A Personal Note on Allen/Farrow and a Plea For Sanity
Monday, February 3, 2014 at 6:15PM I'm about to pull a Hannah Horvath and make something that's not about me entirely about me for a moment but... I had a really difficult week. As long time readers undoubtedly now, Woody Allen and Mia Farrow as artists and as a unit were largely responsible for making me the cinephile that I am today. The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) was a major turning point in my life, the moment that I realized innately if not quite in a self-aware way, how much the movies meant to me.
Woody & Mia in the 80s
I will never be able to thank either of them enough for that gift. Were it not for them, and over the rest of the 80s an actress we should probably just call "Michellyl Glenn Turnstreepfer", I would not be the person I am and you would never have read The Film Experience as it would not exist.
So Allen and Farrow were a superhero duo to wee Nathaniel and their movies, events. To this day, I'd rather think of them that way. I turned up every year from 1984 (Broadway Danny Rose, my older brother drove me because he said "it looks funny") through 1992 (Husbands and Wives, their last film together) even when I had to drag reluctant family or friends. The catatrosphic end of their relationship -- there's no other word for it -- drove Farrow away from Hollywood and thus tarnished her justified place in film history (I hate how often I've had to explain her career/celebrity/talent to people over the years) and permanently tarnished Woody's own reputation; no one who has ever been accused of child molestation, whether or not they are convicted (and Woody was never even charged), is ever presumed innocent again. [more...]
As for me, I will always opt for separating the art from the artist. I wish more people could take the advice of Roman Polanski's victim Samantha Geimer, who urged us to do this when speaking out on the Woody Allen topic very recently to Huffington Post.
Either you’re going to say you separate the art from the artist or you’re not. If you don’t like his movies and they creep you out, don’t see them. If you don’t like him, don’t see his movies.I think it’s kind of a personal choice, what you spend your money on. I don’t think anybody has a place to forgive him but his own family. As far as a public boycott, I think we should save that for public corporations that are doing harm, not artists who make movies.
I have to separate the art from the artist in the case of both Woody Allen and Mia Farrow, neither of whom have (to me) ever come off well in regards to the subject of Dylan Farrow, but who have made indelible contributions to the world of cinema and comedy and cinema and humanitarian endeavors, respectively. I've heard people on the internet boasting on various websites and on twitter that they can't even think of the name of a Woody Allen movie, as if cultural ignorance is a badge of pride, or that they'll never watch one of his movies again, as if boycotting a huge swath of modern cinema will somehow ease Dylan's pain.
This is glibber than I feel but there is truth to it:
Oh jesus. You're not a hero if you stop watching Woody Allen movies. Take that self-congratulatory righteousness and donate to RAINN.
— Vincent Scarpa (@vincentscarpa) February 1, 2014
And here is how to donate to RAINN if you'd like to... which is undoubtedly a better use of your resources than condemning Woody Allen or Mia Farrow (whichever "side" you're on, if you've felt the need to choose one).
I was publicly attacked on twitter recently by someone I was once online-friendly-with for merely suggesting that people ought to know facts before they passed judgment. I was concerned that people were forgetting that "innocent until proven guilty" is the backbone of our whole judicial system and as much as I may feel for Dylan Farrow, I have to admit that the health of our entire nation's legal system is more important to me than her personal journey. I was very aware of this case back when it first reared up and read about it voraciously. "Reading about it voraciously" back in the early-mid 90s was much less time consuming and produced more rational responses since the internet did not provide an instant feedback loop and you had to wait it out between articles. I don't think it makes me a bad person (though some obviously do think so) to admit that I'm far more comfortable with our legal system sorting these gordian knots out than the court of public opinion.
Or as @jazzt put it recently on twitter: "are twitter and open letters the new judiciary?" If so we're all doomed. The internet doesn't really encourage nuanced thinking at least not in 140 character increments and in anything written very quickly (as the bulk of internet articles are). Binary thinking is just terrible for complex situations.
In case you missed any of they key statements articles that people have been discussing they are like so:
- Vanity Fair -the original Mia Farrow article... published during Husbands and Wives release in 1992
- The New York Times - Dylan's Open Letter about her abuse. This was published on Nicolas Krystof's blog. He is friends with Mia Farrow and Ronan Farrow.
