Olivia: Alright Jackson, before we dive in, what’s your one-sentence review of Woody Allen’s memoir, Apropos of Nothing? Jackson: It's like spending 400 pages with a brilliant, hilarious, and deeply neurotic man who has cornered you at a party to explain, in excruciating detail, why he's not a monster. Olivia: That is... shockingly accurate. And today we are diving into Apropos of Nothing by Woody Allen. This book is fascinating because its original publisher, Hachette, actually dropped it after employee walkouts, only for it to be picked up by a smaller press. It’s a book born from controversy. Jackson: So it was controversial before anyone even read it. That sets a certain tone. Olivia: Exactly. And it forces the central question right from the start. The book itself is a paradox, just like the man. The first half is this incredibly funny, almost novelistic account of a classic American success story. The second half is a legal brief. Jackson: A defense attorney’s closing argument, disguised as a memoir. Olivia: Precisely. And to understand the second half, you have to understand the man he builds in the first.

Olivia: He starts by painting this picture of his childhood in Brooklyn, and it's clear he sees himself as an outsider from birth. He quotes himself as a "genetically born louse" and says his philosophy isn't that the glass is half empty, but that the "coffin is half full." Jackson: Classic Woody Allen. It’s the persona he’s perfected for sixty years. The nebbish, anxious, intellectual Jew from Brooklyn. But how much of that is real, and how much is a carefully constructed character? Olivia: The book argues it's very real, and it starts with his parents. They were a complete mismatch. His mother, Nettie, was the practical, hardworking bookkeeper. His father, Marty, was this larger-than-life character who was allergic to work but full of charm. He’d been in the Navy in World War I, his ship was torpedoed, and he was one of only three guys who swam miles in icy water to survive. Jackson: Whoa. That’s a movie right there. Olivia: It gets better. After the family lost their money in the crash, his dad had to hustle. And by hustle, I mean he took on odd jobs, including working for the infamous mob boss Albert Anastasia. Jackson: Wait, the head of Murder, Inc.? His dad worked for that Albert Anastasia? Olivia: According to Woody, yes. He was sent to Saratoga to handle "questionable horse-racing business." And later, his father worked as a waiter on the Bowery, a place filled with alcoholics and down-on-their-luck characters. Woody’s family would even hire these guys as cheap labor to paint their house. Jackson: That explains so much about his films. Think of Broadway Danny Rose—it’s filled with these lovable, tragic, small-time hustlers. He was just writing what he knew. Olivia: Exactly. He was surrounded by these flawed, colorful people. But at the same time, he felt completely alienated from it. He says his parents had no cultural interests. His escape wasn't in his home, but in the movie theater. His cousin Rita was his guide. Jackson: The one who introduced him to the "champagne comedies"? Olivia: The very one. She took him to double features every Saturday. He fell in love with this idealized, glamorous world of penthouses and witty banter, where problems were solved with a clever line, not with the yelling he heard at home. He quotes Blanche DuBois from A Streetcar Named Desire: "I don’t want reality, I want magic." Jackson: That feels like the thesis statement for his entire career. All his films, from The Purple Rose of Cairo to Midnight in Paris, are about escaping a disappointing reality and finding refuge in a more magical, idealized world. Olivia: He says as much. He identifies most with Cecilia, the character in Purple Rose who literally escapes into a movie. For him, movies and magic tricks—his other childhood obsession—were the only things that made sense in a chaotic world. Jackson: It’s a compelling artistic philosophy. But I have to ask, is it also a convenient way to avoid dealing with uncomfortable truths? If you're always seeking "magic," does that mean you get to ignore the messy reality you create for yourself and others? Olivia: That is the million-dollar question. And it’s the question that hangs over the entire second half of this book.

