I’m going to add this to the Bergman Obit Master List in a moment, but I just had to excerpt this great quote from Richard Corliss’ interview with Woody Allen about Ingmar Bergman for TIME. With all the inflation of Bergman’s legacy in the past few days, it’s interesting that his greatest (or, at least, most famous) fan seems determined to prove that Bergman was really just like any hack director: nervous about where to put the camera and neurotic about making money and appeasing the studios.

Woody Allen: [Bergman] and I had dinner in his New York hotel suite; it was a great treat for me. I was nervous, I really didn’t want to go. But he was not at all what you might expect: the formidable, dark, brooding genius. He was a regular guy. He commiserated with me about low box-office grosses and women and having to put up with studios.

Later, he’d speak to me by phone from his oddball little island [Faro, where Bergman lived his last 40 years]. He confided about his irrational dreams: for instance, that he would show up on the set and not know where to put the camera and be completely panic-stricken. He’d have to wake up and tell himself that he is an experienced, respected director and he certainly does know where to put the camera. But that anxiety was with him long after he had created 15, 20 masterpieces.

TIME: You knew he was Ingmar Bergman, but maybe he didn’t. He didn’t get to view his reputation from the outside.

ALLEN: Exactly. The world saw him as a genius, and he was worrying about the weekend grosses.

In semi-related news, Allen’s latest, Cassandra’s Dream, has been added to the lineup of the 2007 Toronto Film Festival. I’ll be there, and I can’t wait to see it.