{{Infobox comedian | name = Jack Paar | image = Paar.jpg | imagesize = 150px | caption = | birth_name = Jack Harold Paar

Early life and education[link]

Paar was born in Canton, Ohio, the son of Howard and Lillian M. Paar. He moved with his family to Jackson, Michigan, 30 miles south of Lansing, as a child. As a child he had a stuttering problem which he conquered.

Career[link]

Early career[link]

He first worked near home as a radio announcer at WIBM in Jackson and later as a humorous disc jockey at Midwest stations, including WJR in Detroit, WIRE in Indianapolis, WGAR in Cleveland and WBEN in Buffalo. In his book ''P.S. Jack Paar'', he recalled doing utility duty at WGAR in 1938 when Orson Welles broadcast his famous simulated alien invasion, ''The War of the Worlds'' over the CBS network (and affiliate WGAR). Attempting to calm possible panicked listeners, Paar announced, "The world is ''not'' coming to an end. Trust me. When have I ever lied to you?"

Paar was drafted into the military during World War II and assigned to the U.S.O in the South Pacific to entertain the troops. He was a clever, wise cracking master of ceremonies whose impersonations of officers nearly got him into trouble.

Radio and films[link]

After WWII, Paar worked in radio as a fill-in on ''The Breakfast Club'' show and appeared as a panelist on the ''$64 Question''. He got his big break when Jack Benny, who had been impressed by Paar's U.S.O. performances, suggested that Paar serve as his 1947 summer replacement. Paar was enough of a hit on Benny's show that Benny's sponsor, American Tobacco Company decided to keep him on the air, moving him to ABC for the fall season. Paar later refused American Tobacco's suggestion that he come up with a weekly running gag or gimmick, saying he "wanted to get away from that kind of old-hat comedy, the kind being practiced by Jack Benny and Fred Allen." The show was then terminated, earning Paar an enduring image as a spoiled kid (as Dunning phrased it). A profile of Paar by the Museum of Broadcast Communications suggests that Paar later emulated Benny's mannerisms.

Paar also signed as a contract player for Howard Hughes' RKO Pictures in the immediate post war period, appearing as the emcee in the movie ''Variety Time'' (1948), a compilation of vaudeville sketches. He later recalled that RKO producers had trouble figuring out what kind of screen characters he could play, until one of the executives dubbed him, "Kay Kyser, with warmth." Paar projected a pleasant personality on film, and RKO called him back to emcee another filmed vaudeville show, ''Footlight Varieties'' (1951). Paar also appeared in the 1950 film, ''Walk Softly, Stranger'', with Joseph Cotten. In 1951, he played Marilyn Monroe's boyfriend in the 20th Century Fox film, ''Love Nest''.

Paar returned to radio in 1950, hosting the ''$64 Question'' for one season, then quitting in a wage dispute in the spring of 1951 after the show's sponsor pulled out and NBC insisted everyone involved take a pay cut. In 1956, he gave radio one more try, hosting a disc jockey effort, ''The Jack Paar Show'', on ABC. Paar once described this show as "so modest we did it from the basement rumpus room of our house in Bronxville."

Television[link]

He got his first tastes of television in the early 1950s, appearing as a comic on ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' and hosting two game shows, ''Up To Paar'' (1952) and ''Bank on the Stars'' (1953), before hosting ''The Morning Show'' (1954) on CBS. He guest starred twice in 1958 on Polly Bergen's short-lived NBC comedy/variety show, ''The Polly Bergen Show''.

''The Tonight Show''[link]

NBC asked Paar to succeed Steve Allen as host of ''The Tonight Show''. He hosted the program from 1957 to 1962. At first, the show was called ''Tonight starring Jack Paar''; after 1959 it was officially known as ''The Jack Paar Show''. Paar was often unpredictable and emotional. When network censors cut a joke about a "water closet" (the British term for a toilet), on February 11, 1960, he received national attention by leaving the show and did not return until three weeks later.

During the first half of 1964, a mock feud pitted Paar against the show immediately preceding his program, David Frost's satire series ''That Was The Week That Was''. A typical exchange would have ''That Was the Week That Was'' "signing off" the NBC Television Network just before the Paar program, with Paar responding that the show immediately preceding his was ''Henry Morgan's Amateur Hour'' (Morgan was a frequent guest on ''TW3''). The feud suddenly evaporated when NBC moved ''That Was the Week That Was'' to a different time slot.

Paar's prime time show aired for three years, including guests such as Brother Dave Gardner, Peter Ustinov, Lawrence of Arabia's brother, Richard Burton, Oscar Levant, Lowell Thomas, Muhammad Ali reciting his poetry to piano accompaniment by Liberace, an occasionally funny Judy Garland, Jonathan Winters, Woody Allen, Bill Cosby (whose nickname for Paar was "The Boss"), Bette Davis, Robert Morley, Cliff Arquette (as Charlie Weaver), Dick Gregory and many others. The final closing segment of the series, broadcast on June 25, 1965, featured Paar sitting alone on a stool, sharing a discussion that he had with his daughter Randy, who called Paar's departure a sabbatical. He said that his own field was, though not completely used up, "a little dry recently." Then he called to his German shepherd, who came to him from the seats of what was, for once, an empty studio, and walked out. (Johnny Carson precisely copied this format for his own farewell episode of ''The Tonight Show'' in 1992.)

Paar continued to appear in occasional specials for the network until 1970.

Later career[link]

Paar came back to television on a regular basis beginning in January 1973, appearing one week a month as one of several rotating hosts on ABC's Wide World of Entertainment. Paar claimed it was the most he was willing to appear, and that he would not have appeared at all unless ABC had committed to keeping Dick Cavett, a former writer for Paar, on the air. Paar's announcer for this series was Peggy Cass, and perhaps its most notable aspect was the national television debut of comic Freddie Prinze. Paar stayed on the show, which was in direct competition with ''Tonight'', for one year before he quit. Dissatisfied with the one-week-per-month formula, he complained that even his own mother did not know when he was on. Paar later expressed discomfort with developments in the television media and once said he had trouble interviewing people dressed in "overalls", a reference to young rock acts.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Paar made rare guest appearances on ''Donahue'', ''The Tonight Show'' (hosted by Johnny Carson and Jay Leno) and ''Late Night with David Letterman'', as well as Charles Grodin's CNBC talk show.

Retrospectives[link]

In 1984, Paar came out of retirement once again for the Museum of Broadcasting's "Tribute to Jack Paar", produced by Kevin Doherty, making two live appearances in New York. This led to a 1986 NBC special featuring Paar, titled ''Jack Paar Comes Home''. The following year, a second special, ''Jack Paar Is Alive and Well'', was broadcast by the network. Both of these specials were largely made up of kinescoped clips used at the tribute from "Tonight" and from Paar's prime time program, to which he maintained the copyright.

PBS television devoted an edition of the ''American Masters'' series to Paar's career in 1997, and in 2003 revisited the topic with another hour-long examination of the Paar phenomenon, entitled ''Smart Television''. The program featured clips of Paar with guests including Jonathan Winters, Woody Allen, Judy Garland, Bill Cosby (in his first network appearance), Peter Ustinov, Richard Burton, John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy (in his first interview after his brother's assassination), Richard Nixon, Barry Goldwater, and many others compiled from the 1950s and 1960s, as well as more recent interviews with people who worked with Paar.

In the spring of 2004, a memorial for Jack Paar was held at The Museum of Television & Radio in New York City. Ron Simon, one of the television and radio curators at the Museum, was host and moderator with appearances and speeches by television talk show host Dick Cavett, TCM host Robert Osborne, and Paar's daughter, Randy.

Awards[link]

Paar was nominated for an Emmy for Best Performance by a Continuing Character in a Musical or Variety Series in 1951, and again nominated in 1958 for an Emmy for Best Continuing Performance in a Series by a Comedian, Singer, Host, Dancer, M.C., Announcer, Narrator, or Panelist.

Bibliography[link]

, ASIN: B0006AVWCE , ASIN: B00005W4PA , ASIN: B0012ACN9S , ASIN: B000O6439O

References[link]

External links[link]

Jack Paar Show Podcast 1947-06-01 Disagreement in the Shade, (Jack's inaugural show)]

Jack Paar and Jack Haskell sing the ''Tonight'' theme, "I-M-4-U" by Jose Melis

''Tonight Starring Jack Paar''

Category:1918 births Category:2004 deaths Category:People from Canton, Ohio Category:American comedians Category:American game show hosts Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:American television talk show hosts Category:Cardiovascular disease deaths in Connecticut Category:Deaths from stroke Category:People from Greenwich, Connecticut Category:People from Jackson, Michigan Category:Radio personalities from Detroit, Michigan Category:RCA Victor artists

de:Jack Paar es:Jack Paar fr:Jack Paar no:Jack Paar pl:Jack Paar fi:Jack Paar

name	Oscar Levant
birth date	December 27, 1906
birth place	Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.
death date	August 14, 1972
death place	Beverly Hills, California, U.S.
yearsactive	1923-1965
spouse	Barbara Woodell (1932-1932) (divorced)June Gale (1939-1972; his death); 3 children}}

Oscar Levant (December 27, 1906August 14, 1972) was an American pianist, composer, author, comedian, and actor. He was as famous for his mordant character and witticisms, on the radio and in movies and television, as for his music.

Life and career[link]

Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to an Orthodox Jewish family from Russia, Levant moved to New York with his mother, Annie, in 1922, following the death of his father, Max. He began studying under Zygmunt Stojowski, a well-established piano pedagogue. In 1924, aged 18, he appeared with Ben Bernie in a short film, ''Ben Bernie and All the Lads'', made in New York City in the DeForest Phonofilm sound-on-film system.

In 1928, Levant traveled to Hollywood where his career took a turn for the better. During his stay, he met and befriended George Gershwin. From 1929 to 1948 he composed the music for more than twenty movies. During this period, he also wrote or co-wrote numerous popular songs that made the Hit Parade, the most noteworthy being "Blame It on My Youth" (1934), now considered a standard.

Around 1932, Levant began composing seriously. He studied under Arnold Schoenberg and impressed him sufficiently to be offered an assistantship (which he turned down, considering himself unqualified). His formal studies led to a request by Aaron Copland to play at the Yaddo Festival of contemporary American music on April 30 of that year. Successful, Levant began on a new orchestral work, a sinfonietta. He married actress Barbara Woodell; they divorced in 1932.

In 1939, Levant married for the second time, to singer and actress June Gale (née Doris Gilmartin; June 6, 1911 – November 13, 1996), one of the Gale Sisters. Oscar and June Levant were married for 33 years, until his death in 1972; they had three children, Marcia, Lorna, and Amanda.

At this time, Levant was perhaps best known to American audiences as one of the regular panelists on the radio quiz show ''Information Please''. Originally scheduled as a guest panelist, Levant proved so quick-witted and popular that he became a regular fixture on the show in the late 1930s and 1940s, along with fellow panelists Franklin P. Adams and John Kieran, and moderator Clifton Fadiman. "Mr. Levant", as he was always called, was often challenged with musical questions, though he impressed audiences with his wide depth of knowledge and quickness with a joke. Kieran praised Levant as having a ''"positive genius for making offhand cutting remarks that couldn't have been sharper if he'd honed them a week in his mind. Oscar was always good for a bright response edged with acid"''.

From 1947 to 1949, Levant regularly appeared on NBC radio's ''Kraft Music Hall'', starring Al Jolson. He not only accompanied Jolson on the piano and played classical and popular solos, but often joked and ad-libbed with Jolson and his guests. This includes comedy sketches. The pairing of the two entertainers was inspired. Their individual ties to George Gershwin --- Jolson introduced Gershwin's "Swanee" --- undoubtedly had much to do with their rapport. Both Levant and Jolson appeared as themselves in the Gershwin biopic ''Rhapsody in Blue'' (1945).

In the early 1950s, Levant was an occasional panelist on the NBC game show, ''Who Said That?'', in which celebrites try to determine the speaker of quotations taken from recent news reports.

Between 1958 and 1960, Levant hosted a television talk show on KCOP-TV in Los Angeles, ''The Oscar Levant Show'', which later became syndicated. It featured his piano playing along with monologues and interviews with top-name guests such as Fred Astaire and Linus Pauling. A full recording of only two shows is known to exist, one with Astaire, who paid to have a kinescope recording of the broadcast made, so that he could assess his performance. This is likely the only Astaire performance to have imperfections, as it was live, and Levant would repeatedly change the tempo of his accompaniment to Astaire's singing during the bridges between verses, which appeared to get him quite off balance at first. He did not dance, as the studio space was extremely small.

