Mia Farrow (born Maria de Lourdes Villiers-Farrow on February 9,
1945) is an American actress.
Farrow has appeared in more than forty films and won numerous awards, including a Golden
Globe award (and seven additional Golden Globe nominations), three BAFTA Film Award nominations, and a win for best actress at the
San Sebastian International Film Festival.[1] Farrow is also notable for her extensive humanitarian work as a
UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. Her latest effort is www.miafarrow.org containing a guide on how to get involved
with Darfur activism, along with her photos and blog entries from Darfur, Chad, and the Central
African Republic.
Biography
Early life
Farrow is the daughter of John Farrow, an Australian
film director, and Irish actress Maureen O'Sullivan.
Both parents were practicing Catholics and Mia, born Maria de Lourdes
Villiers-Farrow (in Los Angeles, California), had a Catholic upbringing. Her sister, Prudence
Farrow, inspired The Beatles' song "Dear
Prudence" when she locked herself in her room having a breakdown while in India with them. Farrow was stricken with
polio as a child and spent a year in an iron lung. For
the most part she grew up in Beverly Hills in Southern California, and often
traveled with her parents for films that were produced on location.
She made her film debut in a 1947 short subject with her mother; the short was about famous mothers and their children
modeling the latest fashions for families. In the 1950s, she appeared in the Cold War
educational film, Duck and Cover.
Career
Farrow screen-tested for the role of Liesl Von Trapp in The Sound of
Music. That footage has been preserved, and appears on the fortieth Anniversary Edition DVD of The Sound of
Music. Farrow began her acting career by appearing in supporting roles in several 1960s films. However, she achieved stardom
on the popular nighttime soap opera Peyton Place as naive, waif-like
Allison Mackenzie, a role she later abandoned at the urging of husband Frank Sinatra. Her
first leading film role was in 1968's Rosemary's Baby, which was a major critical and commercial success at the time and continues
to be widely regarded as a classic of the horror genre.
Farrow's performance in Rosemary's Baby garnered numerous awards and
established her as a leading actress. Film critic and author Stephen Farber described her performance as having an "electrifying
impact… one of the rare instances of actor and character achieving a miraculous, almost mythical match. If Ira Levin's story
shrewdly taps into every pregnant woman's fears about the stranger growing inside her, Mia Farrow gives those fears an achingly
real and human force".[2] Film critic Roger Ebert noted that "the brilliance of the film comes more from Polanski's direction, and from a series
of genuinely inspired performances… The characters emerge as human beings actually doing these things. A great deal of the credit
for this achievement must go to Mia Farrow, as Rosemary".[3] Following Rosemary's Baby, Farrow starred in
Secret Ceremony, opposite Elizabeth Taylor. The film divided critics, but has
gone on to develop a devoted following. Farrow's other late '60s films include John and Mary, opposite Dustin Hoffman.
In the 1970s, Farrow appeared in a number of notable films, including the 1971 thriller
See No Evil, legendary French director Claude Chabrol's 1972 film Docteur
Popaul, and the 1974 version of The
Great Gatsby, in which Farrow played "Daisy Buchanan". She also appeared in director Robert Altman's cult classic A Wedding in 1978. Farrow also
appeared in a number of made for television films in the 1970s, most notably portraying the title role in a 1976 musical version
of Peter Pan. In 1979, Farrow appeared on Broadway opposite Anthony Perkins in the play
Romantic Comedy by Bernard
Slade.
In the 1980s and early '90s, Farrow's relationship with director Woody Allen resulted in
numerous film collaborations. She appeared in nearly all of Allen's critically acclaimed films during this period, including
leading roles in Hannah and Her Sisters (playing the title role of
"Hannah"), The Purple Rose of Cairo, Broadway Danny Rose, and 1990s Alice, again as the title character. Farrow also played Alura, mother of "Kara" (Helen Slater), in the 1984 movie Supergirl and voiced the title role in 1982's animated film The Last Unicorn.
Citing the need to devote herself to raising her young children, Farrow worked less frequently during the '90s. Nonetheless,
she appeared in leading roles in several notable films, included 1994's Widows' Peak (an Irish film) and the 1995 films, Miami Rhapsody and Reckless. She also appeared in several independent features
and made for television films throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s. She also wrote an autobiography, What Falls Away
(New York: Doubleday, 1997).
Farrow most recently appeared as "Mrs. Baylock", the Satanic nanny, in the 2006 remake of
The Omen. Though the film itself received a lukewarm critical reception,
Farrow's performance was widely praised, with the Associated Press declaring "thank
heaven for Mia Farrow" and calling her performance "a rare instance of the new Omen improving on the old one."[4] Filmcritic.com added "it is Farrow who steals the
show,"[5] and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer described her performance as "a truly delicious comeback role
for Rosemary herself, Mia Farrow, who is chillingly believable as a sweet-talking nanny from hell."[6]
Farrow has completed work on several films released in 2007, including the romantic comedy The Ex and the first part of director Luc Besson's planned
trilogy of fantasy films, Arthur and the Invisibles. In September 2006,
she began shooting director Michel Gondry's Be Kind
Rewind, opposite Jack Black and Danny Glover.
