Aren’t we all aware by now that Woody Allen is not putting on an act? That’s my theory anyway. I think he’s so good at playing the Woody Allen character because it’s not really a character…it’s a slightly caricature-ized version of the real person. Lloyd Grove adds evidence to my theory with this account:

Woody Allen stood in a corner of the River Café last night, hard by the exit, and beheld a seething mob of celebrities come to Brooklyn to celebrate the auteur’s latest film, Whatever Works. The expression on his face: Mild alarm, in danger of escalating to silent scream. All those comically lugubrious themes in Allen’s movies—including this one—about the insignificance of human existence, the indifference of the cosmos, the impossibility of sustained happiness? It’s apparently not a pose—this guy actually believes it.

Inside Woody Allen’s Brooklyn Party – The Daily Beast