Anything Else will likely be the title of the next Woody Allen film which the prolific director is planning to start shooting on June 3 in New York City. Starring Jason Biggs, Christina Ricci, Glenn Close and Danny De Vito, the film is a more serious comedy than his more recent films, said Allen at the weekend as he conducted interviews for his 32nd film Hollywood Ending which will be the opening night film at next month's Cannes Film Festival.

"It's a character comedy without a comic idea like Small Time Crooks or Hollywood Ending," he said. "It's about people and relationships. I think I'm going to title it Anything Else."

DreamWorks SKG will again handle domestic rights on the film, but German financier/distributor VCL is no longer involved with Allen and this time UK-based Capitol Films will handle direct territorial sales on his behalf.

"VCL was delightful to work with," he told Screendaily. "I loved them and wish I could still be working with them, but they were not able to do it so I just moved on to another source. This time each of the territories will give me a certain amount of money for the right to distribute it in that country."

Capitol had sold The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion (2001) and Hollywood Ending (2002) on behalf of VCL, but moves into a direct relationship with Allen on Anything Else.

Meanwhile Allen was quick to dispel rumours that he deliberately foiled the Venice Film Festival by opting to unveil Hollywood Ending at Cannes this year. "I don't know why anyone would think it was a political decision in the first place," he said. "I've never gone to Venice or Cannes or any film festival in my life. I've let my films be shown in Venice and Cannes. I love both those festivals. My film was finished and ready to go in May and the Cannes Film Festival is in May. If it was ready to go in September, I'm sure they would have shown it in the Venice Film Festival."

However, Allen will attend Cannes, marking his first attendance of any film festival. "For many years, the French people have been very affectionate towards my films," he explained. "They were the first ones in Europe to embrace my films and they've always invited me to Cannes and I've never gone, so I felt I wanted to go this time to say in some way that I appreciate all that support and affection. I felt this picture was the perfect one to go with because I thought the French would really get a kick out of it."

In Hollywood Ending, Allen plays a neurotic film director fallen on hard times, who is offered a $60m Hollywood movie by the studio chief who is now dating his ex-wife. What's more, she is the studio executive appointed to work on the picture. He accepts the offer, but, just as he is about to start shooting, is struck by a bad case of psychosomatic blindness. Allen stars in the film opposite Tea Leoni, Treat Williams, Mark Rydell, Debra Messing and George Hamilton.