Woody Allen

Was voted the 19th greatest director of all time by Entertainment Weekly.

Although he is barely interested in awards, he's one of the Academy's favorites--his 16 Oscar Nominations for Best Original Screenplay as of 2014 are a record for that category. This puts him ahead of Billy Wilder, who had 19 combined Oscar nominations for Writing and Directing. With 24 nominations in the combination of the top-three categories--acting, directing and writing--he holds the record there as well.

In 2005 he was ranked #10 in Empire (UK) magazine's Greatest Directors Ever! poll.

Was originally attached to co-star with Jim Carrey in The Farrelly Brothers comedy Stuck on You (2003), but decided to pass on the idea.

In 2002 he made his first appearance at the Oscars in Hollywood to make a plea for producers to continue filming their movies in New York after the 9/11 tragedy.

In February 2000 he adopted his second daughter Manzie Tio Allen, named after Manzie Johnson, a drummer with Sidney Bechet's band, after she had been born in Texas.

His adopted daughter Bechet Dumaine, named after Sidney Bechet, was born in December 1998.

In October 1997 he was ranked #43 in Empire (UK) magazine's Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time list.

After completing his first musical, Everyone Says I Love You (1996), he stated that he'd like to do another in the future with an all-original score. Since making that statement, however, nothing has yet materialized.

Has a look-alike puppet in the French show Les Guignols de l'info (1988).

He has only directed one film in which both of his longtime companions Diane Keaton and Mia Farrow appear: Radio Days (1987).

Dated Mia Farrow from 1980 to 1992. They adopted two children, Moses Farrow (b. 1978) and Dylan O'Sullivan Farrow (b. 1985), and had one son, Ronan Farrow (b. 1987). Mia Farrow became Allen's mother-in-law in 1997 when he married Soon-Yi Previn, the adoptive daughter of Farrow and second husband André Previn. In 2013, Mia sensationally claimed that Ronan may possibly be the biological offspring of her first husband Frank Sinatra, rather than Allen.

Five actresses have won Academy Awards for his films: Diane Keaton won Best Actress for Annie Hall (1977), Dianne Wiest won Best Supporting Actress for both Hannah and Her Sisters (1986) and Bullets Over Broadway (1994). Mira Sorvino won Best Supporting Actress for Mighty Aphrodite (1995), Penélope Cruz won Best Supporting Actress for Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) and Cate Blanchett won Best Actress for Blue Jasmine (2013).

Accused British interviewer Michael Parkinson of having a morbid interest in his private life and rejected questions about the custody battle for his children during his appearance on the BBC's Parkinson (1971) in 1999.

His real directorial debut came the next year in the mockumentary Take the Money and Run (1969). He has written, directed and, more often than not, starred in about a film a year ever since, while simultaneously writing more than a dozen plays and several books of comedy.

Woody's theoretical directorial debut was in What's Up, Tiger Lily? (1966); a Japanese spy flick that he dubbed over with his own comedic dialogue about spies searching for the secret recipe for egg salad.

After performing on stage for a few years, he was approached to write a script for Warren Beatty to star in: What's New Pussycat (1965) and would also have a moderate role as a character in the film. During production, Woody gave himself more and better lines and left Beatty with less compelling dialogue. Beatty inevitably quit the project and was replaced by Peter Sellers, who demanded all the best lines and more screen-time. It was from this experience that Woody realized that he could not work on a film without complete control over its production.

Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume Two, 1945-1985." Pages 20-29. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1988.

Got hooked on movies when he was three years old when his mother took him him to see Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937). From that day, he said, theaters became his second home.

Woody Allen was born Allan Stewart Konigsberg on December 1, 1935 in Brooklyn, New York, to Nettie (Cherrie), a bookkeeper, and Martin Konigsberg, a waiter and jewellery engraver. His father was of Lithuanian Jewish descent, and his maternal grandparents were Austrian Jewish immigrants. As a young boy, he became intrigued with magic tricks and playing the clarinet, two hobbies that he continues today. Allen broke into show business at 15 years when he started writing jokes for a local paper, receiving $200 a week. He later moved on to write jokes for talk shows but felt that his jokes were being wasted. His agents, Charles Joffe and Jack Rollins, convinced him to start doing stand-up and telling his own jokes. Reluctantly he agreed and, although he initially performed with such fear of the audience that he would cover his ears when they applauded his jokes, he eventually became very successful at stand-up.