The show was highly controversial, eventually being taken from the air after a comment about Marilyn Monroe's conversion to Judaism: "Now that Marilyn Monroe is kosher, Arthur Miller can eat her". He later stated that he "hadn't meant it ''that'' way". Several months later, the show began to be broadcast in a slightly revised format—it was taped in order to provide a buffer for Levant's antics. This, however, failed to prevent Levant from making comments about Mae West's sex life that caused the show to be canceled for good. Levant was also a frequent guest on Jack Paar's talk show, prompting Paar in later years to sign off by saying, ''"Good night, Oscar Levant, wherever you are."'' On an appearance on the Tonight Show, from New York, Levant once quipped that his Jaguar ambulance was waiting outside for him.

The 1920s and 1930s wit Alexander Woollcott, a member of the Algonquin Round Table, once said of him: "There isn't anything the matter with Levant that a few miracles wouldn't cure."

Open about his neuroses and hypochondria, Levant, in later life became addicted to prescription drugs and was frequently committed to mental hospitals by his wife. Despite his afflictions, Levant was considered a genius by some, in many areas. (He himself wisecracked "There's a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this line.")

Later life and death[link]

Levant drew increasingly away from the limelight in his later years. Upon his death in Beverly Hills, California of a heart attack at the age of 65, he was interred in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles, California. In their routines, some comics have claimed, apocryphally, and citing an old joke, that hypochondriac Levant's epitaph was inscribed, "I ''told'' them I was ill."

Filmography[link]

''Ben Bernie and All the Lads'' (1924), filmed in early DeForest Phonofilm sound-on-film process.

''The Dance of Life'' (1929)

''Night Parade'' (1929) (uncredited)

''In Person'' (1935)

''Rhythm on the River'' (1940)

''Kiss the Boys Goodbye'' (1941)

''Rhapsody in Blue'' (1945)

''Humoresque'' (1946)

''Romance on the High Seas'' (1948), Doris Day's first picture.

''You Were Meant for Me'' (1948)

''The Barkleys of Broadway'' (1949)

''An American in Paris'' (1951), where he played a bohemian pianist.

''O. Henry's Full House'' (1952)

''The I Don't Care Girl'' (1953)

''The Band Wagon'' (1953), where his songwriter character was based on the movie's own co-screenwriter — songwriter Adolph Green.

''Rear Window'' (1954)

''The Cobweb'' (1955)

''The Oscar Levant Show'' (1958)

''Jack Benny Program'' (1958) (TV) (guest star)

Broadway[link]

''Burlesque'' (1927) - musical play - performer ''Ripples'' (1930) - musical - co-composer ''Sweet and Low'' (1930) - musical revue - songwriter ''The Fabulous Invalid'' (1938) - musical play - replacement conductor ''The American Way'' (1939) - musical play - conductor and composer

Memoirs[link]

''A Smattering of Ignorance'', New York : Doubleday, 1940

''The Memoirs of an Amnesiac'', New York : Putnam's, 1965

''The Unimportance of Being Oscar'', New York : Putnam's, 1968

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger. ''A Talent For Genius: the Life and Times of Oscar Levant''. Silman-James Press. ISBN 1-879505-39-8

Dr Charles Barber. "The Concert Music of Oscar Levant". Department of Music, Stanford University. http://www.classical.net/music/composer/works/levant/index.php

Notes[link]

External links[link]

Levant at Classical Net

''Ben Bernie and All the Lads'' (1924), a film featuring Levant as pianist, made in Phonofilm process by Lee DeForest in New York City

Web biography

1958 clip from the Oscar Levant Show featuring Fred Astaire at YouTube

Category:1906 births Category:1972 deaths Category:American actors Category:American classical pianists Category:American comedians Category:American composers Category:American jazz pianists Category:American Jews Category:American pianists Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:Burials at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery Category:Hypochondriacs Category:Jewish actors Category:Jewish classical musicians Category:Jewish classical pianists Category:Jewish comedians Category:Jewish composers and songwriters Category:actors from Pennsylvania

da:Oscar Levant de:Oscar Levant fr:Oscar Levant it:Oscar Levant he:אוסקר לבנט pl:Oscar Levant pt:Oscar Levant sv:Oscar Levant

name	Woody Allen
birth name	Allen Stewart Konigsberg
birth date	December 01, 1935
birth place	The Bronx, New York, U.S.
influences	Charlie Chaplin, Groucho Marx, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Stanley Kubrick
occupation	ActorDirectorScreenwriterComedianMusicianPlaywright
home town	New York City, New York
years active	1950–present
spouse
partner	Mia Farrow (1980–92)
relatives	Letty Aronson (sister)
children	Ronan Farrow (son)Bechet Dumaine Allen (daughter)Manzie Tio Allen (daughter)
website	www.woodyallen.com

Woody Allen (born Allan Stewart Konigsberg, December 1, 1935) is an award-winning American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, and playwright, whose career spans over half a century.

He began as a comedy writer in the 1950s, penning jokes and scripts for television and also publishing several books of short humor pieces. In the early 1960s, Allen started performing as a stand-up comic, emphasizing monologues rather than traditional jokes. As a comic, he developed the persona of an insecure, intellectual, fretful nebbish, which he insists is quite different from his real-life personality. In 2004, Comedy Central ranked Allen in fourth place on a list of the 100 greatest stand-up comics, while a UK survey ranked Allen as the third greatest comedian.

By the mid-1960s Allen was writing and directing films, first specializing in slapstick comedies before moving into more dramatic material influenced by European art films during the 1970s. He is often identified as part of the New Hollywood wave of filmmakers of the mid-1960s to late '70s. Allen often stars in his own films, typically in the persona he developed as a standup. The best-known of his over 40 films include the Academy Award-winners ''Annie Hall'' (1976), ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' (1987) and ''Midnight in Paris'' (2011); and the Golden Globe-winning ''The Purple Rose of Cairo'' (1985). Critic Roger Ebert has described Allen as "a treasure of the cinema."

He is also a jazz clarinetist who performs regularly at small venues in Manhattan.

Early life[link]

Allen was born Allan Stewart Konigsberg in The Bronx and raised in Brooklyn, NY, the son of Nettie (born Cherrie; November 8, 1906 – January 27, 2002), a bookkeeper at her family's delicatessen, and Martin Konigsberg (December 25, 1900 – January 13, 2001), a jewelry engraver and waiter. His family was Jewish and his grandparents were immigrants who spoke Yiddish, Hebrew, and German; both of his parents were born and raised on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Allen has a sister, Letty, who was born in 1943, and was raised in Midwood, Brooklyn. His childhood was not particularly happy: his parents did not get along, and he had a rocky relationship with his stern, temperamental mother. Allen spoke German quite a bit during his early years. While attending Hebrew school for eight years, he went to Public School 99 (now The Isaac Asimov School for Science and Literature) and to Midwood High School. During that time, he lived in an apartment at 1402 Avenue K, between East 14th and 15th Streets. Unlike his comic persona, he was more interested in baseball than school and his strong arms ensured he was the first to be picked for a team. He impressed students with his extraordinary talent at card and magic tricks. To raise money he began writing jokes (or "gags") for the agent David O. Alber, who sold them to newspaper columnists. According to Allen, his first published joke read: "Woody Allen says he ate at a restaurant that had O.P.S. prices – over people's salaries."

He began to call himself Woody Allen. He would later joke that when he was young he was often sent to inter-faith summer camps, where he "was savagely beaten by children of all races and creeds." At the age of 17, he legally changed his name to Heywood Allen. He was already earning more than both of his parents combined.

After high school, he attended New York University, where he studied communication and film. He later briefly attended City College of New York and soon flunked out. Later, he learned via self-study rather than the classroom. He eventually taught at The New School. He also studied with writing teacher Lajos Egri.

Career[link]

Comedy writer[link]

He became a full-time writer for Herb Shriner, earning $75 a week at first. At the age of 19, he started writing scripts for ''The Ed Sullivan Show'', ''The Tonight Show'', specials for Sid Caesar post-''Caesar's Hour'' (1954–1957), and other television shows. By the time he was working for Caesar, he was making $1500 a week; with Caesar he worked alongside Danny Simon, whom Allen credits for helping him to form his writing style.

In 1961, he started a new career as a stand-up comedian, debuting in a Greenwich Village club called the Duplex. Examples of Allen's standup act can be heard on the albums ''Standup Comic'' and ''Nightclub Years 1964–1968'' (including his classic routine entitled "The Moose"). Together with his managers, Allen developed a neurotic, nervous, and intellectual persona for his stand-up routine, a successful move which secured regular gigs for him in nightclubs and on television. Allen brought innovation to the comedy monologue genre and his stand-up comedy is considered influential.

Allen wrote for the popular ''Candid Camera'' television show, and appeared in some episodes.

Allen started writing short stories and cartoon captions for magazines such as ''The New Yorker''; he was inspired by the tradition of four prominent ''New Yorker'' humorists, S. J. Perelman, George S. Kaufman, Robert Benchley and Max Shulman, whose material he modernized. Allen is also an accomplished author having published four collections of his short pieces and plays. These are ''Getting Even,'' ''Without Feathers'', ''Side Effects'' and ''Mere Anarchy.'' His early comic fiction was heavily influenced by the zany, pun-ridden humour of S.J. Perelman.

Playwright[link]

He also became a successful Broadway playwright and wrote ''Don't Drink the Water'' in 1966. It starred Lou Jacobi, Kay Medford, Anita Gillette and Allen's future movie co-star Tony Roberts. A film adaptation of the play, directed by Howard Morris, was released in 1969, starring Jackie Gleason. Because he was not particularly happy with the 1969 film version of his play, in 1994, Allen directed and starred in a third version for television, with Michael J. Fox and Mayim Bialik.

The next play Allen wrote that was produced on Broadway was ''Play It Again, Sam'', which he also starred in. The play opened on February 12, 1969, and ran for 453 performances. It also featured Diane Keaton and Tony Roberts. Allen, Keaton and Roberts would reprise their roles in the film version of the play, directed by Herbert Ross. For its March 21 issue, ''Life'' featured Allen on its cover. In 1981, his play ''The Floating Light Bulb'' premiered on Broadway and ran for 65 performances. While receiving mixed reviews, it was noted for giving an autobiographical insight into Allen's childhood, specifically his fascination with magic tricks. He has written several one-act plays, including 'Riverside Drive' and 'Old Saybrook' which both explore well-known Allen themes.

On October 20, 2011, Allen's one-act play ''Honeymoon Motel'' opened as part of a larger piece entitled ''Relatively Speaking'' on Broadway, along with two other one-acts by Ethan Coen and Elaine May.

Early films[link]

His first movie was the Charles K. Feldman production ''What's New Pussycat?'' in 1965, for which he wrote the initial screenplay. Warren Beatty hired him to re-write a script and to appear in a small part in the movie. Over the course of the re-write, Beatty's role was lessened and Allen's increased. Beatty was upset and quit the production. Peter O'Toole was hired for the Beatty role, and Peter Sellers was brought in as well; Sellers was a big enough star to demand many of Woody Allen's best lines/scenes, prompting hasty re-writes. Because of this experience, Allen realized the importance of having control of his own writing. Despite the fact that most of his movies do not gross well and the fact that due to the small amounts of money his producers are able to raise he asks his actors to work for far less than what they would normally be paid, Allen remains one of a handful of writers and directors who has been able to maintain complete control over his own work.

Allen's first directorial effort was ''What's Up, Tiger Lily?'' (1966, co-written with Mickey Rose), in which an existing Japanese spy movie – ''Kokusai himitsu keisatsu: Kagi no kagi'' (1965), "International Secret Police: Key of Keys" – was redubbed in English by Allen and his friends with entirely new, comic dialogue.

Allen also appeared in Feldman's follow-up to ''What's New Pussycat?'', the James Bond spoof ''Casino Royale''. A number of writers contributed to the film, but once again Allen scripted his own sequences, although in this case uncredited.

