Woody Allen Boxes a Kangaroo, 1966

Last month, we fea­tured Woody Allen answer­ing thir­teen unusu­al ques­tions from Robert B. Wei­de’s film Woody Allen: A Doc­u­men­tary. Well, it turns out that it was­n’t the only unusu­al footage the doc­u­men­tary had to offer. Dur­ing the 1960s, the young com­ic did what­ev­er his man­agers (Charles H. Joffe and Jack Rollins) thought would enhance his pub­lic pro­file. Some of his ear­ly per­for­mances and stunts were genius. Oth­ers flopped. You decide where this one falls. In 1966, Allen appeared on Hip­po­drome, a British vari­ety TV show that show­cased jump­ing dogs, trapeze acts, musi­cal acts and … kan­ga­roo box­ing match­es. This match went one round, with the Aus­tralian light heavy­weight cham­pi­on land­ing the only punch­es.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Thomas Edison’s Box­ing Cats (1894), or Where the LOL­Cats All Began

Muham­mad Ali Plans to Fight on Mars in Lost 1966 Inter­view

Woody Allen and the Rev­erend Bil­ly Gra­ham In Con­ver­sa­tion