- The Daily Beast - Robert Weide attempts to clear up some misperceptions of what originally went down with the investigation and lack of legal proceedings. He is friends with (and a documentarian of) Woody Allen. (I have seen many attack on this article but I would like to note that most of the issues that people seem to take with this piece, apart from its tone, is with its opening gambit of 10 falsehoods about Woody's relationships to both Mia Farrow and Soon-Yi Farrow Previn. This saddens me because these are all verifiable and people would do well to know of what they speak. The only non-facts listed, if you want to get technical are points #5 (how could he know about the last sentence?) and points #9 which is more of an observation of perception... but as someone who lived through the first media war, I can also attest it is basically true since I heard people saing awful and racist things about SoonYi back then.
- CNN Woody's Legal Team Statement
- The Guardian -Michael Wolff claims that the Farrow family is in the Anti-Woody business and stand to benefit from his downfall
- Hollywood Elsewhere Cate Blanchett's Statement to Jeffrey Wells at the Santa Barbara Film Festival
What still might be coming? Some people suspect Moses Farrow, estranged from his mother Mia and friendly with Woody Allen again, might weigh in but I personally doubt it*. Woody Allen's team says Woody himself will soon make a public statement.
*UPDATE (2/5/14): Wrong. Moses has come forward saying that Woody is innocent and that Mia poisoned the children against him and also beat him as a child. Dylan denies her older brother's new claims.
Naturally most of those articles are condemned by some as being "garbage" or agenda-laden, particularly since the people writing them are friendly with either Allen or Farrow and thus have career-interest in making them look good. Yet even in the "balanced" articles there is the whiff of judgement. Take Catherine Shoard's recap article on all of this in The Guardian. It's mostly just journalistic news-sharing but for the brilliantly sly way she describes the plot of Blue Jasmine at the end of the article.
The film tells the story of a wealthy New York socialite and pathological liar whose inability to control her rage on learning of her husband's infidelity leads to the whole family's downfall.
That is a skillfull and funny "Guilty!" verdict right there* cause you could just as easily describe the plot like so, i'll illustrate.
"the film tells the story of a wealthy New York socialite who is driven to madness by her husband's infidelity and criminal behavior which leads to the whole family's downfall."
...which redirects the anger at Woody as if it were written by Mia. It's also equally true.
*UPDATE (2/4/14): I have since received clarification about this from Ms. Shoard who did not intend it the way I read it. Which only further underlines the point that phrasing and multiple possible interpretations make talking about this incident and the articles surrounding it very challenging.
When I was suggesting that people think about the entire history of this case and not just one open letter 20 years later, I was told that this meant I was advocating silencing the victims. Which is a strange charge. Shouldn't we want more than one voice in any complicated situation where whole lives and reputations, and several of them, too, hang in the balance? I understand the passionate advocacy yet even here I find the rhetoric overblown. How is anyone silencing the former Dylan Farrow or even advocating silence? I don't mean to joke, but I kinda have to: If an Open Letter in the New York Times is considered silence, what is shouting?
More disheartening (at least at this very moment) than any facts -- especially since you and I will never be fully privvy to most of them -- is the angry overheated rhetoric on the internet which seems, by and large, to be arguing that the presumption of innocence until someone is proven guilty is an outdated notion that we simply have no use for. Or as Mark Harris so succinctly and smartly tweeted...
A) "Innocent until proven guilty" and "All accusations are true" don't go well together. B) I don't know. C) YOU don't know. So don't guess?
— Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) February 2, 2014
Naturally someone took offense to his sensible balancing act as well calling it 'cut from rape cloth'.
But here is the current 100% most tragic aspect of all of this given that it requires no proof of any sort and applies to any perceived truth on either side of what transpired. Whether Dylan Farrow's recollection of events from her childhood is a) 100% accurate, b) a mix of fantasy, misunderstandings, and agenda-laden misdirection/brainwashing or 3) some mix of the two... and certainly one of those three options must be true... they're all totally traumatizing. So it's impossible not to feel for her or deny that she's the victim in all of this.
Still and all, I wish that Farrow, in her personal grief, hadn't begun lashing out at blameless people who had nothing to do with her victimization. There is no need to compound the tragedy by dragging other faultless people into it. Apart from Diane Keaton none of the other people name-checked had ever even met Woody or Mia or Dylan at the time. Unfortunately the internet, in its bottomless need for drama and people, in their bottomless need to feel superior to other people, have focused on this part of her letter in which Dylan calls out Diane Keaton, Alec Baldwin and Cate Blanchett (and other celebrities who have worked with Woody Allen) and we start to get pieces like 'Ethical Dilemmas hang over the Oscars' or a wave of tasteless punditry pieces like 'Does this hurt Cate Blanchett's Oscar chances' (and no I will not link to any of those tacky articles). Dylan also (indirectly) calls out all people who have ever loved a Woody Allen movie, which is really just a step way too far.
