Farrow Family Follies

[samhexum]

Following several celebrity denouncements against Woody Allen in the recent months, Moses Farrow continues to support his adopted father and details alleged abuse from his adopted mother, Mia Farrow, in a new essay published Wednesday.

 

“I’m a very private person and not at all interested in public attention,” Moses, 40, writes. “But, given the incredibly inaccurate and misleading attacks on my father, Woody Allen, I feel that I can no longer stay silent as he continues to be condemned for a crime he did not commit.”

 

Moses was adopted from South Korea by Mia Farrow when he was 2 years old and was then co-adopted by Allen in 1992. Moses, who now works as a family therapist and photographer, says the “fatal dysfunction within my childhood home had nothing to do with Woody.”

 

“It pains me to recall instances in which I witnessed siblings, some blind or physically disabled, dragged down a flight of stairs to be thrown into a bedroom or a closet, then having the door locked from the outside,” he wrote of Mia. “She even shut my brother Thaddeus, paraplegic from polio, in an outdoor shed overnight as punishment for a minor transgression.”

 

Dylan Farrow wrote an open letter in The New York Times detailing alleged sexual assault at the hands of her adopted father, Woody Allen. She wrote in detail about a train set that was making a loop around the attic where the alleged assault took place.

 

In his new essay, Moses details his version of Aug. 4, 1992, writing, “It’s a precise and compelling narrative, but there’s a major problem: there was no electric train set in that attic. There was, in fact, no way for kids to play up there, even if we had wanted to. It was an unfinished crawl space …”

 

Moses has been publicly defending Allensince Dylan wrote the Times essay in 2014. He has been estranged from his adopted mother for many years.

 

Toward the end of the essay he addresses both Dylan and Mia.

 

To my sister Dylan: Like you, I believe in the power of speaking out. I have broken my silence about the abuse inflicted by our mother. My healing began only after getting away from her. And what she has done to you is unbearable. I wish you peace, and the wisdom to understand that devoting your life to helping our mother destroy our father’s reputation is unlikely to bring you closure in any kind of lasting way.

 

Finally, to my mother: One thing you always said you appreciated about me was my ability to listen. I listened to you for years and held your truth above all others. You once said to me, “It’s not healthy to hold onto anger.” Yet here we are, 26 years later. I’m guessing your next step will be to launch a campaign to discredit me for speaking out. I know it comes with the territory. And it’s a burden I am willing to bear. But, after all this time, enough is enough. You and I both know the truth. And it’s time for this retribution to end.

 

Dylan responded on Wednesday afternoon by saying, “As I said when he last made these claims, this is an attempt to deflect from a credible allegation made by an adult woman, by trying to impugn my mother who has only ever been supportive of me and my siblings. It’s easily disproven, contradicts years of his own statements, is beyond hurtful to me personally, and is part of a larger effort to discredit and distract from my assault. My brother is a troubled person. I’m so sorry he’s doing this.”

 

A rep for Mia Farrow did not immediately return our request for comment.

[samhexum]

Ronan Farrow, the 30-year-old journalist son of Mia Farrow and Woody Allen, defended his mother and reiterated his belief in sister Dylan Farrow’s childhood abuse allegations against Allen, after his brother Moses penned a scathing personal essay earlier this week.

 

“Not worth saying much to dignify the repeated campaign to discredit my sister, often by attacking our mother,” Ronan Farrow wrote in a statementposted on social media on Thursday. “This happens every time Dylan speaks, so this is all I’ll offer: My mother did an extraordinary job raising us, and none of my siblings with whom I’ve spoken ever witnessed anything but love and care from a single mom who went through hell to keep her kids safe.”

 

He continued, “Our brother Moses said the same thing in statements dating back many years. After relentless legal scrutiny of my mother’s parenting—and efforts to discredit her—she was granted sole custody to protect us from Woody Allen. We all grew up with offers from him to speak out against our mother in exchange for support. (He made helping to pay for my college education contingent on turning against her and lying. I declined.) … I believe my sister.”

 

Moses, who was adopted by Mia from South Korea when he was 2 years old, claimed in an essay on Wednesday that he witnessed his mom physically abuse his siblings, including Allen’s now-wife, Soon-Yi Previn. Moses also defended Allen against 32-year-old Dylan’s claims that she was sexually abused as a child.

 

Allen has vehemently denied the abuse allegations. A rep for Mia Farrow did not immediately return our request for comment when asked about Moses’ accusations.

 

Moses, now 40, writes in the essay that he witnessed Mia coaching Dylan on what to say and that previously denouncing Allen “remains the biggest regret of my life.”

 

On Wednesday afternoon, Dylan responded to Moses’ essay, writing on social media, “My brother is a troubled person. I’m so sorry he’s doing this.”

 

Earlier this year, Ronan won a Pulitzer Prize for his exposé on Harvey Weinstein in the New Yorker.

[+ friendofsheila]

Dirty laundry. Yuck.