The writer and director Woody Allen has invited Carla Bruni, the wife of the French President, to appear in a forthcoming film. “I cannot in my life miss an opportunity like this,” she told the television channel Canal Plus. He started as a scriptwriter and stand-up comic and has won awards for films such as Annie Hall and Hannah and Her Sisters. He tries to make a film a year, alternating comedies with drama. His latest film You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, due for release next year, stars Sir Anthony Hopkins. He has no thoughts of slowing down: “I’d be doing the same things as I do now; sitting at home writing a play. So I don’t know what else I would do with my time.” Woody Allen is 74 today. RGT
Birthdays today
Gordon Crosse, composer, 72; Mike Denness, cricketer, 69; Keith Michell, actor, 81; Bette Midler, singer and actress, 64; Stephen Poliakoff, playwright, 57; Andy Ripley, rugby player, 62; Lee Trevino, golfer, 70; Baroness Willoughby de Eresby, a trustee, National Portrait Gallery, 1994-2004, 75.