FACT: Diane Keaton, Alec Baldwin, and Cate Blanchett, and You (if you've ever loved a Woody Allen movie) and I have nothing at all to do with Dylan Farrow's abuse as a child. Let's just stop with that nonsense, even though it's born from a place of understandable grief.
Many people on the internet this week have been, even possibly without realizing it, asking for a world in which we accept that all allegations are true (no need for laws, investigations, courts, professionals to determine veracity) and for which the result should be banishment from society and/or imprisonment. But this scorched earth desire would result in an ugly world that I think none of us would be comfortable living in and it would most certainly be bereft of a healthy artistic culture. Let me explain. Do we really want to go back to the McCarthy era mentality of the blacklist? Once you begin to banish or shame artists because of professional relationships, friendships, biological relations, associations and belief systems including "innocent until proven guilty", who is ever going to escape the all consuming fire of it? Do we also have to condemn their fans as Dylan indirectly suggests? I mean, I'm not going to suddenly start pretending I don't love The Purple Rose of Cairo, Manhattan, Annie Hall and Hannah and Her Sisters and to anybody who thinks that makes me a bad person - 'nice knowing ya!'
If Diane Keaton and Cate Blanchett should be publicly dissed for being friends or professional colleagues with Woody Allen and if Mia Farrow should be publicly shamed for staying friends with Roman Polanski and for having a brother who is in jail for child molestation, where do we stop? Where do we draw the line? When do we stop compounding the tragedy? Do we really want a world where no one who has ever been accused of a crime is allowed to have any friends or colleagues or family who can risk being associated with them. I don't even want that for hardened criminals since everyone needs people to love them unconditionally no matter what heinous things they've done.
Once people calm down -- I fear Woody Allen's impending statement will only reignite fury on both sides -- I hope I will be less lonely in the place of choosing to reserve judgment and leave the legal system and the families involved to sort this all out privately (not that some of them don't want it to be public) without the ignorant chorus of people (including me) who weren't there and who know much less about everything to interpet anything they don't like as "garbage" and the rest as "perfect truth" adding more fuel to this very sad bonfire.
As per usual Cate Blanchett seems the wisest person in the room. Her response, via Jeffrey Wells:
It’s obviously been a long and painful situation for the family and I hope they find some sort of resolution and peace.
What she said. And only that.
Reader Comments (128)
If we the Internet aren't supposed to choose sides in this Woody/Mia debate until knowing more facts, I don't see why you felt the need to run your mouth about this topic for as long as you did in this "article."
Lisa, I'm black and I agree that Woody Allen has a complicated relationship/erm...interesting ideas about people of color (let's just say that). I do think that this charge is levied against him in a disproportionately unfair manner in that I don't think he's any more racist than Hollywood in general. And he did make Melinda and Melinda, which has a black main character. But I do agree in general that claims of racism (by omission and lack of representation) are not accusations that Woody Allen can refute with any real modicum of truth when you look at his overall film output.
To be fair, though...you say that Nathaniel is not acknowledging his bias, but this whole essay (even the title) is a pretty clear admission of bias going in, isn't it? He starts off by talking about how formative Allen's films have been to his cinematic narrative, etc, etc. Anyway, you get my point and I'll leave it at that. He's perfectly capable of defending himself if he wants to and I know I bristle when people try to speak to me, but I think this article is full of admission and owning of bias. Just my two cents.
Also, re: the OJ thing and the George Zimmerman thing, I hear you in that there weren't witnesses to those crimes, yet there is general public acceptance of what probably happened. True. I think that trying to draw those parallels to the Allen scenario is problematic in that Nicole Brown is dead. Trayvon Martin...is dead. And we have a 911 call that provides audio of the events leading up to his death. Because these two people are (tragically and senselessly) dead, there is no question that at the very least, a crime was committed. That's why prosecuting rape is so very difficult and fraught with complications. Because so much of it is determining whether a crime took place. I'm talking in circles. I just think that we have so little of the information in this case. Party of me honestly wishes that they had just gone forward with a trial back when the allegations actually happened, but I recognize it's not my place to question how this family chose to handle this very messy situation.
This is pointless. Kudos to nathaniel for having the balls to talk about this in an objective manner and face the wrath of the indignated internet crowd. He may very well have lost the respect of some his followers but they re but a drop in the sea. The price of fame
Is high. Celebrities are vulnerable to the judgement of the masses. And there will always be people who think they got it figured it out based on an article. Hopefully i ll be able to protect my children from real pedophiles, vindictive lovers and angry poorly
Informed internet "commentators". They are all bad for us.