Jackson: Speaking of uncomfortable truths... the book's title, Apropos of Nothing, feels like the most ironic title of all time. Because the second half is apropos of everything. Olivia: It’s a complete pivot. The charming, anecdotal tone vanishes, and it becomes a meticulous, almost obsessive, point-by-point rebuttal of the allegations that have defined his public image for the last thirty years. It’s why so many critics found the book to be self-serving and tone-deaf. They felt it lacked any real introspection. Jackson: Well, it's his side of the story. He’s essentially trying his own case in the court of public opinion. So what is his central argument? Olivia: His argument is that the molestation allegation was a fabrication, born out of Mia Farrow's rage after she discovered his affair with her adopted daughter, Soon-Yi. He details the moment Mia found the nude Polaroids he’d taken of Soon-Yi. He claims it was an accident, just a "blunder by a klutz," not some subconscious desire to be found out. Jackson: Which is a bit hard to believe, leaving something like that on the mantelpiece. But okay, let's go with it. What happened next, according to him? Olivia: He describes Mia’s reaction as crossing the line from "understandable to unforgivable and then to unconscionable." He alleges she immediately told the children he had raped Soon-Yi, and then, a few months later, when he wanted to end their professional and personal relationship, she threatened him, saying, "You took my daughter, now I’ll take yours." He claims this is when she began coaching their seven-year-old daughter, Dylan, to say he had molested her. Jackson: That's an incredibly serious accusation to make against a mother. What evidence does he offer? Olivia: This is where the book becomes a legal document. He points to two major, independent investigations. First, the Child Sexual Abuse Clinic at Yale–New Haven Hospital, which concluded, and I'm quoting their findings here, "It is our expert opinion that Dylan was not sexually abused by Mr. Allen." They noted her testimony had a "rehearsed quality" and was likely "coached or influenced by her mother." Jackson: Wow. That's a powerful finding. Olivia: It is. And then, New York State Child Welfare investigated for fourteen months and also concluded there was "no credible evidence" of abuse, deeming the report "unfounded." He emphasizes repeatedly that he was never charged with a crime. Jackson: Okay, so if two official investigations cleared him, why does this cloud of suspicion still hang so heavily over him? Why did the #MeToo movement reignite this and lead to him being effectively blacklisted in the U.S.? Olivia: That's the tragedy he's trying to articulate. He blames a "feeding frenzy" in the media and a public that prefers a simple, dramatic narrative of a powerful man abusing a child. He argues that the nuance of the case—the bitter custody battle, the documented findings of the investigations, the testimony of his son Moses Farrow who also claims Mia was abusive and manipulative—gets lost. Jackson: Moses's account is a huge part of this. He wrote a public blog post defending his father and describing a very different home life than the one Mia portrayed. In the book, Allen recounts Moses's story of Mia banishing him from the family for even speaking to Woody. Olivia: Yes, and he uses that to paint a picture of Mia as a controlling figure who demands absolute loyalty. But for many people, especially in the post-#MeToo era, the default is to believe the accuser. Dylan has been steadfast in her account for years. And Allen's own book, with its sometimes demeaning descriptions of women and its complete lack of remorse for the affair with Soon-Yi, doesn't win him much sympathy. Jackson: Right. He can present all the "facts" he wants, but if the "character" he presents in his own memoir is unlikable or seems untrustworthy, people won't buy it. It's the ultimate "art vs. artist" problem, but the art, in this case, is his own life story.

Olivia: And that’s the tightrope this book walks. It’s a masterclass in storytelling from a man who is, by any measure, a brilliant writer. The first half is filled with wit and charm. But it’s all in service of the second half, which is a desperate plea for the reader to believe his version of reality. Jackson: So, after all this, where do we land? We have this brilliant, funny artist who created a persona out of his own anxieties, and then we have this messy, ugly, and unresolved public drama. Can you even enjoy Annie Hall the same way after reading this? Olivia: That's the core of it. The book doesn't give you an easy answer. It presents his case, forcefully and sometimes uncomfortably. What it really reveals is the tragedy of a narrative war. He presents the findings of two official investigations that cleared him, yet the court of public opinion, fueled by a powerful counter-narrative, has rendered its own verdict. It's a stark reminder that in the modern age, facts and feelings can exist in two separate, warring realities. Jackson: And he seems to know he can't win that war, which is maybe why the book ends with him saying he prefers to "live on in my apartment" rather than in the hearts and minds of the public. It’s a retreat. Olivia: Exactly. He retreats back into his own world, the only place where he has total creative control. It leaves you with a really challenging question: When faced with two irreconcilable stories, where do you place your belief? And what does that choice say about you? Jackson: A question with no easy answer. This is Aibrary, signing off.