Just A Minute With: Woody Allen on nostalgia, scandal

A. "I think I gain something in the translation ... I make a film and all over Europe, all over the world, they love it, because possibly they are not seeing my mistakes."

Q. Are you too much for the Middle American mentality?

A. "Yes, we are a very religious country, but to me that is their problem. I don't subscribe to it. I am not religious or prudish. In that way I am slightly more European, but you will find that a certain amount of that more in New York, I think, rather than the rest of the country. New York is the closest we have to a European city. As you get out in the country it doesn't become a very puritanical and very raised eyebrows, but you can't give in an inch to that because that way lies sterility and death."

Q. Still, critics like this film. Do you think America is ready to forgive you for your past scandals?

A: "What was the scandal? I fell in love with this girl, married her. We have been married for almost 15 years now.

"There was no scandal, but people refer to it all the time as a scandal and I kind of like that in way because when I go I would like to say I had one real juicy scandal in my life."

Q. Do you miss filming in Central Park in 'the fall'?

A. "No, I love new York. And I am sure I will come back and work here, the only two things that have kept me from here is when a foreign place has put up the money and insisted that I work there or I couldn't afford to work here."

Q. Will your next film in Italy be inspired by Fellini?

A. "No. Why Fellini? ... Why not Antonioni? No, it is not inspired by anybody. It is just a comedy, not a romantic comedy, but an out-and-out comedy."

(Editing by Patricia Reaney)