Oscar Profile #162: Mia Farrow

Born February 9, 1945 in Los Angeles, California, the fourth child and eldest daughter of director John Farrow and actress Maureen O’Sullivan, Maria de Lourdes Villiers (Mia) Farrow was born into a life of wealth and privilege that nevertheless had its tragic undertones. She was raised by nannies and educated in a convent by nuns for 13 years. When she was nine she developed polio and spent three weeks in a hospital which she has said effectively ended her childhood. When she was twelve, her eldest brother, aged 19, died in a plane crash.

A beautiful child, she worked as a fashion industry model for a number of years. She made her film debut at 14 in a minor role in 1959’s John Paul Jones and had her first major role in 1964’s Guns at Batasi, the same year she lept to stardom as Allison Mackenzie in the nighttime soap opera, Peyton Place. Although it would run an additional three years, she left the show in 1966 after her whirlwind romance and marriage to Frank Sinatra, at his insistence. Her acclaimed performance in the 1967 TV movie Johnny Belinda led to her being cast in the lead in 1968’s Rosemary’s Baby. Her refusal to give up her starring role in that film to play a minor role in Sinatra’s The Detective led to their divorce in August of that year.

Her film career in full swing, she married Oscar winning composer André Previn in 1970. They remained married until 1979, during which time they had six children together, three biological and three adopted. Her best known films during this period were 1974’s The Great Gatsby and 1978’s Death on the Nile.

After her divorce from Previn, Farrow entered into a professional and personal relationship with Woody Allen, starring in thirteen of his films including 1985’s The Purple Rose of Cairo; 1986’s Hannah and Her Sisters; 1989’s Crimes and Misdemeanors; 1990’s Alice and 1992’s Husbands and Wives. Together they adopted two children and Farrow gave birth to another biological child, Satchel O’Sullivan Farrow, now known as Ronan Farrow, in 1987. Latterly Farrow has suggested that blue-eyed Ronan’s father may actually be Sinatra, with whom she carried on a clandestine affair throughout her relationship with Allen. She and Ronan are reportedly very close to Sinatra’s daughter Nancy and Nancy’s mother, Sinatra’s first wife, also named Nancy, reportedly treats Ronan like a favored grandson.

The Farrow-Allen relationship came to a headline making end in 1992 when Farrow discovered compromising pictures Allen had taken of her then 19 year-old adopted daughter Su-Yin and subsequent accusations by her adopted daughter with Allen that he had molested her. The allegations have never been proven, but Farrow’s family, friends and all her children, except Soon-Yi, believe them and want nothing to do with Allen who has been married to Soon-Yi since 1997.

Since her split with Allen, Farrow has continued to work sporadically in films, most notably in 1994’s Widows’ Peak, but her acting has long since taken a backseat to her charitable causes. She has since adopted another six children on her own, making a total of fifteen children overall. To quote her Rhodes Scholar son, Ronan: “I am so proud of my family. I grew up across the table from Moses, who has cerebral palsy, and next to my sister Quincy, born of a drug-addicted inner-city mother, and Minh, who is blind. I could never have understood what it means to grow up blind or with cerebral palsy. I saw problems and needs, so the next thing you think is: O.K., what are you going to do about it?”

Farrow has given up her rent-controlled apartment in the building next to the Dakota where Rosemary’s Baby was filmed and now lives quietly in rural Connecticut near her son Fletcher Previn and his family. A UNICEF Special Representative since 2000, she still spends a great deal of time traveling on behalf of the charity, most notably to Dafur.

Mia Farrow is a still vibrant 68 years old and still without Oscar recognition. Perhaps someday she will be given a Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award. No one deserves it more.

ESSENTIAL FILMS

ROSEMARY’S BABY (1968), directed by Roman Polanski

One of the great psychological horror films of all time, Mia Farrow gives a haunting performance as the naïve bride who gives birth to the devil’s spawn. Still regarded as one of the landmark performances of the 1960s, Farrow was oddly left off the list of nominees for that year’s Best Actress Oscar despite having been nominated for a Golden Globe and various other awards. Indeed, the film received only two Oscar nominations including one for Polanski’s adapted screenplay and one win for Ruth Gordon’s incandescent portrayal of the witch next door.

DEATH ON THE NILE (1978), directed by John Guillermin

This all-star Agatha Christie mystery was not quite the hit that Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express had been four years earlier, but it was successful enough. The film’s greatest assets were Jack Cardiff’s cinematography, its Oscar winning costumes and the delightful playing of several cast members, most notably Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot and legends Bette Davis, Maggie Smith and Angela Lansbury as various suspects. Smith and Lansbury were nominated for BAFTAs and Lansbury won the National Board of Review award for Best Supporting Actress. Farrow impresses in the film’s latter scenes.

HANNAH AND HER SISTERS (1986), directed by Woody Allen

Farrow was Hannah in Allen’s film which traces the lives of three siblings and their various relationships from Thanksgiving Day of one year to the next. The film won a multitude of awards including Oscars for Allen’s screenplay and the performances of Michael Caine and Dianne Wiest. Barbara Hershey and Max von Sydow were also singled out for their performances while Farrow’s work was pretty much taken for granted. Her mother, Maureen O’Sullivan, and veteran Lloyd Nolan played her parents. O’Sullivan also played Farrow’s mother in Allen’s 1987 film, September, but Allen recast the part with Elaine Stritch after O’Sullivan had completed her assignment, and re-shot all her scenes.

ALICE (1990), directed by Woody Allen

Farrow won the Best Actress award of the National Board of Review for her portrayal of a pampered and unfulfilled Manhattan socialite who finds enlightenment after visit to an herbal doctor (the great Keye Luke in his final film) and self-discovery after a visit with Mother Theresa in India. Allen surrounds her with a stellar supporting cast that also includes William Hurt, Joe Mantegna, Alec Baldwin, June Squibb, Judy Davis, Cybill Shepherd, Blythe Danner, Bernadette Peters, Gwen Verdon and Holland Taylor. This was one of Allen’s best films featuring the best part he ever wrote for Farrow.

WIDOWS’ PEAK (1994), directed by John Irvin

Farrow broadened her range considerably with her deft coming timing in this delightful comedy of manners set in an Irish village in the 1920s. Natsaha Richardson plays a recently widowed new resident to the town who gets on the wrong side of spinster Farrow. Joan Plowright is the town’s doyenne. Jim Broadbent has an amusing turn as the town dentist but the film is essentially about the relationships between the three women, all of them – Farrow, Richardson and Plowright – at the peak of their acting prowess. It’s a pity Farrow has yet to get another role as good as this in her later years.