@TPKIA You can't be completely objective if you are biased. That is my point, he's biased, just like everyone else fans of Woody are going to biased and be waay more objective because it's someone you like. People who don't like him are going to biased too. I would rather hear from someone who is pretty neutral or who has never even seen a Woody Allen film.
Thank you Nathaniel for sharing your thoughts. I especially appreciated the contrasting synopses for Blue Jasmine that you provided. It reminded me of the synopsis for The Wizard of Oz that was penned by tv columnist Rick Polito:
"Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets and then teams up with three strangers to kill again."
The Mia/Woody/Dylan/Ronan/Moses/Soon-Yi war is an example of how "truth" is elusive and the same story can be viewed from a variety of perspectives. If Pirandello were still around, this is the kind of material he might be mining for a new play ("Six Characters In Search Of An Audience?"). It's a theme Pirandello really mined to great effect in his novel "One, No One, and One Hundred Thousand."
I'm also reminded of the scene in "Doubt" (which I watched this weekend as a way to remember Phillip Seymour Hoffman's artistry) where Father Flynn delivers a sermon on the theme of "gossip." It's worth reading in its entirety:
"A woman was gossiping with her friend about a man whom they hardly knew - I know none of you have ever done this. That night, she had a dream: a great hand appeared over her and pointed down on her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession. She got the old parish priest, Father O' Rourke, and she told him the whole thing. 'Is gossiping a sin?' she asked the old man. 'Was that God All Mighty's hand pointing down at me? Should I ask for your absolution? Father, have I done something wrong?' 'Yes,' Father O' Rourke answered her. 'Yes, you ignorant, badly-brought-up female. You have blamed false witness on your neighbor. You played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed.' So, the woman said she was sorry, and asked for forgiveness. 'Not so fast,' says O' Rourke. 'I want you to go home, take a pillow upon your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me.' So, the woman went home: took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to her roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed. 'Did you gut the pillow with a knife?' he says. 'Yes, Father.' 'And what were the results?' 'Feathers,' she said. 'Feathers?' he repeated. 'Feathers; everywhere, Father.' 'Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out onto the wind,' 'Well,' she said, 'it can't be done. I don't know where they went. The wind took them all over.' 'And that,' said Father O' Rourke, 'is gossip!' "
A clip of this scene is available here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OwpGUI-TAI
What I find interesting with respect to the many comments that this story has generated (not just the comments in this thread, but generally), is that Soon-Yi is so often rendered invisible. I admire the fact that she has stayed out of the fray (perhaps proof, if any was necessary, that she is a woman of uncommon intelligence?).
But Soon-Yi is Mia's daughter too. And she is Ronan's sister. Isn't it at least worthwhile to point out that the actions they engage in, actions which some portray as taking a courageous stand in support of a family member, are harmful to Soon-Yi and her two children (Mia's grandchildren and Ronan's nieces). Or is Soon-Yi not "really" a daughter/sister because she is adopted? Or, having made her choice to marry and raise a family with Woody, has Soon-Yi forfeited any claim to the kind of compassion and humanity that everyone seems ready to accord to Dylan? Or that Mia, by her silence, seems to have accorded to her brother notwithstanding the fact that he is a convicted child molester (a crime far graver, I would suggest, than "stealing" your mother's boyfriend).
Woody Allen is not the only one who suffers from the very public battle that Mia, Ronan, Dylan and their supporters are engaging in. Even assuming that he did, in fact, violate Dylan their public battle against him hurts other parties in very real ways. Which is why, assuming family matters to them and closure and healing are what everyone is after, the media blitz and public battles seems a very wrong way of approaching the problem.
And why Soon-Yi and her silence earn my respect.
@davide
Another biased poster
Yes Soon-Yi has everything to do with what happened with Dylan and Woody in the attic.RIGHT.
I personally think that any who is a fan of Woody and anyone who isn't....just shut the fuck up. Your opinions are useless and holds no weight whatsoever.
Lisa:
you are the most biased of all.
@Gustavo
Oh, Honey, unlike the rest of you I've admitted my bias from the start. When will the rest of you admit yours????
I too had wondered how this would be different if it were non-famous people but came to the opposite conclusion than other commenters. Joe Smith, investigated but not charged or convicted, could move town and start anew. After a while no-one would mention it and the accusers/victims would not be reminded. That isn't a comparison that applies.