Allen directed, starred in, and wrote ''Take the Money and Run'' in 1969. That same year he starred in his own TV special, ''The Woody Allen Special.'' On the show he performed standup comedy routines before a live audience and acted in a sketch with Candice Bergen in which they appeared nude but their bodies were kept hidden from view by the camera. The special also had Allen interviewing evangelist Billy Graham and performances by the pop vocal group The 5th Dimension, singing their hit singles "Workin' On A Groovy Thing" and "Wedding Bell Blues." The show's sponsor, Libby's, broadcast comical commercials starring Tony Randall as a detective.

From 1971 to 1975, Allen co-wrote, directed, and starred in ''Bananas'', ''Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask)'', ''Sleeper'', and ''Love and Death''. ''Take the Money and Run'' and ''Bananas'' were co-written by his childhood friend, Mickey Rose.

In 1972, he wrote and starred in the film version of ''Play It Again, Sam'', which was directed by Herbert Ross and co-starred Diane Keaton. In 1976, he starred in ''The Front'' (directed by Martin Ritt) a humorous and poignant account of Hollywood blacklisting during the 1950s.

Then came two of Allen's finest films. ''Annie Hall'' won four Academy Awards in 1977, including Best Picture, Best Actress in a Leading Role for Diane Keaton, Best Original Screenplay and Best Director for Woody Allen. ''Annie Hall'' set the standard for modern romantic comedy and also started a minor fashion trend with the clothes worn by Diane Keaton in the film (the masculine clothing, such as ties with cardigans, was actually Keaton's own). While in production, its working title was "Anhedonia," a term that means the inability to feel pleasure and its plot revolved around a murder mystery. Allen re-cut the movie after production ended to focus on the romantic comedy between Allen's character, Alvy Singer, and Keaton's character, Annie Hall. The new version, retitled ''Annie Hall'' (named after Keaton, Hall being her original last name and Annie a nickname), still deals with the theme of the inability to feel pleasure. The film is ranked at No. 35 on the ''American Film Institute'' "100 Best Movies" and at No. 4 on the AFI list of "100 Best Comedies."

''Manhattan,'' released in 1979, is a black-and-white film that can be viewed as an homage to New York City. As in many other Allen films, the protagonists are upper-middle class academics. The love-hate opinion of cerebral persons found in ''Manhattan'' is characteristic of many of Allen's movies including ''Crimes and Misdemeanors'' and ''Annie Hall.'' ''Manhattan'' focuses on the complicated relationship between a middle-aged Isaac Davis (Allen) and a 17-year-old Tracy (Mariel Hemingway).

Between ''Annie Hall'' and ''Manhattan'', Allen wrote and directed the dark drama ''Interiors'' (1978), in the style of the late Swedish director Ingmar Bergman, one of Allen's chief influences. ''Interiors'' represented a departure from Allen's "early, funny" comedies (a line from 1980s ''Stardust Memories'').

1980s[link]

Allen's 1980s films, even the comedies, have somber and philosophical undertones. Some are influenced by the works of European directors, notably Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini. ''September'' resembles Bergman's ''Autumn Sonata'', and Allen uses many elements from Bergman's ''Wild Strawberries'' in ''Another Woman''. Similarly, the Federico Fellini classic ''Amarcord'' strongly inspired ''Radio Days''.

''Stardust Memories'' features Sandy Bates, a successful filmmaker played by Allen, who expresses resentment and scorn for his fans. Overcome by the recent death of a friend from illness, the character states, "I don't want to make funny movies any more" and a running gag has various people (including a group of visiting space aliens) telling Bates that they appreciate his films, "especially the early, funny ones." Allen believes this to be one of his best films.

Allen combined tragic and comic elements in such films as ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' and ''Crimes and Misdemeanors'', in which he tells two stories that connect at the end. He also produced a vividly idiosyncratic tragi-comical parody of documentary, ''Zelig''.

He made three films about show business: ''Broadway Danny Rose'', in which he plays a New York show business agent, ''The Purple Rose of Cairo'', a movie that shows the importance of the cinema during the Depression through the character of the naive Cecilia, and ''Radio Days'', which is a film about his childhood in Brooklyn and the importance of the radio. ''Purple Rose'' was named by ''Time'' as one of the 100 best films of all time and Allen has described it as one of his three best films, along with ''Stardust Memories'' and ''Match Point.'' (Allen defines them as "best" not in terms of quality but because they came out the closest to his original vision.)

In 1989, Allen teamed up with directors Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese to make ''New York Stories'', an anthology film about New Yorkers. Allen's short, ''Oedipus Wrecks'', is about a neurotic lawyer and his critical mother. His short pleased critics, but ''New York Stories'' bombed at the box office.

1990s[link]

His 1992 film ''Shadows and Fog'' is a black-and-white homage to the German expressionists and features the music of Kurt Weill. Allen then made his critically acclaimed drama ''Husbands and Wives'' (1992), which received two Oscar nominations: Best Supporting Actress for Judy Davis and Best Original Screenplay for Allen. His film ''Manhattan Murder Mystery'' (1993) combined suspense with dark comedy and marked the return of Diane Keaton, Alan Alda and Anjelica Huston.

He returned to lighter movies like ''Bullets Over Broadway'' (1994), which earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Director, followed by a musical, ''Everyone Says I Love You'' (1996). The singing and dancing scenes in ''Everyone Says I Love You'' are similar to many musicals starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. The comedy ''Mighty Aphrodite'' (1995), in which Greek drama plays a large role, won an Academy Award for Mira Sorvino. Allen's 1999 jazz-based comedy-drama ''Sweet and Lowdown'' was also nominated for two Academy Awards for Sean Penn (Best Actor) and Samantha Morton (Best Supporting Actress). In contrast to these lighter movies, Allen veered into darker satire towards the end of the decade with ''Deconstructing Harry'' (1997) and ''Celebrity'' (1998). Allen made his only sitcom "appearance" to date (2009) via telephone on the show ''Just Shoot Me!'' in a 1997 episode, "My Dinner with Woody" which paid tribute to several of his films. Allen also provided the lead voice in the 1998 animated film ''Antz'', which featured many actors he had worked with and had Allen play a character that was similar to his earlier neurotic roles.

2000s[link]

''Small Time Crooks'' (2000) (a remake of the 1942 film comedy ''Larceny, Inc.'', written by S. J. Perelman and starring Edward G. Robinson) was his first film with the DreamWorks studio and represented a change in direction: Allen began giving more interviews and made an attempt to return to his slapstick roots. ''Small Time Crooks'' was a relative financial success, grossing over $17 million domestically but Allen's next four films floundered at the box office, including Allen's most expensive film, ''The Curse of the Jade Scorpion'' (with a budget of $26 million). ''Hollywood Ending'', ''Anything Else'', and ''Melinda and Melinda'' were given "rotten" ratings from film-review website Rotten Tomatoes and each earned less than $4 million domestically. Some critics claimed that Allen's films since 1999's ''Sweet and Lowdown'' were subpar and expressed concern that Allen's best years were now behind him. Others have been less harsh; reviewing the little-liked ''Melinda and Melinda'', Roger Ebert wrote, "I cannot escape the suspicion that if Woody had never made a previous film, if each new one was Woody's Sundance debut, it would get a better reception. His reputation is not a dead shark but an albatross, which with admirable economy Allen has arranged for the critics to carry around their own necks." Woody gave his godson Quincy Rose a small part in ''Melinda and Melinda''. Allen was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2001. ''Match Point'' (2005) was one of Allen's most successful films of the decade, garnering very positive reviews. Set in London, it starred Jonathan Rhys-Meyers and Scarlett Johansson. It is also markedly darker than Allen's first four films with DreamWorks SKG. In ''Match Point'', Allen shifts his focus from the intellectual upper class of New York to the moneyed upper class of London. It earned more than $23 million domestically (more than any of his films in nearly 20 years) and over $62 million in international box office sales. ''Match Point'' earned Allen his first Academy Award nomination since 1998, for Best Writing – Original Screenplay and also earned directing and writing nominations at the Golden Globes, his first Globe nominations since 1987. In an interview with ''Premiere Magazine'', Allen stated this was the best film he has ever made.

Allen returned to London to film ''Scoop'', which also starred Johansson, Hugh Jackman, Ian McShane, Kevin McNally and Allen himself. The film was released on July 28, 2006, and received mixed reviews. He has also filmed ''Cassandra's Dream'' in London. ''Cassandra's Dream'' was released in November 2007, and stars Colin Farrell, Ewan McGregor and Tom Wilkinson.

After finishing his third London film, Allen headed to Spain. He reached an agreement to film ''Vicky Cristina Barcelona'' in Avilés, Barcelona and Oviedo, where shooting started on July 9, 2007. The movie stars Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem, Rebecca Hall and Penélope Cruz. Speaking of his experience there, Allen said: "I'm delighted at being able to work with Mediapro and make a film in Spain, a country which has become so special to me." ''Vicky Cristina Barcelona'' was well received, winning "Best Musical or Comedy" at the Golden Globe awards. Penélope Cruz received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the film.

Allen has said that he "survives" on the European market. Audiences there have tended to be more receptive to Allen's films, particularly in Spain, France and Italy – countries where he has a large audience (something joked about in ''Hollywood Ending''). "In the United States things have changed a lot, and it's hard to make good small films now," Allen said in a 2004 interview. "The avaricious studios couldn't care less about good films – if they get a good film they're twice as happy but money-making films are their goal. They only want these $100 million pictures that make $500 million."

In April 2008, he began filming for a movie focused more towards older audiences starring Larry David, Patricia Clarkson and Evan Rachel Wood. Released in 2009, ''Whatever Works'', described as a dark comedy, follows the story of a botched suicide attempt turned messy love triangle. ''Whatever Works'' was written by Allen in the 1970s and the character now played by Larry David was originally written for Zero Mostel, who died the year ''Annie Hall'' came out.

2010s[link]

''You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger'', filmed in London, stars Antonio Banderas, Josh Brolin, Anthony Hopkins, Anupam Kher, Freida Pinto and Naomi Watts. Filming started in July 2009. It was released theatrically in the US on September 23, 2010, following a Cannes debut in May 2010, and a screening at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 12, 2010. Allen announced that his next film would be titled ''Midnight in Paris'', starring Adrien Brody, Owen Wilson, Marion Cotillard, Rachel McAdams, Kathy Bates, Michael Sheen, Gad Elmaleh and French First Lady Carla Bruni. The film followed a young engaged couple in Paris who see their lives transformed. It debuted at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival on May 12, 2011. Allen said he wanted to "show the city emotionally," during the press conference. "I just wanted it to be the way I saw Paris – Paris through my eyes," he added. ''Midnight in Paris'' has overthrown ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' to become Allen's most successful film at the box office in the United States. It has also opened to much critical acclaim, and has been considered by many critics to mark his return to form. His next film, ''To Rome with Love'', is a Rome-set comedy slated for a 2012 release. The film will be structured in four different vignettes featuring dialogue in both Italian and English. The film will mark Allen's return to acting since his last role in ''Scoop''. In October 2011, Woody Allen's one-act play called ''Honeymoon Motel'' premiered as one in a series of one act plays on Broadway titled ''Relatively Speaking''. Also contributing to the plays are Elaine May and Ethan Coen with John Turturro directing.

Future projects[link]

For many years, Allen wanted to make a film about the origins of jazz in New Orleans. The film, tentatively titled ''American Blues'', would follow the vastly different careers of Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet. Allen has stated that the film would cost between $80 and $100 million and is therefore unlikely to be made.

It was announced in February 2012 that Allen would adapt ''Bullets Over Broadway'' into a Broadway musical scheduled to open in 2013.

Distinction in the film world[link]

Over the course of his career, Allen has received a considerable number of awards and distinctions in film festivals and yearly national film awards ceremonies, saluting his work as a director, screenwriter, and actor.

Allen's film ''Annie Hall'' won four Academy Awards in 1977, including Best Picture.

Allen won the 1978 O. Henry Award for his short story ''The Kugelmass Episode'', published in ''The New Yorker'' on May 2, 1977.

Allen twice won the César Award for Best Foreign Film, the first in 1980, for ''Manhattan'' and the second in 1986, for ''The Purple Rose of Cairo''. Seven other of his movies were nominated for the prize.

