James Dolan reportedly banned Woody Allen from MSG VIP lounge

Woody Allen is no longer allowed inside a VIP suite in Madison Square Garden after declining a request to do some promotional work for MSG Network, according to a report.

The four-time Academy Award-winning filmmaker, whose love affair with New York and the Knicks has been expressed throughout his movie career, has been a regular at “Suite 200”, which is the name of the VIP lounge celebrities hang out in before and during halftime of games. But the New York Post says Allen is no longer welcome in there after declining to do promotion for MSG Network or the Garden of Dreams Foundation.

The Post says MSG bought the rights to some of Allen’s movies and asked him to do some specials for them where he would talk about the movies or introduce them.

“Woody said he would not be comfortable doing that,” The Post quoted a source as saying. “He has never done that for any show or network. They then said that this was a ‘reciprocal arrangement’ and that if Woody couldn’t go on TV for them, he should not eat in their VIP restaurant anymore. Woody said fine and thanked them for the many years he had enjoyed the space there.”

Is anyone really surprised by this? Dolan is the same guy who has his head coach followed and who told his dance team to stop dancing because they were losing. He sounds like a real charmer.

I’d love to see Woody weave this storyline into one of his next movies, but I doubt he will. You know Larry David absolutely would if that happened to him.