Nathaniel- What I really don't like about this whole conversation is that the sides in focus is not Dylan-Woody but Woody vs. The Farrows as a monolith. Somehow, Mia's whole life factors into this debate. Ronan's TV aspirations and certifiable genius. The plot of revenge. That this is supposedly all about taking Blue Jasmine down in the Oscar race. That Dylan is still being coached in some way to do this despite being a grown woman. It's as if these cannot be a person vs. a person but Mia Farrow's associations cloud a lot of people's views. Why? Why should Dylan's word be held against her because her mother spoke to Roman Polanski's character in a civil trial?
Anyway, I'm sorry but that Bob Wiede piece is trash and not journalism. Anybody on the Woody side who uses it should be properly called to the floor for doing so. Also, don't mention The Hunt or The Celebration or Doubt or any cinematic inspiration that you are taking for this real-life controversy. As a cinephile, please, take a break. NOT EVERYTHING YOU HAVE SEEN ON YOUR TV/MOVIE SCREEN IS APPLICABLE TO REAL-LIFE. And no, I am not even sure I want to hear about Capturing The Friedmans at this point in time.
Let me also just say while what Dylan described in her letter is something I have not been through to this very day, I remember being touched inappropriately by an aunt's friend in a restaurant bathroom. She was drunk, but I was 8 and this is the first time I have ever discussed it with anyone. It was effed up. I never saw this person again but occasionally the memory of it would trigger it all back. She was not a public figure. She was just bigger than me at the time and refused to stop when I screamed no, a call that nobody heard, and I froze and remained quiet until she let go of me. I overheard my relatives note the drunken behavior of the particular group of friends and never found the courage to tell them what happened because it seemed that the behavior felt sanctioned. So Dylan Farrow saying what she said and then seeing people, people who made this issue more about Mia vs. Woody, act like this is just for publicity, that it was already said, that it is all because of her mother poisoning her mind. Sorry. People who face that never forget because it lies within them everyday because something within us feels a bit shattered. You feel failed but also the failure. That sense of failure and failing is why we stay silent and feel useless. I side with Dylan, I believe Dylan, and I am frankly not interested in seeing the other side. I am aware of my biases, but that bias is due to the fact there was a moment in my life where I felt the fraction of what she did- I just never had my abuser be a public figure who was synonymous with film, New York, the arts, etc.
Finally, as somebody who watched people I know come forward about being raped while I was in college and that college as an institution failed them to have the proper set of rules in place, let me just say I am cynical of the structures of law being the end all, be all. This is a country not about fairness but having the best paid lawyer and it is the rich, wealthy, privileged people who have that access.
This Allen stuff on his films, legacy, art/artis: I am not at the point into really exploring the issues, contentions of art and artist because despite my own experiences am full of contradictions. Rosemary's Baby is my all-time favorite film despite knowing the Polanski controversy beforehand.
Nathaniel, I want to note that this past year Jim DeRogatis, a music journalist who unearthed R. Kelly being on tape engaging with sexual conduct with an underage woman, came back in 2013, long after R. Kelly was more or less acquitted by the courts (See, this is why I cannot apply the black and white, innocent until proven guilty zeal some people **want** me to have about these things), to reveal the numerous allegations of sexual misconduct/abuse by underage women. R. Kelly eagerly looking for underaged girls was known throughout Chicago. Everyone had a story of him looking into high school girls. But the explicitness of the tapes, he peed on an alleged victim, made him a joke. And then, somehow, someway, became this icon of post-modernism, hipster music. The people at Pitchfork Media and other places had forgiven him and turned off all people knew about his personal life despite Kelly showing no level of contrition or admitting that he preyed on young, underaged women despite one of his most public relationships being with Aaliyah when she was a teenager. DeRogatis had enough by this point, R. Kelly headlined music festivals with almost nobody protesting. So he dropped these documents and actually wants people to never forget. In line with me admitting to my contradictions, I was too young to know the whole R. Kelly details and thought Trapped in the Closet was hilarious and owned a few of his songs. But reading the documents, I just stopped laughing and feel awful for not taking R. Kelly's indiscretions seriously. Here is DeRogatis' interview.
http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/2013/12/read_the_stomac.php
It notes a cultural problem. So when people ask 'why now?' it is because people ignored it, never took it seriously. DeRogatis notes that each and every one of us have to come up with our own answer as to art and artist but that certain structures, for R. Kelly it's Pitchfork Media, often seem fine with the separation but feel as though they are not critical or self-critical about how promoting such artist represents them. Dylan Farrow being mad at an industry letting Woody Allen make a movie without a problem or a pause to me, does not bother me. He keeps getting the 'respected' actors as if being in one of his movies is a prerequisite to the A-list. People forgot. People accepted that he did something (which is mostly accepted that he had something with Soon-Yi that I would say is still a bridge too far for a lot of people) but have moved along. So this is why I am fine that Maureen Orth came back to this story, why Dylan wrote her letter.