In 1986, Allen won the Golden Globe for Best Screenplay for ''The Purple Rose of Cairo''. In 2009 he won the same award for Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical for ''Vicky Cristina Barcelona''. In 2012, he won the Best Screenplay award for ''Midnight in Paris'' which was also nominated for Best Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical, Best Director and Best Actor (Comedy/musical) - ''Owen Wilson''. Overall, Allen has been nominated five times as Best Director, five times for Best Screenplay and twice for Best Actor (Comedy/musical).

At the 1995 Venice Film Festival, Allen received a Career Golden Lion for lifetime achievement.

In 1996, Allen received a lifetime achievement award from the Directors Guild of America.

In 2002, Allen won the Prince of Asturias Award. Subsequently, the city of Oviedo, Spain, erected a life-size statue of Allen. In 2002, Allen received the ''Palme des Palmes'', a special lifetime achievement award granted by the Cannes Festival. In a 2005 UK poll ''The Comedian's Comedian'', Allen was voted the third greatest comedy act ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.

In June 2007, Allen received a PhD Honoris Causa from Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain.

Academy Awards[link]

Woody Allen has won 4 Academy Awards: three Best Original Screenplays (''Annie Hall'' (1978, shared with Marshall Brickman), ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' (1987) and ''Midnight in Paris'' (2012)), and one Best Director (''Annie Hall'' (1978)). Mr. Allen has been nominated a total of 23 times: 15 as a screenwriter, seven as a director, and once as an actor. He has more screenwriting Academy Award nominations than any other writer; all are in the Best Original Screenplay category. He is tied for third all-time with seven Best Director nominations.

''Annie Hall'' won four Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay, Best Director and Best Actress in a Leading Role - Diane Keaton). The film received a fifth nomination, for Allen as Best Actor in a Leading Role. ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' won three, for Best Original Screenplay, Best Actor in a Supporting Role and Best Actress in a Supporting Role categories; it was nominated in four other categories, including Best Picture and Best Director.

His actors have regularly received both nominations and Academy Awards for their work in Allen films, particularly in the Best Supporting categories: In 1987 Michael Caine and Diane Wiest won for ''Hannah and Her Sisters'', in 1995 Diane Wiest again won for ''Bullets Over Broadway'', in 1996 Mira Sorvino won for '' Mighty Aphrodite '', and in 2009 Penelope Cruz won for ''Vicky Cristina Barcelona.''

Despite friendly recognition from the Academy, Allen has consistently refused to attend the ceremony or acknowledge his Oscar wins. He broke this pattern only once. At the Academy Awards ceremony in 2002, Allen made an unannounced appearance, making a plea for producers to continue filming their movies in New York City after the 9-11 attacks, where he stated, "I didn't have to present anything. I didn't have to accept anything. I just had to talk about New York City." He was given a standing ovation before introducing a montage of movie clips featuring New York.

BAFTA[link]

Allen has won a number of British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) awards and nominations for best picture, best director, best actor, and best screenplay. In 1997, he received the honorary BAFTA Fellowship for his work.

1978 – Won – Best Film – ''Annie Hall''

1978 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''Annie Hall'' (with Marshall Brickman)

1978 – Won – Best Direction – ''Annie Hall''

1980 – Won – Best Film – ''Manhattan''

1980 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''Manhattan'' (with Marshall Brickman)

1985 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''Broadway Danny Rose''

1986 – Won – Best Film – ''The Purple Rose of Cairo''

1986 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''The Purple Rose of Cairo''

1987 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''Hannah and Her Sisters''

1987 – Won – Best Direction – ''Hannah and Her Sisters''

1993 – Won – Best Screenplay – ''Husbands and Wives''

2012 – Nominated – Best Screenplay – ''Midnight in Paris''

Nominated for best film for ''Hannah and Her Sisters'', ''Radio Days'', ''Crimes and Misdemeanors''.

Nominated for best actor for ''Annie Hall'', ''Manhattan'', ''Hannah and Her Sisters''.

Nominated for best director for ''Manhattan'', ''Crimes and Misdemeanors''.

Nominated for best screenplay for ''Zelig'', ''Radio Days'', ''Crimes and Misdemeanors'', and ''Bullets Over Broadway'' (with Douglas McGrath).

Theatre[link]

Although best known for his films, Allen has also enjoyed a very successful career in theater, starting as early as 1960, when Allen wrote sketches for the revue ''From A to Z''. His first great success was ''Don't Drink the Water'', which opened in 1968, and ran for 598 performances for almost two years on Broadway. His success continued with ''Play it Again, Sam'', which opened in 1969, starring Allen and Diane Keaton. The show played for 453 performances and was nominated for three Tony Awards, although none of the nominations were for Allen's writing or acting.

In the 1970s, Allen wrote a number of one-act plays, most notably ''God'' and ''Death'', which were published in his 1975 collection ''Without Feathers''.

In 1981, Allen's play ''The Floating Light Bulb'' opened on Broadway. The play was a critical success but a commercial flop. Despite two Tony Award nominations, a Tony win for the acting of Brian Backer (who also won the 1981 Theater World Award and a Drama Desk Award for his work), the play only ran for 62 performances. , it is the last Allen work that ran on Broadway.

After a long hiatus from the stage, Allen returned to the theater in 1995, with the one-act ''Central Park West'', an installment in an evening of theater known as ''Death Defying Acts'' that was also made up of new work by David Mamet and Elaine May.

For the next couple of years, Allen had no direct involvement with the stage, yet notable productions of his work were being staged. A production of ''God'' was staged at The Bank of Brazil Cultural Center in Rio de Janeiro, and theatrical adaptations of Allen's films ''Bullets Over Broadway'' and ''September'' were produced in Italy and France, respectively, without Allen's involvement. In 1997, rumors of Allen returning to the theater to write a starring role for his wife Soon-Yi Previn turned out to be false.

In 2003, Allen finally returned to the stage with ''Writer's Block'', an evening of two one-acts – ''Old Saybrook'' and ''Riverside Drive'' – that played Off-Broadway. The production marked the stage-directing debut for Allen. The production sold out its entire run.

Also that year, reports of Allen writing the book for a musical based on ''Bullets Over Broadway'' surfaced, but no show ever formulated. In 2004, Allen's first full-length play since 1981, ''A Second Hand Memory'', was directed by Allen and enjoyed an extended run Off-Broadway.

In June 2007, it was announced that Allen would make two more creative debuts in the theater, directing a work that he did not write and directing an opera – a re-interpretation of Puccini's ''Gianni Schicchi'' for the Los Angeles Opera – which debuted at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on September 6, 2008. Commenting on his direction of the opera, Allen said, "I have no idea what I'm doing." His production of the opera opened the Festival of Two Worlds in Spoleto, Italy, in June 2009.

Marriages and relationships[link]

Harlene Rosen[link]

At age 19, Allen married 16-year-old Harlene Rosen. The marriage lasted from 1954 to 1959. ''Time'' stated that the years were "nettling" and "unsettling."

Rosen, whom Allen referred to in his standup act as "the Dread Mrs. Allen," later sued Allen for defamation due to comments at a TV appearance shortly after their divorce. Allen tells a different story on his mid-1960s standup album ''Standup Comic.'' In his act, Allen said that Rosen sued him because of a joke he made in an interview. Rosen had been sexually assaulted outside her apartment and according to Allen, the newspapers reported that she "had been violated." In the interview, Allen said, "Knowing my ex-wife, it probably wasn't a moving violation." In a later interview on ''The Dick Cavett Show'', Allen brought the incident up again where he repeated his comments and stated that the amount that he was being sued for was "$1 million."

Louise Lasser[link]

Allen married Louise Lasser in 1966. They divorced in 1969, and Allen did not marry again until 1997. Lasser appeared in three Allen films after the divorce – ''Take the Money and Run'', ''Bananas'', and ''Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask)'' – and made a brief appearance in ''Stardust Memories''.

Diane Keaton[link]

In 1970, Allen cast Diane Keaton in his Broadway show, ''Play It Again, Sam.'' During the run she and Allen became romantically involved and although they broke up after a year, she continued to star in a number of his films, including ''Sleeper'' as a futuristic poet and ''Love and Death'' as a composite character based on the novels of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. ''Annie Hall'' was very important in Allen and Keaton's careers. It is said that the role was written specifically for her as Diane Keaton's given name is Diane Hall. She then starred in ''Interiors'' as a poet, followed by ''Manhattan''. In 1987, she had a cameo as a night-club singer in ''Radio Days'' and was chosen to replace Mia Farrow in the co-starring role for ''Manhattan Murder Mystery'' after Allen and Farrow began having troubles with their personal and working relationship while making this film. Keaton has not worked with Allen since ''Manhattan Murder Mystery.'' Since the end of their romantic relationship, Keaton and Allen have remained close friends.

Stacey Nelkin[link]

The film ''Manhattan'' is said by the Los Angeles Times to be widely known to have been based on his romantic relationship with the actress Stacey Nelkin. Her bit part in ''Annie Hall'' ended up on the cutting room floor, and their relationship, though never publicly acknowledged by Allen, reportedly began when she was 17 years old and a student at New York's Stuyvesant High School.

Mia Farrow[link]

Around 1980, Allen began a relationship with actress Mia Farrow, who had leading roles in several of his movies from 1982 to 1992. Farrow and Allen never married and kept separate homes but they adopted two children, Dylan Farrow (who changed her name to Eliza and is now known as Malone) and Moshe Farrow (now known as Moses); they also had one biological child, Satchel Farrow (now known as Ronan Seamus Farrow). Allen did not adopt any of Farrow's other family, including Soon-Yi Farrow Previn (the adopted daughter of Farrow and André Previn, now known as Soon-Yi Previn). Allen and Farrow separated in 1992, after Farrow discovered nude photographs that Allen had taken of a then 20-year-old Soon-Yi. In her autobiography, ''What Falls Away'' (New York: Doubleday, 1997), Farrow says that Allen admitted to a relationship with Soon-Yi.

After Allen and Farrow separated, a long public legal battle for the custody of their three children began. During the proceedings, Farrow alleged that Allen had sexually molested their adopted daughter Dylan, who was then seven years old. The judge eventually concluded that the sex abuse charges were inconclusive but called Allen's conduct with Soon-Yi "grossly inappropriate." She called the report of the team that investigated the issue "sanitized and therefore, less credible" and added that she had "reservations about the reliability of the report." Farrow won custody of their children. Allen was denied visitation rights with Malone and could see Ronan only under supervision. Moses, who was then 14, chose not to see Allen.

In a 2005 ''Vanity Fair'' interview, Allen estimated that, despite the scandal's damage to his reputation, Farrow's discovery of Allen's attraction to Soon-Yi Previn by finding nude photographs of her was "just one of the fortuitous events, one of the great pieces of luck in my life. . . It was a turning point for the better." Of his relationship with Farrow, he said, "I'm sure there are things that I might have done differently. . . Probably in retrospect I should have bowed out of that relationship much earlier than I did." In a report June 22, 2011, Reuters quoted Allen as saying, "What was the scandal? I fell in love with this girl, married her. We have been married for almost 15 years now. There was no scandal, but people refer to it all the time as a scandal and I kind of like that in a way because when I go I would like to say I had one real juicy scandal in my life."

Soon-Yi Previn[link]

After ending his relationship with Mia Farrow in 1992, Allen continued his relationship with Soon-Yi Previn. Even though Allen never married Mia Farrow and was never Previn's legal stepfather, the relationship between Allen and Previn has often been referred to as a father involved romantically with his stepdaughter since he had been perceived as being in Previn's life in a father-like capacity. For example, in 1991, ''The New York Times'' described Allen's family life by reporting, "Few married couples seem more married. They are constantly in touch with each other, and not many fathers spend as much time with their children as Allen does." Despite assertions from Previn that Allen was never a father figure to her, the relationship became a scandal. In 1991, when the relationship started, Allen was 56 and Previn was 21. Asked whether their age difference was conducive to "a healthy, equal relationship," Allen said equality is not necessarily a requirement in a relationship and said, "The heart wants what it wants. There's no logic to those things. You meet someone and you fall in love and that's that."

Allen and Previn married on December 24, 1997, in the Palazzo Cavalli in Venice. The couple have adopted two daughters, naming them Bechet and Manzie Tio after jazz musicians Sidney Bechet, Manzie Johnson and Lorenzo Tio, Jr.

