. Of course it is difficult
to compare the sheer audacity of Zelig with the light-hearted Take the
Money; the dark mood that overhangs Stardust Memories with the play-
fulnonsenseofSex....Wearenothereclaimingthattheseinitialfilms
somehowdeservethescholarlyattentionorpossesstheintellectualheft
of the later works. Perhaps they have received most of the attention
they deserve, as steps along the way toward an unprecedented career
achievement.ButweshouldatleastremindourselvesthatAllen’spen-
chantforquotation,referentiality,homage,dialogism,andasensibility
thatextendsacrossmediaandtemporalitywasthereatthestart.Allen
turned the “anxiety of influence” on its head by liberally borrowing
from past masters, and dared critics, scholars, and audiences to take
himseriouslyneverthelessasadeeplyoriginalartist.Thesplendidessays
inthisvolumerangeacrossAllen’slaterfilmsandacrossanimpressive
rangeofintertextualreferences.It’satributetotheseauthorsthatthey
understandAllen’sdeepculturalandintellectualroots—asmuchasitis
toAllen’scomplexcinemaitself.
DavidDesser
ChapmanUniversity,USA