Nathaniel, since you put a lot of thought into this piece, and I don't want this to come off too strong, let me just suggest: Remove the Ronan, Mia, Woody & Dylan portrait. For one thing, seeing somebody allegedly abused held by her alleged abuser is disturbing (even the alleged victims of Sandusky never had their photos with him re-published on a website without doctoring to hide their faces). Another thing is that even if we take the more, 'Let's be objective, let's hear both sides of the story,' I am still not sure the photo is appropriate. Why not just show Dylan's photo that accompanied her letter? It's her story, her experience.
Only made my way through about half the comments on the first page so far, but I have to say that I agree with every word of Morgan's comment (the first one at least, I don't know yet if there are more).
Nathaniel, very good article.
@Lisa (and some others), I'm probably as close as it comes among readers of TFE to "neutral/never seen a Woody Allen film", if I remember correctly I've only ever seen "Bullets over Broadway" which I liked just fine, and "Mighty Aphrodite", which I didn't like. And he has always stricken me as weird. My general idea about who I suspect him to be as a person might be best summed up by my take on a description of the film "Manhattan" I read in a TV magazine once, which was something like "42-year-old so-and-so (Woody Allen) desperately tries to convince his 17-year-old girlfriend that she's too young for him and they should stop seeing each other" (Me: Yeah, right, like it's that way and not the other way 'round. You don't even believe this yourself, Woody, do you?) - When this whole thing arose to the surface again after the Golden Globes, I was initially very sure that the allegations (this was not the first time I'd heard about them by the way) must be true. Meanwhile after reading quite a bit again and again, I've changed my view and I am convinced that I just can't know, and both scenarios seem plausible.
Either way, Dylan Farrow has one parent who is a despicable human being. If her account is true, one parent is despicable and the other is mostly a good one who has always been there for her. If the opposite is true, one is despicable and the other is a freak who has run away with her sister (not blood-related, but still) and whom a judge denied any custody for her and her siblings because he considered him an "unfit parent".
@Sawyer: a TV-movie exists already, not sure whether it's "Lifetime": http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113708/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_59
@Flickah (and others): how about these precious few in Hollywood supporting her? Wouldn't naming some of them be kinder than shaming some random people who've worked with him?
But then again, this is not easy: if he had been tried and found guilty, would he still be working? (Ok, I dread the answer could be yes...) How would people feel about working with him then? With no trial and/or verdict as it is, have those people working with him ever (personally) doubted his innocence, and how did they feel about working with him under these circumstances? But then again, people work with Roman Polanski, and there is no doubt of his guilt. And I liked "The Ghostwriter"...
I'll stop before this goes further than I want to go.
Oh, and I wanted to add, I think we should value "innocent until proven guilty" very high in a civilized society. I know it's an ideal none of us will really live up to. Even people aquitted of a crime will always carry the "but maybe (s)he did do it" brand with them for the rest of their lives, only for ever being indicted in the first place. It sticks. But an alarmingly high number if people really strike me as the kind who wish back on the good old days of the witch trials, because they are in desperate need of somewhere to direct their deep, enormous anger to.
CMG -- i am sorry for your personal pain (that sounds awful) but your personal journey is your personal journey. This is the issue i'm having with people who have so much rage about this. You can't expect other people, totally unrelated to your journey, to abandon all their senses and join your pain. You can't expect people not to think about great works of art like The Crucible, Doubt (the play),Twelve Angry Men, etcetera when they contemplate accusations of any crime.
Art is often there to instruct us about ourselves and even if Woody is 100% guilty (possible) people should still ALWAYS reference works of art that caution people to be cautious when it comes to matters of accusations, blame, guilt and innocence. Crimes and accusations of crime destroy lives. We need not become accomplices to destructions of people's lives we have nothing to do with. We have to be well reasoned and not angry. The thing this whole thing has convinced me of is if i ever became a lawyer (LOL) i would check people's twitter histories to see if they had any capacity for objectivity, any capacity for picking out facts and considering them even if they are delivered with innuendo, etcetera because it seems most people don't so there goes 'innocent til proven guilty', consideration of facts presented in trial, and the whole concept of reasonable doubt.