Allen and Farrow's biological son, Ronan Seamus Farrow, said of Allen: "He's my father married to my sister. That makes me his son and his brother-in-law. That is such a moral transgression. I cannot see him. I cannot have a relationship with my father and be morally consistent... I lived with all these adopted children, so they are my family. To say Soon-Yi was not my sister is an insult to all adopted children."

Clarinetist[link]

thumb|250px|Woody Allen with Jerry Zigmont and Simon Wettenhall performing at Vienne Jazz Festival, [[Vienne, Isère|Vienne, France, September 20, 2003]] Allen is a passionate fan of jazz, which is often featured prominently in the soundtracks to his films. He began playing as a child and took his stage name from clarinetist Woody Herman. He has performed publicly at least since the late 1960s, notably with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band on the soundtrack of ''Sleeper''. One of his earliest televised performances was on ''The Dick Cavett Show'' on October 20, 1971.

Woody Allen and his New Orleans Jazz Band have been playing each Monday evening at Manhattan's Carlyle Hotel for many years (as of 2011, specializing in classic New Orleans jazz from the early twentieth century). The documentary film ''Wild Man Blues'' (directed by Barbara Kopple) documents a 1996 European tour by Allen and his band, as well as his relationship with Previn. The band has released two CDs: ''The Bunk Project'' (1993) and the soundtrack of ''Wild Man Blues'' (1997).

Allen and his band played the Montreal Jazz Festival on two consecutive nights in June 2008.

Significant works about Woody Allen[link]

Apart from ''Wild Man Blues'', directed by Barbara Kopple, there are a number of other documentaries featuring Woody Allen, including the 2002 cable-television documentary ''Woody Allen: a Life in Film'', directed by ''Time'' film critic Richard Schickel, which interlaces interviews of Allen with clips of his films, and ''Meetin' WA'', a short interview of Allen by French director Jean-Luc Godard. In 2011 the PBS series American Masters co-produced a comprehensive documentary about him, ''Woody Allen: a Documentary'' directed by Robert B. Weide.

From 1976 to 1984, Stuart Hample wrote and drew ''Inside Woody Allen'', a comic strip based on Allen's film persona.

Psychoanalysis[link]

Allen spent over 37 years undergoing psychoanalysis. Many of his films contain references to psychoanalysis. Even the film ''Antz'', an animated feature in which Allen contributes the voice of lead character Z, opens with a classic piece of Allen analysis shtick.

''Moment Magazine'' says, "It drove his self-absorbed work." John Baxter, author of ''Woody Allen – A Biography'', wrote, "Allen obviously found analysis stimulating, even exciting."

Allen says he ended his psychoanalysis visits around the time he began his relationship with Previn. He says he still is claustrophobic and agoraphobic.

Filmography[link]

Allen's films span six decades, starting with 1965's ''What's New Pussycat?''. He has written, directed, and starred in many of them, including films such as ''Annie Hall'' (1977), ''Hannah and Her Sisters'' (1986), and ''Husbands and Wives'' (1992), all of which earned major awards. Originally known for his comedies, his early successes were followed by his first purely dramatic work, ''Interiors (1978).

Theatre works[link]

In addition to directing, writing, and acting in films, Allen has written and performed in a number of Broadway theater productions.

{|class="wikitable" |- ! style="width:33px;"| Year ! Title ! Credit ! Venue |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1960 | ''From A to Z'' | Writer (book) | style="text-align:center;"|Plymouth Theatre |- | style="text-align:center;"|1966 | ''Don't Drink the Water'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|Coconut Grove Playhouse, Florida |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1969 | ''Play It Again, Sam'' | Writer, Performer (Allan Felix) | style="text-align:center;"|Broadhurst Theatre |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1975 | ''God'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|— |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1975 | ''Death'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|— |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1981 | ''The Floating Light Bulb'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|Vivian Beaumont Theatre |- | style="text-align:center;"| 1995 | ''Central Park West'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|Variety Arts Theatre |- | style="text-align:center;"| 2003 | ''Old Saybrook'' | Writer, Director | style="text-align:center;"|Atlantic Theatre Company |- | style="text-align:center;"| 2003 | ''Riverside Drive'' | Writer, Director | style="text-align:center;"|Atlantic Theatre Company |- | style="text-align:center;"| 2004 | ''A Second Hand Memory'' | Writer, Director | style="text-align:center;"|Atlantic Theater Company |- | style="text-align:center;"| 2011 | ''Honeymoon Motel'' | Writer | style="text-align:center;"|Brooks Atkinson Theatre |}

Bibliography[link]

Published plays[link]

''Don't Drink the Water: A comedy in two acts'' (1967), ASIN B0006BSWBW

''Play It Again, Sam'' (1969), ISBN 0-394-40663-X

''God: A comedy in one act'' (1975), ISBN 0-573-62201-9

''The Floating Light Bulb'' (1981)

''Three One-Act Plays: Riverside Drive / Old Saybrook / Central Park West'' (2003), ISBN 0-8129-7244-9

''Writer's Block: Two One-Act Plays'' (2005), ISBN 0-573-62630-8 (includes ''Riverside Drive'' and ''Old Saybrook'')

''A Second Hand Memory: A drama in two acts'' (2005)

The one-act plays ''God'' and ''Death'' are both included in Allen's 1975 collection ''Without Feathers'' (see below).

Short stories[link]

''Getting Even'' (1971), ISBN 0-394-47348-5

''Without Feathers'' (1975), ISBN 0-394-49743-0

"The Whore of Mensa" (1974)

''Side Effects'' (1980), ISBN 0-394-51104-2

''Mere Anarchy'' (2007), ISBN 978-1-4000-6641-4

Anthologies[link]

''Complete Prose of Woody Allen'' (1992), ISBN 0-517-07229-7. (Collection of Allen's short stories first published in ''Getting Even'', ''Without Feathers'' ''and Side Effects''.)

''The Insanity Defense: The Complete Prose''. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2007, ISBN 978-0812978117.

Chapbook[link]

''Lunatic's Tale'' (1986), ISBN 1-55628-001-7 (Short story previously included in ''Side Effects''.)

See also[link]

Woody Allen filmography

List of awards and nominations received by Woody Allen

Cinema of the United States

References[link]

Further reading[link]

Stardust Memories: Visiting Woody Michael Žantovský recalls a memorable meeting between two giants, Woody Allen and Václav Havel

Essay by Victoria Loy on Woody Allen's career

''The Essential Woody Allen''; Lauren Hill

''Fun With Woody, The Complete Woody Allen Quiz Book (Henry Holt)'', Graham Flashner

''The Importance of Being Famous: Behind the Scenes of the Celebrity Industrial Complex'' by Maureen Orth p233 ISBN 0-8050-7545-3

''Woody Allen – A Biography''; John Baxter (1999) ISBN 0-7867-0666-X

''Woody Allen: Conversations with Filmmakers Series'', ed. R. E. Kapsis and K. Coblentz, (2006) ISBN 1-57806-793-6

''Woody Allen''; Stephan Reimertz, (rororo-Monographie), Reinbek (2005) ISBN 3-499-50410-3 (in German)

''Woody Allen: Eine Biographie''; Stephan Reimertz, Reinbek (2000) ISBN 3-499-61145-7 (in German)

''Woody Allen On Location'', by Thierry de Navacelle (Morrow, 1987); a day-to-day account of the making of ''Radio Days'' (1987)

''Woody Allen on Woody Allen: In Conversation With Stig Bjorkman'' (1995), ISBN 0-8021-1556-X

''Woody Allen: Profane and Sacred''; Richard A. Blake (1995) ISBN 978-0-810-82993-0

External links[link]

The Official Site of Woody Allen

in 2009

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Name	Judy Garland
Birth name	Frances Ethel Gumm
Birth date	June 10, 1922
Birth place	Grand Rapids, Minnesota
Death date	June 22, 1969
Death place	Chelsea, London, England
Death cause	Barbiturate overdose
Restingplace	Ferncliff Cemetery, Hartsdale, New York
Other names	Judy Garland
Occupation	Singer, actress, vaudevillian
Years active	1924-1969 as a singer 1929-1967 as an actress
Nationality	American
Spouse	David Rose (m. 1941-1944; divorced) Vincente Minnelli (m. 1945-1951; divorced) Sid Luft (m. 1952-1965; divorced) Mark Herron (m. 1965-1967; divorced) Mickey Deans (m. 1969, her death)
Children
Awards	List of awards and honours }}

Judy Garland (June 10, 1922 – June 22, 1969), was an American actress, singer and vaudevillian. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage. Respected for her versatility, she received a Juvenile Academy Award and won a Golden Globe Award, as well as Grammy Awards and a Special Tony Award. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the remake of ''A Star is Born'' and for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the 1961 film, ''Judgment at Nuremberg''. At 39 years of age, she remains the youngest recipient of the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement in the motion picture industry.

After appearing in vaudeville with her two older sisters, Garland was signed to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer as a teenager. There she made more than two dozen films, including nine with Mickey Rooney and the 1939 film with which she would be most identified, ''The Wizard of Oz''. After 15 years, she was released from the studio but gained renewed success through record-breaking concert appearances, including a return to acting beginning with critically acclaimed performances.

Despite her professional triumphs, Garland battled personal problems throughout her life. Insecure about her appearance, her feelings were compounded by film executives who told her she was unattractive and manipulated her on-screen physical appearance. She was plagued by financial instability, often owing hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes. She married five times, with her first four marriages ending in divorce. She had a long struggle with alcohol and drug use during most of her career, dying of an accidental drug overdose at the age of 47, leaving children Liza Minnelli, Lorna Luft, and Joey Luft.

In 1997, Garland was posthumously awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Several of her recordings have been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. In 1999, the American Film Institute placed her among the ten greatest female stars in the history of American cinema.

Early life[link]

Born Frances Ethel Gumm in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, Garland was the youngest child of Ethel Marion (née Milne; November 17, 1893–January 5, 1953) and Francis Avent "Frank" Gumm (March 20, 1886–November 17, 1935). Her parents were vaudevillians who settled in Grand Rapids to run a movie theatre that featured vaudeville acts.

Garland's ancestry on both sides of her family can be traced back to the early colonial days of the United States. Her father was descended from the Marable family of Virginia, her grandfather from a Milne ancestry from Aberdeen, and her maternal grandmother from a Patrick Fitzpatrick, who emigrated to America in the 1770s from Smithtown, County Meath, Ireland.

Named after both her parents and baptized at a local Episcopal church, "Baby" (as she was called by her parents and sisters) shared her family's flair for song and dance. Her first appearance came at the age of two-and-a-half when she joined her two older sisters, Mary Jane "Suzy/Suzanne" Gumm (1915–1964) and Dorothy Virginia "Jimmie" Gumm (1917–1977), on the stage of her father's movie theater during a Christmas show and sang a chorus of "Jingle Bells". Accompanied by their mother on piano, The Gumm Sisters performed there for the next few years.

Following rumors that Frank Gumm had made sexual advances toward male ushers, the family relocated to Lancaster, California in June 1926. Frank purchased and operated another theater in Lancaster, and Ethel, acting as their manager, began working to get her daughters into motion pictures.

Early career[link]

The Gumm Sisters[link]

In 1928, The Gumm Sisters enrolled in a dance school run by Ethel Meglin, proprietress of the Meglin Kiddies dance troupe. They appeared with the troupe at its annual Christmas show. It was through the Meglin Kiddies that they made their film debut, in a 1929 short subject called ''The Big Revue''. This was followed by appearances in two Vitaphone shorts the following year, ''A Holiday in Storyland'' (featuring Garland's first on-screen solo) and ''The Wedding of Jack and Jill''. They next appeared together in ''Bubbles''. Their final on-screen appearance came in 1935, in another short entitled ''La Fiesta de Santa Barbara''.

In 1934, the trio, who by then had been touring the vaudeville circuit as "The Gumm Sisters" for many years, performed in Chicago at the Oriental Theater with George Jessel. He encouraged the group to choose a more appealing name after "Gumm" was met with laughter from the audience. According to theatrical legend, their act was once erroneously billed at a Chicago theater as "The Glum Sisters".

Several stories persist regarding the origin of the name "Garland". One is that it was originated by Jessel after Carole Lombard's character Lily Garland in the film ''Twentieth Century'' which was then playing at the Oriental; another is that the girls chose the surname after drama critic Robert Garland. Garland's daughter, Lorna Luft, stated that her mother selected the name when Jessel announced that the trio "looked prettier than a garland of flowers". Another variation surfaced when he was a guest on Garland's television show in 1963. He claimed that he had sent actress Judith Anderson a telegram containing the word "garland," and it stuck in his mind.

