Woody Allen has given a rare defence of his relationship with his wife Soon-Yi Previn.
The film director, now 84, started dating Soon-Yi, the adopted daughter of his ex Mia Farrow and Andre Previn, when he was 56 and she was 21.
They have now been married for 21 years and share two adopted daughters, Bechet, 22, and Manzie, 20.
He has insisted that the relationship wasn't "exploitative" and though it looked "irrational" to the outside world it "works" for them.
A defiant Allen told the Daily Mail's Event magazine : "I admit, it didn't make sense when our relationship started.
"On the surface we looked like an irrational match. I was much older and she was an adopted kid.
"It looked to the outside world that it was an exploitative situation – that I would exploit her as an older predatory male, and she would exploit me for whatever I had.
"That was never the case.
"In the past, I had always gone out with actresses, but for whatever inexplicable reason, with Soon-Yi it worked."
Mia Farrow previously told how she uncovered the affair between her adopted daughter and Allen when she came across erotic pictures of them together.
In his recently released memoir Apropos of Nothing Allen spoke about the beginning of their relationship.
He said Soon-Yi was "ready to ripen superbly if only someone would show her some love" when they first got together.
The relationship went public around the same time his daughter Dylan alleged Allen sexually molested her when she was seven.
Allen has always denied the allegations.