DAVIDE -- interesting point on Soon-Yi. I've often thought about her in this because she was abandoned by her family for choosing Woody. Her own father says "she does not exist" if i've read the quotes right. You never hear Mia mention her. Which is, i don't know, not the actions of a loving supportive family life so it seriously makes me question that family (unrelated to the Dylan allegations). Many many families have rifts and pain based on particular decisions people make but pretending someone doesn't exist is... in general i find it the mark of people who have trouble with forgiveness and maybe never loved unconditionally in the first place. Moving on and healing is something everyone has to do all the time when things go wrong. If you can't do it you're in trouble. Hatred just eats people up inside. It is really a form of self-destruction
EVERYONE -- all of this reminds me again that I myself have trouble judging strangers and this helps no one . i'll shut up. i promise. no more comments from me unless something else happens. Oh god i hope we can move on from this. why oh why can't i be more like cate blanchett and just say something simple and perfect and be done with it.
Nathaniell- Thanks for your response and I knew my rant about art connecting to this case was not going to be felt or actually happen. But I found when Bob Weide was endorsing The Hunt to be one of the height of smarminess and hateful. Wielding ones sophisticated film viewing knowledge like a weapon in a sensitive case is not helpful.
I just feel as though there are people who take these accusations like on attack on them liking and associating great films with Allen. In some ways that is true but it feels like a few people's central hang-up which strikes me as odd. I know somebody falsely accused of sexual,misconduct with a minor when he was a teaching trainee, who was in her teens and did it to,'get back at him'. He is on a list and yeah, it is awful. He had to switch careers. But it and other abuse cases just feel so different. How often does, after 20 years, the accuser, now at adult age, speak up and continue this?
And we again need to be careful at looking at the Farrows as a singular than plural. Shouldn't the fact that Dylan has to live her life under a different name show she doesn't want just this in her life? In some ways, yeah, Soon-Yi will always be central to Allen/Farrow rifts, but let's not act like there were not many levels of betrayal going on. I've seen people not forgiven or acknowledged by their families for lesser things. If we are playing the game of court, acknowledging these are imperfect people involved would be helpful than any details of their lives is not this cast doubt character flaw.
Farrow's boyfriend courted and married her daughter yet you chide the family for having "trouble with forgiveness"? From your position of privilege and empathy, I hope you're patting yourself on the back. You're right. Take a deep breath and follow your own advice: don't take the affairs of people whom you don't know so personally and confine yourself to watching their films.
Ugh, I hate typing my thoughts on this on iPads with the auto-correct.
Nathaniel, I understand What you say about Soon-Yi. But think the other way round-she was never Allen's daughter. But she was Mia's. Therefore, all Mia's children, adopted or biological, are Soon-Yi's siblings. Imagine discovering that your sister is dating your father/stepfather/mother's longtime boyfriend behind her back.
Relember, woody never broke up with Mia to be with Soon-Yi. The affair was already going on behind everyone's back for a whole when they all found out. Imagine now woody's other children must have felt-their sister dating their father. It borders on taboo. Their sister dating their father. Their father dating, having sex, with their sister. Imagine What This must have been like.
Priven is Soon-Yi's father and he had 3 biological children with Mia. Soon-Yi's siblings. He must know what he's talking about. And yes, he did say she doesnt exist. And Previn married two other times after Mia, and has had other children. I'm not sure it is fair to classify him as one of "The Farrows"-and I'm not sure its fair to talking about the, like This, as if they werent
Individuals.
There's a lot of betrayal going on in This story, in so many levels.
i said i wasn't going to speak up again unless something else happened and something did. Moses Farrow, Dylan's older brother, who i predicted would not come forward HAS come forward talking to People magazine and defending Woody and accusing Mia of beating him as a child. This thing just gets uglier and uglier which is why we should take Cate Blanchett's cue.
I have updated the post with links to two corrections
And Dylan has already responded to what Moses said. Its like a soap opera. there´s a new chapter every day.
Here are the money quotes:
"I will not see my family dragged down like this," she [Dylan] adds. "I can't stay silent when my family needs me and I will not abandon them like Soon-Yi and Moses. My brother is dead to me."
Let's break that down a bit: Dylan's family consists only of those who side with Mia. Because Moses sided with Woody and attacked Mia, he is now dead to her. Soon-Yi clearly died to her ages ago. What is striking is the reason that Dylan has articulated for speaking out: she can't stay silent because her family (i.e., Mia) needs her. Dylan is doing what she is doing because she can't abandon her family the way Soon-Yi and Moses did? That language certainly does little to dispel the notion that at some level this is more about Mia's war with Woody and a daughter's need to side with a mother who has been betrayed.