By late 1934 the Gumm Sisters had changed their name to the Garland Sisters. Frances changed her name to "Judy" soon after, inspired by a popular Hoagy Carmichael song. By August 1935 they were broken up when Suzanne Garland flew to Reno, Nevada and married musician Lee Kahn, a member of the Jimmy Davis orchestra playing at Cal-Neva Lodge, Lake Tahoe.

Signed at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer[link]

In 1935, Garland was signed to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, supposedly without a screen test, though she had made a test for the studio several months earlier. It did not know what to do with her, as at age 13 she was older than the traditional child star but too young for adult roles. Her physical appearance created a dilemma for MGM. At only , her "cute" or "girl next door" looks did not exemplify the more glamorous persona required of leading ladies of the time. She was self-conscious and anxious about her appearance. "Judy went to school at Metro with Ava Gardner, Lana Turner, Elizabeth Taylor, real beauties," said Charles Walters, who directed her in a number of films. "Judy was the big money-maker at the time, a big success, but she was the ugly duckling ...I think it had a very damaging effect on her emotionally for a long time. I think it lasted forever, really." Her insecurity was exacerbated by the attitude of studio chief Louis B. Mayer, who referred to her as his "little hunchback". During her early years at the studio, she was photographed and dressed in plain garments or frilly juvenile gowns and costumes to match the "girl next door" image that was created for her. She was made to wear removable caps on her teeth and rubberized disks to reshape her nose.

She performed at various studio functions and was eventually cast opposite Deanna Durbin in the musical short ''Every Sunday''. The film contrasted her alto vocal range and swing style with Durbin's operatic soprano and served as an extended screen test for the pair, as studio executives were questioning the wisdom of having two girl singers on the roster. Mayer finally decided to keep both actresses, but by that time Durbin's option had lapsed and she was signed by Universal Studios.

On November 16, 1935, in the midst of preparing for a radio performance on the ''Shell Chateau Hour,'' Garland learned that her father, who had been hospitalized with meningitis, had taken a turn for the worse. Frank Gumm died the following morning, on November 17, leaving her devastated. Her song for the ''Shell Chateau Hour'' was her first professional rendition of "Zing! Went the Strings of My Heart", a song which would become a standard in many of her concerts.

Garland next came to the attention of studio executives by singing a special arrangement of "You Made Me Love You" to Clark Gable at a birthday party held by the studio for the actor; her rendition was so well regarded that she performed the song in the all-star extravaganza ''Broadway Melody of 1938'' (1937), singing to a photograph of him.

MGM hit on a winning formula when it paired Garland with Mickey Rooney in a string of "backyard musicals". The duo first appeared together in the 1937 B movie ''Thoroughbreds Don't Cry''. They became a sensation and teamed up again in ''Love Finds Andy Hardy''. She would eventually star with him in nine films.

To keep up with the frantic pace of making one film after another, Garland, Rooney, and other young performers were constantly given amphetamines, as well as barbiturates to take before going to bed. For Garland, this regular dose of drugs led to addiction and a lifelong struggle and contributed to her eventual demise. She later resented the hectic schedule and felt that her youth had been stolen from her by MGM. Despite successful film and recording careers, awards, critical praise and her ability to fill concert halls worldwide, she was plagued throughout her life with self-doubt and required constant reassurance that she was talented and attractive.

''The Wizard of Oz''[link]

In 1938, aged 16, she was cast as Dorothy Gale in ''The Wizard of Oz'' (1939), a film based on the children's book by L. Frank Baum. In this film, she sang the song for which she would forever be identified, "Over the Rainbow". Although producers Arthur Freed and Mervyn LeRoy had wanted her from the start, studio chief Mayer tried first to borrow Shirley Temple from 20th Century Fox. Her services were denied and Garland was cast.

She was initially outfitted in a blonde wig for the part, but Freed and LeRoy decided against it shortly into filming. Her breasts were bound with tape and she was made to wear a special corset to flatten out her curves and make her appear younger; her blue gingham dress was also chosen for its blurring effect on her figure.

Shooting commenced on October 13, 1938, and was completed on March 16, 1939, with a final cost of more than US$2 million. With the conclusion of filming, MGM kept Garland busy with promotional tours and the shooting of ''Babes in Arms''. She and Rooney were sent on a cross-country promotional tour, culminating in the August 17 New York City premiere at the Capitol Theater, which included a five-show-a-day appearance schedule for the two stars.

''The Wizard of Oz'' was a tremendous critical success, though its high budget and promotions costs of an estimated $4 million coupled with the lower revenue generated by children's tickets meant that the film did not make a profit until it was re-released in the 1940s. At the 1940 Academy Awards ceremony, Garland received an Academy Juvenile Award for her performances in 1939, including ''The Wizard of Oz'' and ''Babes in Arms''. Following this recognition, she became one of MGM's most bankable stars.

Stardom as an adult[link]

In 1940, she starred in three films: ''Andy Hardy Meets Debutante'', ''Strike Up the Band'', and ''Little Nellie Kelly''. In the latter, she played her first adult role, a dual role of both mother and daughter. ''Little Nellie Kelly'' was purchased from George M. Cohan as a vehicle for her to display both her audience appeal and her physical appearance. The role was a challenge for her, requiring the use of an accent, her first adult kiss, and the only death scene of her career. The success of these three films, and a further three films in 1941, secured her position at MGM as a major property.

During this time Garland experienced her first serious adult romances. The first was with the band leader Artie Shaw. She was deeply devoted to him and was devastated in early 1940 when he eloped with Lana Turner. Garland began a relationship with musician David Rose, and, on her 18th birthday, he gave her an engagement ring. The studio intervened because he was still married at the time to the actress and singer Martha Raye. They agreed to wait a year to allow for his divorce from her to become final, and were wed on July 27, 1941. Garland, who had aborted her pregnancy by him in 1942, agreed to a trial separation in January 1943, and they divorced in 1944. She was noticeably thinner in her next film, ''For Me and My Gal'', alongside Gene Kelly in his first screen appearance. She was top billed over the credits for the first time and effectively made the transition from teenage star to adult actress.

At the age of 21, she was given the "glamour treatment" in ''Presenting Lily Mars'', in which she was dressed in "grown-up" gowns. Her lightened hair was also pulled up in a stylish fashion. However, no matter how glamorous or beautiful she appeared on screen or in photographs, she was never confident in her appearance and never escaped the "girl next door" image that had been created for her. One of Garland's most successful films for MGM was ''Meet Me in St. Louis'' (1944), in which she introduced three standards: "The Trolley Song", "The Boy Next Door", and "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas". Vincente Minnelli was assigned to direct and he requested that makeup artist Dorothy Ponedel be assigned to Garland. Ponedel refined her appearance in several ways, including extending and reshaping her eyebrows, changing her hairline, modifying her lip line and removing her nose discs. She appreciated the results so much that Ponedel was written into her contract for all her remaining pictures at MGM.

During the filming of ''Meet Me in St. Louis'', after some initial conflict between them, Garland and Minnelli entered a relationship. They were married June 15, 1945, and on March 12, 1946, daughter Liza was born. In 1951, they divorced.

''The Clock'' (1945) was her first straight dramatic film, opposite Robert Walker. Though the film was critically praised and earned a profit, most movie fans expected her to sing. It would be many years before she acted again in a non-singing dramatic role. Garland's other famous films of the 1940s include ''The Harvey Girls'' (1946), in which she introduced the Academy Award-winning song "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe", and ''The Pirate'' (1948).

Leaving Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer[link]

During filming for ''The Pirate'' in April 1947, Garland suffered a nervous breakdown and was placed in a private sanitarium. She was able to complete filming, but in July she undertook her first suicide attempt, making minor cuts to her wrist with a broken glass. During this period, she spent two weeks in treatment at the Austen Riggs Center, a psychiatric hospital in Stockbridge, Massachusetts Following her work on ''The Pirate'', she completed three more films for MGM: ''Easter Parade'' (in which she danced with Fred Astaire), ''In the Good Old Summertime'', and her final film with MGM, ''Summer Stock''.

Because of her mental condition, Garland was unable to complete a series of films. During the filming of ''The Barkleys of Broadway'', she was taking prescription sleeping medication along with illicitly obtained pills containing morphine. It was around this time she also developed a serious problem with alcohol. These, in combination with migraine headaches, led her to miss several shooting days in a row. After being advised by her doctor that she would only be able to work in four-to-five-day increments with extended rest periods between, MGM executive Arthur Freed made the decision to suspend her on July 18, 1948. She was replaced by Ginger Rogers.

Garland was cast in the film adaptation of ''Annie Get Your Gun'' in the title role of Annie Oakley. She was nervous at the prospect of taking on a role strongly identified with Ethel Merman, anxious about appearing in an unglamorous part after breaking from juvenile parts for several years and disturbed by her treatment at the hands of director Busby Berkeley. She began arriving late to the set and sometimes failed to appear. She was suspended from the picture on May 10, 1949, and was replaced by Betty Hutton.

Garland was next cast in the film ''Royal Wedding'' with Fred Astaire after June Allyson became pregnant in 1950. She again failed to report to the set on multiple occasions and the studio suspended her contract on June 17, 1950. She was replaced by Jane Powell. Reputable biographies following her death stated that after this latest dismissal, she slightly grazed her neck with a broken water glass, requiring only a Band-Aid, but at the time, the public was informed that a despondent Garland had slashed her throat. "All I could see ahead was more confusion," Garland later said of this suicide attempt. "I wanted to black out the future as well as the past. I wanted to hurt myself and everyone who had hurt me."

Later career[link]

Renewed stardom on the stage[link]

In October 1951, Garland opened in a vaudeville-style, two-a-day engagement at Broadway's newly refurbished Palace Theatre. Her 19-week engagement exceeded all previous records for the theater, and was described as "one of the greatest personal triumphs in show business history". Garland was honored for her contribution to the revival of vaudeville with a Special Tony Award.

In May 1952, at the height of Garland's comeback, her mother Ethel was featured in a ''Los Angeles Mirror'' story in which she revealed that while Garland was making a small fortune at the Palace, Ethel was working a desk job at Douglas Aircraft Company for $61 a week. They had been estranged for years, with Garland characterizing her mother as "no good for anything except to create chaos and fear" and accusing her of mismanaging and misappropriating her salary from the earliest days of her career. Garland's sister Virginia denied this, stating "Mama never took a dime from Judy." On January 5, 1953, Ethel Gumm was found dead in the Douglas Aircraft parking lot. She was 59 years old.

''A Star Is Born''[link]

In 1954, Garland filmed a musical remake of the 1937 film ''A Star is Born'' for Warner Bros. She and her third husband, Sid Luft (whom she had married in 1952) produced the film through their production company, Transcona Enterprises, while Warner Bros. supplied the funds, production facilities, and crew. Directed by George Cukor and costarring James Mason, it was a large undertaking to which she initially fully dedicated herself.

As shooting progressed, however, she began making the same pleas of illness which she had so often made during her final films at MGM. Production delays led to cost overruns and angry confrontations with Warner Bros. head Jack Warner. Principal photography wrapped on March 17, 1954. At Luft's suggestion, the "Born in a Trunk" medley was filmed as a showcase for her and inserted over director Cukor's objections, who feared the additional length would lead to cuts in other areas. It was completed on July 29.

Upon its September 29, 1954 world premiere, the film was met with tremendous critical and popular acclaim. Before release, it was edited at the instruction of Jack Warner; theater operators, concerned that they were losing money because they were only able to run the film for three or four shows per day instead of five or six, pressured the studio to make additional reductions. About 30 minutes of footage was cut, sparking outrage among critics and filmgoers. ''A Star is Born'' ended up losing money, and the secure financial position Garland had expected from the profits did not materialize. Transcona made no more films with Warner.

Garland was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress and, in the run-up to the 27th Academy Awards, was generally expected to win. She could not attend the ceremony because she had just given birth to her son, Joseph Luft, so a television crew was in her hospital room with cameras and wires to televise her anticipated acceptance speech. The Oscar was won, however, by Grace Kelly for ''The Country Girl'' (1954). The camera crew was packing up before Kelly could even reach the stage. Groucho Marx sent her a telegram after the awards ceremony, declaring her loss "the biggest robbery since Brinks". ''TIME'' magazine labeled her performance as "just about the greatest one-woman show in modern movie history". Garland won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Musical for the role.

