Topless Feminist Activists Disrupt Woody Allen’s Germany Jazz Concert
Woody Allen appeared unperturbed after two topless feminist activists stormed the stage where he and his New Orleans Jazz Band were playing their concert in Germany Tuesday evening.
The filmmaker, who was happily sitting front and center amid his bandmates, had his eyes closed as he played the clarinet when two women hopped onstage in nothing but black pants, white sneakers and flowers in their hair and began shouting lines from Dylan Farrow’s 2014 open letter to her father.
The women – who have yet to be identified – had their torsos painted with quotes from Farrow’s letter, which detailed Allen’s alleged sexual abuse, according to Femen‘s Facebook page.
In video clips of the incident shared to YouTube, the crowd can be heard booing the women as they pace around the Elbphilharmonie concert hall stage for a few minutes. Security guards quickly pulled the pair offstage and they were escorted out of the venue.
The activists later released their letter to the press, according to The Hollywood Reporter, and it reads (as translated from German): “Although the incident occurred decades ago, Dylan (now 31) is still suffering the consequences. Woody Allen is not just the neurotic and charming director, actor and musician, but a father who likes to stick his finger in his daughter. We’d like to remind the world, and jazz fans, of that fact.”
Allen and his band continued with their performance following the protestors’ disruption, and Variety reports that the group even received a standing ovation at the end of the concert.
After the show, activists stationed outside the Elbphilharmonie handed out leaflets to departing patrons, explaining that they did not want “to spoil the evening,” but rather, were hoping “to give the victims of sexual violence a voice,” according to broadcaster NDR.
Allen has long denied Farrow’s claims that he was sexually abusive toward his adoptive daughter, even penning an op-ed for the The New York Times suggesting that Farrow had been coached by her mother, Allen’s ex-wife Mia Farrow. (Allen and Mia famously split in 1992 after it was discovered that he had been having an affair with their adoptive daughter Soon-Yi Previn. Allen and Previn later married.)
Local news publisher SHZ later reported that Allen issued a short statement calling the Tuesday protest “stupid.”