The other money quote is in Mia's response, or lack thereof, to Moses's accusations:
"Farrow, who declined to respond to Moses's accusations, Tweeted, 'I love my daughter. I will always protect her. A lot of ugliness is going to be aimed at me. But this is not about me, it's about her truth.'"
Translation: if you side with Woody, you are dead to me and I don't care if you're my son...I will cut you off. This doesn't do much to counter Moses's assertion that Mia was subject to unbridled rage and demanded obedience.
But what's particularly interesting is the last sentence: Mia doesn't assert that "this" (whatever "this" might be) is about her; she claims it's about Dylan's truth. Interesting choice of words. It's not about THE truth. It's about "Dylan's truth." An interesting lapsus from someone who purports to have certainties as to what happened.
A wonderful and true article Nate.
Let's hope Cate Blanchett wins Best Actress- which no one mentioned in their responses. She's winning- it's the best performance of all 20 nominees. There I said it!
Thank you for this article and for the links you've provided. I would agree that it was unneeded to bring the named actors and actresses into the open letter. The writing had enough impact on its own. Hopefully the Farrows and Allens find closure and release from pain.
This is what I find troubling. It seems that the adult Dylan has not done any research. She wants to be the accuser, judge and jury. If she is going to target Cate Blanchet et al as culprits, then she needs to know that after accusing Woody of child molestation Mia was still willing to star in his movies.
Was she not aware that Mia gave consent for her images to be used in the montage for Woody's award at the golden globes? How does she explain that? Why weren't the Farrows trying to stop the public from watching Woody's movies when he was paying child support Dylan, Moses and Satchel Sinatra.
After reading Dylan's comments in People magazine - "I don't have money or publicists or limos or fancy apartments in Manhattan. All I have is the truth and that is all I put out there." something tells me that this is about money.
“On the other hand, believing him guilty doesn't deprives him of freedom. He is given awards. He makes movies. He travels. He is filthy rich. And since we do not harm him, we are not obligated to make sure our actions protect him....protect him from what? Dislike? He doesn't have that right.”
Preposterous!!!
I presume the same applies to Dylan. Not believing her accusation doesn’t deprive her of anything.
To borrow Deborah’s words; we are not obligated to make sure our actions protect Dylan....protect her from what? Dislike? She doesn't have that right.”
"On the other hand, believing him guilty doesn't deprives him of freedom. He is given awards. He makes movies. He travels. He is filthy rich. And since we do not harm him, we are not obligated to make sure our actions protect him....protect him from what? Dislike? He doesn't have that right."
Almost eight years later. We're at the end of a year in which the Farrows have tried to nail Woody Allen's coffin with their propaganda movie 'Allen v Farrow'. Their attempt appears to have been quite successful, even when the, ahem, 'documentary' did not win any Emmy awards.
Is Woody Allen still 'not harmed' by those who 'believe him guilty'? Is he still not 'deprived of freedoms'? Is he still being 'given awards', 'making movies', being 'filthy rich'? Are his rights and freedoms 'protected' like any citizen deserves protection under the law or under common justice?
Let me recall a few successes of the 'cancel mob', who was fueled by the Farrows' media initiatives in the past eight years:
- calls from a bunch of actors to not work with Woody Allen;
- actors and their agents now feeling afraid to work with him for fear of their reputation (and income)
- Amazon breaking his multi-year movie contract
- Hachette breaking his book contract and destroying the already printed autobiography
- movie financiers withdrawing from him as he has become a liability without US releases
- demands that his awards be withdrawn
- his movies being shunned in US cinemas
- his family (two daughters, a wife) maligned and ridiculed in social media.
All because a man has been the target of a vicious child abuse allegation, by a furious, desperate, threatening ex-partner (in the words of her therapist) during an acrimonious separation. A single allegation in 86 years, from which he has been 100% exonerated in due process, while no less than *four* independent child abuse expert instances found the allegation non-credible. Even Dylan's own hired expert (Dr Steven Herman) and her own attorney (Eleanor Alter) did NOT find the allegation credible. Herman testified that Mia's questions during her videotaped "interviews" had "set a tone for a child on how to answer". Alter said that she wasn't sure Dylan had been abused, and that it may just have been a fantasy.
This is not just about an abuse allegetion. The real importance of this tragedy is how our present society deals with issues of guilt and innocence under the influence of commercial media who are desperate to make money over drawing our attention and feeding our thirst for salacious stories about sex and celebrity. We appear to be willing to give up on due process and the innocence presumption, all to eager to throw celebrites who fell from grace to the wolves.
And we don't learn a damn thing from it. We'd do it again tomorrow. Without blinking.