Garland's films after ''A Star Is Born'' included ''Judgment at Nuremberg'' (1961) (for which she was Oscar- and Golden Globe-nominated for Best Supporting Actress), the animated feature ''Gay Purr-ee'' (1962), and ''A Child Is Waiting'' (1963) with Burt Lancaster. Her final film was ''I Could Go On Singing'' (1963), costarring Dirk Bogarde.

Television, concerts, and Carnegie Hall[link]

Garland engaged Sid Luft as her manager the same year she divorced Minnelli. He arranged a four-month concert tour of the United Kingdom, where she played to sold-out audiences throughout England, Scotland, and Ireland. It included her first appearances at the renowned London Palladium, for a four-week stand in April. Although some in the British press chided her before her opening for being "too plump", she received rave reviews and the ovation was described by the Palladium manager as the loudest he had ever heard.

Garland and Luft were married on June 8, 1952, in Hollister, California. Garland gave birth to Lorna Luft, herself a future actress and singer, on November 21, 1952, and to Joey Luft on March 29, 1955.

Beginning in 1955, Garland appeared in a number of television specials. The first, the 1955 debut episode of ''Ford Star Jubilee'', was the first full-scale color broadcast ever on CBS and was a ratings triumph, scoring a 34.8 Nielsen rating. She signed a three-year, $300,000 contract with the network. Only one additional special, a live concert edition of ''General Electric Theater'', was broadcast in 1956 before the relationship between the Lufts and CBS broke down in a dispute over the planned format of upcoming specials. In 1956, Garland performed four weeks at the New Frontier Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip for a salary of $55,000 per week, making her the highest-paid entertainer to work in Las Vegas. Despite a brief bout of laryngitis, her performances there were so successful that her run was extended an extra week. Later that year she returned to the Palace Theatre, site of her two-a-day triumph. She opened in September, once again to rave reviews and popular acclaim.

In November 1959 Garland was hospitalized, diagnosed with acute hepatitis. Over the next few weeks several quarts of fluid were drained from her body until, still weak, she was released from the hospital in January 1960. She was told by doctors that she likely had five years or less to live, and that even if she did survive she would be a semi-invalid and would never sing again. She initially felt "greatly relieved" at the diagnosis. "The pressure was off me for the first time in my life." However, she recovered over the next several months and, in August of that year, returned to the stage of the Palladium. She felt so warmly embraced by the British that she announced her intention to move permanently to England.

Her concert appearance at Carnegie Hall on April 23, 1961, was a considerable highlight, called by many "the greatest night in show business history". The two-record ''Judy at Carnegie Hall'' was certified gold, charting for 95 weeks on ''Billboard'', including 13 weeks at number one. The album won four Grammy Awards including Album of the Year and Best Female Vocal of the Year. The album has never been out of print.

In 1961, Garland and CBS settled their contract disputes with the help of her new agent, Freddie Fields, and negotiated a new round of specials. The first, entitled ''The Judy Garland Show'', aired in 1962 and featured guests Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. Following this success, CBS made a $24 million offer to her for a weekly television series of her own, also to be called ''The Judy Garland Show'', which was deemed at the time in the press to be "the biggest talent deal in TV history". Although she had said as early as 1955 that she would never do a weekly television series, in the early 1960s she was in a financially precarious situation. She was several hundred thousand dollars in debt to the Internal Revenue Service, having failed to pay taxes in 1951 and 1952, and the failure of ''A Star is Born'' meant that she received nothing from that investment. A successful run on television was intended to secure her financial future.

Following a third special, ''Judy Garland and Her Guests Phil Silvers and Robert Goulet'', Garland's weekly series debuted September 29, 1963. ''The Judy Garland Show'' was critically praised, but for a variety of reasons (including being placed in the time slot opposite ''Bonanza'' on NBC) the show lasted only one season and was canceled in 1964 after 26 episodes. Despite its short run, the series was nominated for four Emmy Awards. The demise of the series was personally and financially devastating for Garland.

Garland sued Luft for divorce in 1963, claiming "cruelty" as the grounds. She also asserted that he had repeatedly struck her while he was drinking and that he had attempted to take their children from her by force. She had filed for divorce from Luft more than once previously, including as early as 1956, but had reconciled.

Final years[link]

With the demise of her television series, Garland returned to the stage. Most notably, she performed at the London Palladium with her then 18-year-old daughter Liza Minnelli in November 1964. The concert, which was also filmed for British television network ITV, was one of her final appearances at the venue. She made guest appearances on ''The Ed Sullivan Show'', ''The Tonight Show'', ''The Hollywood Palace'', and ''The Merv Griffin Show'', on which she guest-hosted an episode.

A 1964 tour of Australia was largely disastrous. Garland's first concert in Sydney, held in the Sydney Stadium because no concert hall could accommodate the crowds who wanted to see her, went well and received positive reviews. Her second performance, in Melbourne, started an hour late. The crowd of 7,000, angered by her tardiness and believing her to be drunk, booed and heckled her, and she fled the stage after just 45 minutes. She later characterized the Melbourne crowd as "brutish". A second concert in Sydney was uneventful but the Melbourne appearance garnered her significant bad press. Some of that bad press was deflected by the announcement of a near fatal episode of pleurisy.

Garland's tour promoter Mark Herron announced that they had married aboard a freighter off the coast of Hong Kong; however, she was not legally divorced from Luft at the time the ceremony was performed. It became final on May 19, 1965, but she and Herron did not legally marry until November 14, 1965 and then separated six months later.

In February 1967, Garland was cast as Helen Lawson in ''Valley of the Dolls'' for 20th Century Fox. During the filming, she missed rehearsals and was fired in April, replaced by Susan Hayward. Her prerecording of the song "I'll Plant My Own Tree" survived, along with her wardrobe tests.

Returning to the stage, Garland made her last appearances at New York's Palace Theatre in July, a 16-show tour, performing with her children Lorna and Joey Luft. She wore a sequined pantsuit on stage for this tour, which was part of the original wardrobe for her character in ''Valley of the Dolls.''

By early 1969, Garland's health had deteriorated. She performed in London at the Talk of the Town nightclub for a five-week run and made her last concert appearance in Copenhagen during March 1969. She married her fifth and final husband, musician Mickey Deans, at Chelsea Register Office, London, on March 15, 1969, her divorce from Herron having been finalized on February 11.

Death[link]

On June 22, 1969, Garland was found dead by Deans in the bathroom of their rented house in Chelsea, London. At the subsequent inquest, coroner Gavin Thursdon stated that the cause of death was "an incautious self-overdosage" of barbiturates; her blood contained the equivalent of ten Seconal capsules. Thursdon stressed that the overdose had been unintentional and that there was no evidence to suggest she had committed suicide. Her autopsy showed that there was no inflammation of her stomach lining and no drug residue there, which indicated that the drug had been ingested over a long period of time, rather than in one dose. Her death certificate stated that her death had been "accidental". Even so, a British specialist who had attended her said she had been living on borrowed time due to cirrhosis of the liver. She had turned 47 just twelve days prior to her death. Her ''Wizard of Oz'' costar Ray Bolger commented at her funeral, "She just plain wore out."

On June 26, Deans took Garland's remains to New York City, where an estimated 20,000 people lined up for hours at the Frank E. Campbell Funeral Chapel in Manhattan to pay their respects. On June 27, James Mason gave a eulogy at the funeral, an Episcopal service led by the Rev. Peter A. Delaney of Marylebone Church, London, who had officiated at her marriage to Deans. The public and press were barred. She was interred in a crypt in the community mausoleum at Ferncliff Cemetery, in Hartsdale, New York.

Legacy[link]

Garland's legacy as a performer and a personality has endured long after her death. The American Film Institute named her eighth among the Greatest Female Stars of All Time. She has been the subject of over two dozen biographies since her death, including the well-received ''Me and My Shadows: A Family Memoir'' by her daughter, Lorna Luft, whose memoir was later adapted into the television miniseries ''Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows'', which won Emmy Awards for the two actresses portraying her (Tammy Blanchard and Judy Davis).

Garland was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1997. Several of her recordings have been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. These include "Over the Rainbow", which was ranked as the number one movie song of all time in the American Film Institute's "100 Years...100 Songs" list. Four more Garland songs are featured on the list: "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" (#76), "Get Happy" (#61), "The Trolley Song" (#26), and "The Man That Got Away" (#11). She has twice been honored on U.S. postage stamps, in 1989 (as Dorothy) and again in 2006 (as Vicki Lester from ''A Star Is Born'').

Gay icon[link]

Garland always had a large base of fans in the gay community and has become a gay icon. Reasons often given for her standing, especially among gay men, are admiration of her ability as a performer, the way her personal struggles mirrored those of gay men in America during the height of her fame and her value as a camp figure. When asked about how she felt about having a large gay following, she responded, "I couldn't care less. I sing to people."

Some have also suggested a connection between the date of Garland's death and funeral on June 27, 1969 and the Stonewall riots, the flashpoint of the modern Gay Liberation movement, which started in the early hours of June 28. However, in a 2009 interview gay historian David Carter stated that this connection is untrue, and based on a mocking reference to the riot by an anti-gay writer in the ''Village Voice'' the next day.

Filmography and performances[link]

Portrayals in fiction[link]

Garland has been portrayed on television by Andrea McArdle in ''Rainbow'' (1978), Tammy Blanchard (young Judy) and Judy Davis (older Judy) in ''Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows'' (2001) and Elizabeth Karsell in ''James Dean'' (2001). Anne Hathaway is set to play Garland in a biopic titled ''Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland'' which is in production and is set to be released in either 2012 or 2013.

On stage, Garland is a character in the musical ''The Boy from Oz'' (1998), portrayed by Chrissy Amphlett in the original Australian production and by Isabel Keating on Broadway in 2003. ''End of the Rainbow'' (2005) featured Caroline O'Connor as Garland. Adrienne Barbeau played Garland in ''The Property Known as Garland'' (2006) and ''The Judy Monologues'' (2010) featured Kimberly Roberts as Garland. Garland was briefly mentioned in the biopic film ''Introducing Dorothy Dandridge'' for the 1954 Academy Awards for ''A Star Is Born''.

Discography[link]

Awards[link]

Notes[link]

References[link]

Bianco, David. ''Gay Essentials: Facts For Your Queer Brain''. Alyson Publications. Los Angeles, 1999. ISBN 1-55583-508-2.

Clarke, Gerald (2001). ''Get Happy: The Life of Judy Garland''. New York, Random House. ISBN 0-375-50378-1.

DiOrio, Jr., Al. ''Little Girl Lost: The Life and Hard Times of Judy Garland''. Manor Books. New York, 1973.

Duberman, Martin (1993). ''Stonewall''. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-525-93602-5.

Edwards, Anne. ''Judy Garland''. Simon & Schuster. New York, 1975. ISBN 0-671-80228-3 (paperback edition).

Finch, Christopher. ''Rainbow: The Stormy Life of Judy Garland''. Ballantine Books. 1975. ISBN 0-345-25173-3 (paperback edition).

Frank, Gerold. ''Judy''. Harper & Row. New York, 1975. ISBN 0-06-011337-5.

Juneau, James. ''Judy Garland: A Pyramid Illustrated History of the Movies''. Pyramid Publications. 1974, New York. ISBN 0-515-03482-7.

Luft, Lorna. ''Me and My Shadows: A Family Memoir''. Simon & Schuster. New York, 1999. ISBN 0-283-06320-3.

Sanders, Coyne Steven. ''Rainbow's End: The Judy Garland Show''. Zebra Books. 1990 ISBN 0-8217-3708-2 (paperback edition).

Seaman, Barbara. ''Lovely Me: The Life of Jacqueline Susann''. Seven Stories Press. 1996, New York. ISBN 0-9658770-6-X (1996 edition).

Shipman, David. ''Judy Garland: The Secret Life of an American Legend''. Hyperion. New York, 1992. ISBN 0-7868-8026-0 (paperback edition).

Steiger, Brad (1969). ''Judy Garland''. New York, Ace Books.

