Woody Allen Fails to Step to Ricky Gervais

Today “Rush & Molloy� makes a valiant attempt to fan the flames of discord between Ricky Gervais and Woody Allen, asking the director what he thought of Gervais’s comments last month that “Woody Allen isn’t Woody Allen anymore.� Gervais, telling an interviewer he’d been offered a role in one of Allen’s films, said he pulled out after deciding Allen was just seduced by British accents and didn’t recognize good acting anymore.

Sadly, Allen failed to take the bait. “I am charmed by British accents — definitely,� he said at this week’s premiere of Cassandra’s Dream. But is Woody Allen Woody Allen anymore? “I don’t know what [Gervais] means. I have no idea what picture we offered him. He may be 100 percent right for all I know.� Crap, this means we won’t get to see what likely would have been the funniest celebrity feud in years. Could you imagine these two trading snaps and exchanging angry YouTube videos? Come on, Woody, take a potshot at Ricky! Call him fat! Claim you didn’t cast him because his British accent sounded fake! Loudly proclaim you prefer the American Office to the British one! It seems a shame to let this opportunity slip away.

A pain in Spain for Woody Allen [NYDN]