Woody Allen may have issued a statement Tuesday declaring he is innocent of charges he once sexually molested his adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, but the Annie Hall director doesn’t appear concerned the accusation will hurt his career.
Allen made his standard appearance at the Carlyle Hotel Monday night. He played When You’re Smiling on clarinet during the set.
Robert Weide, who directed an exhaustive 2012 documentary on Allen’s career, believes the acclaimed auteur is able to shrug off the latest batch of bad news.
When I did the documentary on him, we talked about all this business that happened and I said, ‘Was there any concern on your part that this could be the end of your career?’ And he said no. He said, ‘First of all, all of my films aren’t that commercial anyway, so if a few people are going to drop out and not watch my films now because they’re mad at me, fine.’ It’s not like he’s Steven Spielberg. And he said, ‘If I couldn’t get financing for my films, I would write plays, I’ve got my music.’
The same appears true for Allen’s Hollywood peers. The Hollywood Reporter suggests the latest headlines won’t stop actors from lining up to appear in his films.
But despite the uproar, many Hollywood insiders believe the impact on the veteran filmmaker, who operates outside the studio system by raising financing abroad to make one film a year like clockwork, will be minimal.
Even the Oscar odds for Allen’s latest film, Blue Jasmine, may not be impacted by the public battle, the magazine says.
A survey of Academy members finds near agreement that Dylan’s attempt in her letter to tie Blanchett to Allen (“What if it had been your child, Cate Blanchett?” she asked) will prove fruitless.
Meanwhile, Allen does have a new defender–Dylan Farrow’s brother.
Of course Woody did not molest my sister,” says Moses, who is estranged from Farrow and many of his siblings and is close to Allen and Soon-Yi. “She loved him and looked forward to seeing him when he would visit. She never hid from him until our mother succeeded in creating the atmosphere of fear and hate towards him. The day in question, there were six or seven of us in the house. We were all in public rooms and no one, not my father or sister, was off in any private spaces. My mother was conveniently out shopping. I don’t know if my sister really believes she was molested or is trying to please her mother. Pleasing my mother was very powerful motivation because to be on her wrong side was horrible.