Wayne, Jane Ellen (2003). ''The Golden Girls of MGM''. New York, Carroll & Graf Publishers. ISBN 0-7867-1303-8.

External links[link]

Judy Garland at TV Guide

The Judy Room Celebrating the life and career of Judy Garland

The Judy Garland Birthplace and Museum in Grand Rapids, MN

The Judy Garland Club official international fan club

American Masters special">''Judy Garland: By Myself'' – American Masters special

Judy Garland's Film "The Wizard of Oz" Film site on Judy and Oz

Judy Garland at The Biography Channel

Category:1922 births Category:1969 deaths Category:People from Grand Rapids, Minnesota Category:Academy Juvenile Award winners Category:Accidental deaths in England Category:Actors from Minnesota Category:University High School (Los Angeles, California) alumni Category:American people of English descent Category:American child actors Category:American child singers Category:American contraltos Category:American film actors Category:American voice actors Category:American people of Irish descent Category:American people of Scottish descent Category:American radio personalities Category:Best Musical or Comedy Actress Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Burials at Ferncliff Cemetery Category:Capitol Records artists Category:Decca Records artists Category:Drug-related deaths in England Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Tony Award winners Category:Traditional pop music singers Category:Vaudeville performers

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Name	Jonathan Winters
Birth name	Jonathan Harshman Winters III
Birth date	November 11, 1925
Birth place	Bellbrook, Ohio, US
Medium	Comedian, actor
Nationality	American
Active	1953–present
Influenced	George Carlin, Bill Cosby, Robin Williams, Richard Lewis, Conan O'Brien, Patton Oswalt, Frank Caliendo
Spouse	Eileen Schauder (1948–2009; her death; 2 children)

}} Jonathan Harshman Winters III (born November 11, 1925) is an American comedian, actor, and artist.

Early life[link]

Winters was born in Bellbrook, Ohio, the son of Alice Kilgore (née Rodgers), a radio personality, and Jonathan Harshman Winters II, an investment broker. He is a descendant of Valentine Winters, founder of the Winters National Bank in Dayton, Ohio (now part of JPMorgan Chase). Of English and Scotch-Irish ancestry, Winters has described his father as an alcoholic who had trouble holding a job. When he was seven, his parents separated, and Winters' mother took him to Springfield, Ohio to live with his maternal grandmother.

At age 17, Winters quit high school and joined the United States Marine Corps and served two and a half years in the Pacific Theater during World War II. Upon his return he attended Kenyon College. He later studied cartooning at Dayton Art Institute, where he met Eileen Schauder, whom he married in 1948.

Winters is a brother of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Lambda chapter).

Career[link]

His career began as a result of a lost wristwatch, about six or seven months after his marriage to Eileen. The newlyweds couldn’t afford to buy another one. Then Eileen read about a talent contest in which the first prize was a wristwatch, and encouraged Jonathan to “go down and win it.” She was certain he could…and he did. His performance led to a disc jockey job, where he was supposed to introduce songs and announce the temperature. Gradually his ad libs, personas and antics took over the show.

He began comedy routines and acting while studying at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. He was also a local radio personality on WING (mornings, 6 to 8) in Dayton, Ohio and at WIZE in Springfield, Ohio. He performed as Johnny Winters on WBNS-TV in Columbus, Ohio for two and a half years, quitting the station in 1953 when they refused him a $5.00 raise. After promising his wife that he would return to Dayton if he did not make it in a year, and with $56.46 in his pocket, he moved to New York City, staying with friends in Greenwich Village. After obtaining Martin Goodman as his agent, he began stand-up routines in various New York nightclubs. His big break occurred (with the revised name of Jonathan) when he worked for Alistair Cooke on the CBS Sunday morning show ''Omnibus''. In 1957, he performed in the first color television show, a 15-minute routine sponsored by Tums. Winters recorded many classic comedy albums for the Verve Records label, starting in 1960. Probably the best-known of his characters from this period is Maude Frickert, the seemingly sweet old lady with the barbed tongue. He was a favorite of Jack Paar and appeared frequently on his television programs, even going so far as to impersonate then-U.S. President John F. Kennedy over the phone as a prank on Paar. In addition, he would often appear on ''The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson'', usually in the guise of some character. Carson often did not know what Winters had planned and usually had to tease out the character's back story during a pretend interview. Carson invented a character called "Aunt Blabby" that was an impression of Maude Frickert.

Winters has appeared in nearly 50 movies and several television shows, including particularly notable roles in the film ''It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World'' and in the dual roles of Henry Glenworthy and his dark, scheming brother, the Rev. Wilbur Glenworthy, in the film adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's ''The Loved One''. Fellow comedians who starred with him in ''Mad World'', such as Arnold Stang, claimed that in the long periods while they waited between scenes, Winters would entertain them for hours in their trailer by becoming any character that they would suggest to him. He also appeared in ''Viva Max!'' (1970) and ''The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming'' (1966).

He appeared as a regular (along with Woody Allen and Jo Anne Worley) on the Saturday morning children's television program ''Hot Dog'' in the late sixties. He also had a CBS nighttime show from 1967 to 1969, and had his own show, ''The Wacky World of Jonathan Winters'' during 1972–74. Winters did dramatic work in the ''The Twilight Zone'' episode "A Game of Pool" (episode #3.5, October 13, 1961). He recorded Ogden Nash's ''The Carnival of the Animals'' poems to Camille Saint-Saëns' classical opus. He appeared on ABC's ''The American Sportsman'', hosted by Grits Gresham, who took celebrities on hunting, fishing, and shooting trips to exotic places around the world. He appeared regularly as a panelist on ''The Hollywood Squares'' and made many very memorable appearances on both ''The Dean Martin Show'' and ''The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast''. In the fourth and last season of the sci-fi-based TV comedy ''Mork & Mindy'', Jonathan Winters (one of Robin Williams' idols) was brought in as Mork & Mindy's child, Mearth. Due to the different Orkan physiology, Mork laid an egg, which grew and hatched into the much older Winters. It had been previously explained that Orkans aged "backwards," thus explaining Mearth's appearance and that of his teacher, Miss Geezba (portrayed by then-11-year-old actress Louanne Sirota). Mork's infant son Mearth in ''Mork & Mindy'' was created in hopes of improving ratings and as an attempt to capitalize on Williams' comedic talents. Winters had previously guest-starred in Season 3, Episode 18 as Dave McConnell, Mindy's uncle. However, after multiple scheduling and cast changes, ''Mork & Mindy'''s 4th season was already pretty low in the ratings and ended up being the show's last season.

He was a regular on ''Hee Haw'' during the 1983–84 season. Shortly after this, in 1987, Winters was featured in NFL Films' ''The NFL TV Follies''. He was the voice of Grandpa Smurf from 1986–1990 on the television series ''The Smurfs''.

In 1991 and 1992, he was on ''Davis Rules'', a sitcom that lasted two seasons (25 episodes). He played Gunny Davis, an eccentric grandfather who was helping raise his grandchildren after his son lost his wife. In addition to his live action roles, he was also a guest star on ''The New Scooby-Doo Movies'' (in an episode in which the Scooby Gang was looking forward to his promised performance as Maude Frickert) and the narrator in ''Frosty Returns''. Winters also provided the voice for the thief in ''Arabian Knight''.

In 1994, he appeared in a cameo as a fired factory worker in ''The Flintstones'', and as the police chief uncle of Lamont Cranston (Alec Baldwin) in ''The Shadow''.

From 1959 to 1964, Winters' voice could be heard in a series of popular television commercials for Utica Club beer. In the ads, he provided the voices of talking beer steins, named "Shultz and Dooley." Later, he became a spokesman for Hefty brand trash bags, for whom he appeared as a dapper garbageman known for collecting "gahr-bahj," as well as Maude Frickert and other characters.

Later years[link]

In 1999, Winters was awarded the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. He now lives near Santa Barbara, California, and is often seen browsing and hamming for the crowd at the antique show on the Ventura County fairgrounds. He often entertains the tellers and other workers whenever he visits his local bank to make a deposit or withdrawal. He spends time painting, and has had many gallery showings and been presented in one-man shows of his art. In 1987, he published ''Winters' Tales: Stories and Observations for the Unusual''.

In 2008, Winters was presented with a TV Land Award by Robin Williams. Winters provided the voice of Papa Smurf in the live-action Smurfs movie, released in 2011.

Personal life[link]

In his interview with the Archive of American Television Winters reported that he suffered a nervous breakdown and spent eight months in a private mental hospital in the late 1950s. Although he was not given a diagnosis while in the hospital, he was later diagnosed with manic depression (known today as bipolar disorder). The comedian referred to this incident obliquely in his stand-up act, most famously on his 1960 comedy album ''The Wonderful World of Jonathan Winters''. During his classic "flying saucer" routine, Winters casually mentions that if he wasn't careful, the authorities might put him back in the "rubber room," referring to the institution.

On January 11, 2009, Eileen, Jonathan's wife of 60 years, died at the age of 84 after a 20-year battle with breast cancer.

Discography[link]

''Down to Earth'' (1960)

''The Wonderful World of Jonathan Winters'' (1960; reissued in 2003)

''Here's Jonathan'' (1961)

''Another Day, Another World'' (1962)

''Humor Seen through the Eyes of Jonathan Winters'' (1962)

''Jonathan Winters' Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World'', compilation album in conjunction with the film (1963)

''Whistle Stopping with Jonathan Winters'' (1964)

''Movies Are Better Than Ever'' (1966)

''Jonathan Winters… Wings it!'' (1969)

''Stuff 'n Nonsense'' (1969)

''Answers Your Telephone'' (1988)

''Finally Captured'' (1988)

''Into the '90s'' (1990)

''Jonathan Winters is Terminator 3'' (1992)

''Crank(y) Calls'' (1995)

''Outpatients'' (2000)

''Paul Bunyan'' (2001)

''Old Folks'' (2006)

''The Underground Tapes'' (2007)

''Final Approach'' (2011)

''The Smurfs (voice) (2011)

Filmography[link]

Features:

''Alakazam the Great'' (1960) (voice in English dubbed version)

''It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World'' (1963)

''The Loved One'' (1965)

''The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming'' (1966)

''Penelope'' (1966)

''Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mama's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feeling So Sad'' (1967)

''Eight on the Lam'' (1967)

''Viva Max!'' (1969)

''The New Scooby-Doo Movies'' (1972)

''The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh'' (1979)

''Pogo for President: I Go Pogo'' (1980) (voice)

''Mork & Mindy'' (1981)

''E. Nick: A Legend in His Own Mind'' (1984)

''The Little Troll Prince'' (1985)

''The Longshot'' (1986)

''Say Yes'' (1986)

''On The Ledge'' (1987)

''Moon over Parador'' (1988)

''Frosty Returns'' [Narrator] (1992)

''Davis Rules'' (1992)

''The Flintstones'' (1994)

''The Shadow'' (1994)

''Arabian Knight'' (Miramax 1995)

''The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle'' (2000)

''Swing'' (2003)

''Comic Book: The Movie'' (2004)

''Tell Them Who You Are'' (2004) (documentary)

''National Lampoon's Cattle Call'' (2006)

''Certifiably Jonathan'' (2011) ''The Smurfs'' (2011)

''Big Finish'' (2012)

Short Subjects:

''Sonic Boom'' (1974)

''Edwurd Fudwupper Fibbed Big'' (2000) (voice)

''Santa vs. the Snowman 3D'' (2002) (voice)

References[link]

External links[link]

Jonathan Winters' Official Homepage

Interview with the Archive of American Television

Official Website of the Jonathan Winters film, Certifiably Jonathan

video: "Jonathan Winters roasts Ronald Reagan", on Dean Martin Roasts TV show, 3 minutes

Marc Maron interviews Jonathan Winters - WTF Podcast Episode 173 - May 2011

Category:1925 births Category:American comedians Category:American film actors Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:American people of English descent Category:American people of Scotch-Irish descent Category:American stand-up comedians Category:American television actors Category:American voice actors Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Kenyon College alumni Category:Living people Category:Mark Twain Prize recipients Category:People from Dayton, Ohio Category:People from Knox County, Ohio Category:People with bipolar disorder Category:United States Marines

de:Jonathan Winters fr:Jonathan Winters pl:Jonathan Winters ro:Jonathan Winters sh:Jonathan Winters fi:Jonathan Winters tl:Jonathan Winters