Woody Allen

Born: December 1935
Where: Brooklyn, New York, USA

Woody Allen is one of a handful of American filmmakers who can rightly be labelled as an auteur.

His films, be they dramas or comedies, are remarkably personal and are permeated with Allen's preoccupation with art, religion and love.

Allen's obsessions with Judaism, the WASP world that eludes the Jew, and the balm of psychiatry - which may or may not chase these devils - are also never far beneath the surface of his work.

Dropping out of New York University, he joined the NBC Writer's Program and began contributing material to such programs as The Colgate Comedy Hour.

At the same time, Allen started a secondary career as a gag writer for such comics and nightclub performers as Carol Channing and Art Carney.

By 1960, he had begun his own successful career as a stand-up comedian, honing what would become his screen persona, the intellectual "schnook".

In 1965, Allen made his feature film acting and writing debut with the farcical, but uneven, What's New, Pussycat?, directed by Clive Donner.

He then debuted as a filmmaker of sorts by re-tooling a minor Japanese spy thriller with his own storyline and with English dialogue dubbed by American actors - What's Up Tiger Lily, followed by James Bond spoof Casino Royale.

Following stage and TV work, he wrote, directed and starred in the feature Take the Money and Run which parodied both gangster films and cinema verite documentaries.

Bananas was a south-of-the-border satire that lambasts both politics and mass media while Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*but were afraid to ask) consisted of a series of skits loosely related to a title borrowed from a then-popular self-help book.

As the 70s progressed, Allen found his voice as a filmmaker - Sleeper and particularly Love and Death, which signalled Allen's higher aspirations and desire to be considered a "serious" moviemaker.

The bittersweet Annie Hall followed - regarded by many as defining the quintessential Allen movie: personal and thoughtful yet satirical and entertaining.

Critically-acclaimed, Annie Hall received numerous accolades, including four Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Actress (Diane Keaton), Best Director (Allen) and Best Original Screenplay (Allen and Marshall Brickman).

As a surprising follow-up, Allen shifted to more dramatic material and focused on the starchy, repressed WASP milieu in Interiors in 1978.

Re-teaming with Marshall Brickman, Allen wrote what is his most profitable, and arguably his best, film, Manhattan, with its lush Gershwin score, gorgeous black-and-white photography and brilliant ensemble cast.

Allen moved on to the somewhat self-indulgent Felliniesque Stardust Memories and then found a new leading lady in Mia Farrow in A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy.

Zelig melded Allen's fascination with celebrity with his growing grasp of cinematic methods and was followed by the the Runyonesque Broadway Danny Rose.

The Purple Rose of Cairo, in which Allen did not appear, was another technical tour de force followed by the nostalgia laden Radio Days.

For much of the remainder of the decade, Allen concentrated on dramatic material, peaking with the Chekhovian Hannah and Her Sisters.

The early 90s found Allen in a lighter mode with the the New Age-themed Alice and the critically-reviled Shadows and Fog.

Husbands and Wives was released early by its distributor in part to capitalize on its uncanny parallels with the real-life turmoil between Allen and Farrow.

Their very public break-up, spurred by Allen's romantic involvement with Farrow's adopted daughter, was followed by Farrow's public accusations that Allen had molested their adopted daughter.

Next came the frothy Manhattan Murder Mystery but by 1994's Bullets of Broadway audiences were ready to embrace his work anew.

Mighty Aphrodite was an uneven attempt and with Everyone Says I Love You he combined frothy 30s musical sensibilities with his familiar themes to a mixed result that divided audiences and critics.

Deconstructing Harry was a critically-praised, scatological and complex look at a writer's life that employed black comedy and dramatizations of the author's works to comment on the function of the artist in society.

Allen continued to put out one movie per year for the next five years. He dappled in different genres, with his comic heist pic Small Time Crooks and the mystery Curse of the Jade Scorpion.

A running theme for his most recent films, however, seems to eerily mimic his real life romance with step-daughter and wife, Soon Yi Previn.

In Jade Scorpion, Allen becomes romantically involved with starlet Charlize Theron, entangled with the youthful Tea Leoni in Hollywood Ending, and Anything Else couples Allen with Christina Ricci, who is 45 years his junior.

Melinda & Melinda marked an overdue return to form, with Will Ferrell essaying the Allen character opposite Rhada Mitchell as Melinda.