This book takes a more biographical slant to Woody Allen’s work, going through his life and the filming of his movies rather than studying the movies to deduce Allen’s characteristics and real life references.

The prologue to the book describes the scandal with Mia Farrow and Soon-Yi. However, this aspect of the prologue is only useful in its juxtaposition with the description of the overall appeal and greatness of Woody Allen. Meade briefly goes over the benchmarks in Woody Allen’s career, such as his change from stand-up comedy to film, but more importantly, Meade expresses the popularity and the special attributes that make Woody Allen a household name. The biographer discusses the recognizable appearance, the Chaplin references, and the breadth of his film career. Meade lists Allen’s praises as an artist and writer for his originality, independence from the Hollywood establishment, and his intelligence. The writer sees Allen as an auteur, who breathes himself into life in his films through his control over the many stages of filmmaking. In this prologue, Meade stresses that Woody Allen has survived several controversies in his public personal life, and his fans remain with him because of the love of his films and his persona.

The seventh chapter of the book “A Picture about Me” focuses on the Woody Allen’s life during the making of Annie Hall. Allen is quoted as saying that the film was about him in its ideas, thoughts, and background, and despite the title, Meade points out that Annie is not the main character. The film was originally titled “Anhedonia” – the inability to experience pleasure – focusing on Allen’s own perception of life in his forties. In vivid passages, Meade describes the relationship between Allen and Keaton, the writing process, and the input of other film executives, who were particularly against the depressing original title. The chapter describes the postproduction process, the public reaction to the film, the increased focus and building of the Woody Allen persona that resulted from the success, and Allen’s reactions to the attention. This section of the article is particularly different from the other sources, because the depiction of Woody Allen at the time of Annie Hall’s success stands out when compared to the image that the public was painting of Allen at the time.

This introduction is useful for this project, because it describes Allen as a film auteur, who also went beyond his films and became a household name. The chapter establishes how “onscreen Woody” was a creation of the public imagination, dramatizing the differences between the image and Allen's actual feelings and actions.

This book contains several essays about Woody Allen and his work. The second chapter – entitled “Will the Real Little Man Please Stand Up?” – discusses the question of the real Woody Allen versus the onscreen Woody Allen. Pogel argues that more and more critics are treating Woody Allen separately from his creation. Allen even argues that point, and in interviews, he does not appear as the man from the movies. Thus, Pogel pursues that any understanding of Woody Allen based on his films would be incomplete and unconvincing.

Pogel runs through Allen’s private, rigid daily routine, juxtaposing it to the scatter-brained characters that he writes and portrays in his films. The author paints him in the most normal actions and emphasizes the simplicity rather than the exaggerated character associated with Woody Allen. Pogel comments on Woody Allen as a writer, a comedian, a filmmaker, and a businessman drifting away from the everyday man that she initially depicts.

Still, as the chapter continues, Pogel begins to draw similarities between Allen and his “little-man” characters. The discussion at the end of the first section of this chapter comments on Allen’s feelings about politics, being Jewish, and romance, using small references to their infusion into his films. However, Pogel continues to resist the temptation to equate Woody Allen with his onscreen persona. Quotes of Allen’s comments on those subjects are taken from interviews rather than films, although his films do bring up the same opinions to some degree.

The second part of the chapter draws a line between Allen and his characters citing the ambiguities that surround Woody Allen’s personal life, particularly his childhood. The author ponders why Allen would withhold private details, suggesting that Allen may want the audience to consider the broader implications of the film rather than focus on the film as a personal introspection. The chapter goes on to detail Allen’s childhood and written and stand-up comedy career, never mentioning the similarities to his film persona.

This source opposes the idea that the filmmaker Woody Allen is the Woody Allen character in his films, and despite its sound arguments, the essay can also be seen as the extent to which one must avoid the connections between Allen and his onscreen persona to uphold this perspective in this debate.

This article presents a biased point of view of Woody Allen’s real life, depicting him as a contradiction, mystery, and possibly even a hypocrite. After succinctly delineating the persona that Woody Allen carries as an intellectual, shy, funny, and neurotic New Yorker, the article gives a detailed account of Woody Allen’s personal everyday life, removed from all of the personality that has stuck to the distinctive image of Woody Allen.

The title of the article, “The Conflicting Life and Art of Woody Allen,” establishes the point of the article: The writer attempts to list and question the many contradictions within Woody Allen’s life. Most of the contradictions come from what Woody Allen says versus what he actually does, such as a purported “disinterest for material wealth” versus the Rolls Royce that Woody Allen uses to go around New York City. The writer bases many impressions of Woody Allen on the film roles, and in some instances, the writer undoes this cinematic persona of Woody Allen with descriptions of his real life. In other instances, the image of Woody Allen says one thing, such as that he chases many women, while Allen makes comments that contradict this idea. However, in the case of women-chasing, Allen’s friend Tony Roberts laughs at Allen’s contradiction of the promiscuous Woody Allen persona. The line between reality and film becomes complicated as the line becomes an intersection between reality, film, AND self-image.

The article oscillates between Allen’s perception, the writer’s perception, and the perception of close friends. The article does not answer the questions about the contradictions in Allen’s life, but rather raises these questions through this new and thorough information and the confusion through the varying opinions and images of Woody Allen. The final statement of the article is made by Tony Roberts, personally describing the enigma of Woody Allen and his ambivalence toward fame and the way that Allen chooses to live. The article simply concludes with the idea that outsiders will never truly know Woody Allen, because he is ultimately the one in control of what people know. This statement harkens back to the ideas that Woody Allen has molded the image and that his life may not actually reflect the onscreen Woody Allen, and that is exactly how he meant it to be. Perhaps, Woody Allen should simply be viewed as a shrewd self-advertisement and manipulator.

This perspective on the issue of fact versus fiction in Woody Allen's life adds to the considerations of the autobiographical quality of Annie Hall, while allowing one to view Annie Hall, as a vehicle for an image through exaggeration and the direct contact with the audience.