The First Woody Allen Pages Book! The Watchers Guide Volume 1 Out Now

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On the eve of our fourth birthday, I am very happy to announce that The Woody Allen Pages have a book (well, ebook)! It will hopefully be the first of many volumes, and unlike any other Woody Allen book.

It is called The Watcher’s Guides Volume 1.

You can buy the book on Amazon US, Amazon UK and the iTunes/iBooks.

This ain’t no biography – It’s the most comprehensive guide you will find on Allen’s films. We’ve used the years of research we spent running this website, matched it with so many great source materials, and plenty or original research to create the ultimate resource.

At the heart of the book is the Watchers Guides. Like a written version of a DVD commentary, they are designed for you to follow along when you watch and re-watch Allen’s films in the years to come.

Every chapter covers

  • Story of how the films were conceived
  • Stories from the films’ production
  • Quotes and first hand accounts from the cast and crew
  • Trivia on who missed out on roles, original story ideas that were discarded, deleted scenes and much more
  • Box office information
  • Our favourite quotes
  • 6 films to watch that inspired the film, or was inspired by it (one more than our web version)

The Watcher’s Guides feature

  • Every music cue
  • Every location we could find, with many new uncovered by us
  • Information on every cast member, big or small
  • Unpack every literary, art and film reference
  • Every car
  • Every doctor joke, every dentist joke, every California joke, every Hollywood joke, every Television joke.
  • Every time someone is in therapy, talks about therapy, refers to therapy, refers to a therapist and generally we just tagged anything about therapy.
  • More. Lots more.

Volume 1 covers Allen’s first six films.

Cool stuff you will find in Volume 1

  • A list and descriptions of as many Annie Hall deleted scenes that have ever been mentioned, leaked, or otherwise discovered.
  • The weird cameo by Sidney Lumet‘s dad.
  • Enough info on all those Russian writers and books referenced in Love And Death so you can totally fake it.
  • What Isaac Asimov thought of the science fiction bits of Sleeper
  • A terrible cover that I just mocked up. Someone help me.
  • More.

Now here’s the cool bit. Because we are new to this world, we just set it to be the absolutely cheapest that Kindle and the iBookstore would let us. But using that technology, we can offer free updates which we 100% intend to do. With this website, we are always finding out more about the films. New information emerges, we will update. We want these guides to live and grow. Because Allen never stops.

The ambition is to make a great physical book, with every volume collected together. But that costs money, and we want to license photos and do a lavishly illustrated version. Once we work out the kinks, we will look at launching a Kickstarter or something.

But right now – your ideas and feedback are what we need. We will do some giveaways on our social media accounts in the coming days. And of course, buying the book also helps us run the site, pay for the hosting, find the time and make this happen.

If you’ve been thinking about rewatching every Woody Allen film again, or just go back to Annie Hall, there’s bound to be something new in our book to help you see the films in a new way.

Amazon US

Amazon UK

iBooks

The Woody Allen Pages – The Watcher’s Guide Volume 1 – William Miller

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2 Comments

  1. Very cool. I look forward to checking this out. I haven’t watched the “early funny” films in a long long time so I’m sure there’s plenty about them that I either forgot or never knew. I don’t think I ever watched “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex” at all and I’m pretty sure I’ve only watched “Love and Death” once when I was in High School. The other 4 films I’m more familiar with and have re-watched many times over the years. I hope you plan to cover “Play it Again, Sam” and other early films that Woody had a hand in but didn’t direct.

    All the best
    Jack

  2. Thanks Jack. Not sure about Play…Allen himself has discounted it, even though it did a lot for his career. We’ll definitely do all his directed work first – volume 2 will cover Interiors to Broadway Danny Rose.

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