Book Pick: Apropos of Nothing, by Woody Allen

Woody Allen has spent most of his 85 years shunning public interviews, statements, award ceremonies, letting his prodigious work speak for itself. But the former Allen Konigsberg out of Jewish lower middle class Brooklyn spends nearly 400 pages in telling much of his life and artistic vision. His odd title roughly translates to his life’s theme of meaninglessness. He navigates a neat trick of using extreme self-deprecation to build up a life of titanic artistic achievement. Woody’s straw-man child is a clueless, unintelligent, klutz who hated school, professional achievement; instead idolizing idealized heroes in sports, crime and cinema. In his telling he was headed to ‘nowheresville’ till be began writing little jokes to pass the boredom of school. Still in grade school he took a friend’s suggestion to send them to newspaper columnists. They were so good some appeared uncredited in print. When one finally appeared as the work of “Allen Konigsberg”, Allen found his ticket to fame and fortune from a prodigious comedic talent coupled with an unquenchable work ethic. How unquenchable? While composing on his portable, he heard the news of JFK’s assassination. After 10 minutes he turned off the radio to finish his latest opus, only meeting with friends much later to grieve.

An unabashed Allen fan since seeing his incredibly neurotic and hilarious standup on Carson, I avidly await each year’s Allen film; some so-so, many entertaining, a few, like ‘Match Point’ and ‘Midnight In Paris’ fabulous. That was until last year when ‘A Rainy Day In New York’ got bounced from America due to the Me Too rehash of the 26 year old allegation Allen molested his adopted 7 year old daughter amidst his break up from longtime girlfriend Mia Farrow. Yes, Allen spends a good hunk of ‘Apropos of Nothing’ defending himself from that charge, quoting several legal proceedings all exonerating him.

In the year of pandemic, economic collapse, neo-fascist Trumpism and no new Woody Allen film, there hasn’t been much laughter. Reading ‘Apropos of Nothing’ had me laugh out loud a good hundred times, about once every four pages. Never thought meaninglessness could be so important...and funny.