Activism
Farrow has been a high profile advocate for children's rights, working to raise funds and awareness for children in conflict
affected regions, predominantly in Africa. She is a UNICEF Goodwill
Ambassador and has worked extensively to draw attention to the fight to eradicate polio, which she survived as a child. She has
traveled to Darfur three times to advocate for Darfuri refuges. She traveled there, in
November 2004 and June 2006, joining her son Ronan Farrow, who has also worked for
UNICEF in Sudan.[7] Her third trip was as part of a
documentary film expidition in 2007.[8] Farrow's
photographs of Darfur appeared in People magazine in July 2006 and she authored
an article on the crisis, published in the Chicago Tribune on July 25, 2006. On February 5, 2007, Farrow authored an editorial for the Los Angeles Times.[9]. On August 7, 2007, Farrow offered to "trade her freedom" for the freedom of a rebel leader, being
treated in a UN hospital but afraid to leave. She wanted to be taken captive in exchange for him being allowed to leave the
country.
Her latest effort is www.miafarrow.org,[10] containing a
guide on how to get involved with Darfur activism, along with her photos and blog entries from
Darfur, Chad, and the Central African Republic.
Personal life and relationships
In 1968, Farrow famously traveled to India, where she spent the early part of the year at the ashram of the Maharishi in Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, studying transcendental meditation. The visit gained worldwide media attention due to the presence of
all four Beatles, Donovan, Mike
Love (the Beach Boys lead singer), Prudence
Farrow (Mia's younger sister who inspired John Lennon to write Dear
Prudence), and Mia Farrow.
Farrow married singer Frank Sinatra on July 19,
1966, when she was 21 and he was 50. While she was filming Rosemary's Baby with director Roman Polanski, Sinatra
served her divorce papers in front of the cast and crew. The move came as a shock to Farrow, who did not think that Sinatra would
divorce her because she had refused his prior demand that she quit filming in order to work on his movie The Detective. The split was finalized two years later. Farrow married German-American Jewish pianist
André Previn in 1970. His former wife, songwriter Dory
Previn, blamed Farrow for his leaving her and wrote a scathing attack in a song entitled "Beware of Young Girls". Farrow
and Previn had three biological children (twins Matthew and Sascha, born in 1970; and Fletcher, born in 1974) together and
adopted three children, one from Korea, the other two from
Vietnam, Soon-Yi, Lark Song, and Daisy. André and Mia divorced in 1979, but they
remained on good terms. Fletcher Previn appears in one of Farrow's Woody Allen films, Radio
Days; Fletcher plays with the children in a scene set on a roof-top.
In the 1980s and early 1990s, Farrow spent many years with director Woody Allen, but did
not marry or live with him. The two had one biological son named Ronan Seamus
Farrow. They also adopted a son and daughter together. They separated after Allen began a sexual relationship with
Farrow's adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn, whom he later married. Their marriage
reportedly left Farrow devastated. During the custody battle, Farrow filed child abuse
charges against Allen, involving her other daughter, Dylan. Those charges were later dropped.
Farrow has been a high profile advocate of adoption since the 1970s, adopting children from poverty stricken regions, many of
whom were deemed "difficult to place" due to biological handicaps. She adopted three children and has three biological children
with Andre Previn. She also adopted two children and has one biological child with Woody Allen. Farrow went on to adopt five
additional children as a sole parent thereafter. Her last adoption was in 1995. Farrow has fifteen children, eleven of them
adopted. She is active in agencies that encourage adoption, as evidenced by her involvement with UNICEF. Farrow is estranged from Soon-Yi Previn
since Soon-Yi's marriage to Woody Allen. She called the loss a "tragedy" in The
Observer (a U.K. Sunday newspaper) and remarked that "she's not coming back". Farrow said of Soon-Yi: "She was on the
streets in Korea when she was captured and brought to the state orphanage. And in a way I can see from her perspective — a very
limited perspective — that she's improved her situation. For a little orphan kid from Korea ... Perhaps she's not to be blamed."
In a widely circulated quote, Soon-Yi dismissed Mia as "no Mother Teresa."
Farrow's adopted daughter Tam Farrow died in March 2000 at 21 years-old, after a long illness. Farrow splits her time between
her spacious SoHo Loft in NYC's Greenwich Village and
her estate/farm in Roxbury, Connecticut near the Town of New Milford.
List of children
With André Previn
- Matthew Phineas Previn (born in 1970)
- Sascha Villiers Previn (born in 1970)
- Fletcher Farrow Previn (born in 1974)
Adopted
- Soon-Yi Previn, (born in South Korea 8 Oct 1970, adopted c. 1978 [citation needed])
- Lark Song Previn, (born in Vietnam 1973, adopted 1973)
- Summer Song Previn (also known as Daisy), (born in Vietnam c. 1975, adopted 1976)
With Woody Allen
Adopted
- Moses Amadeus Farrow (also known as Misha Farrow) (1978, adopted 1980)
- Dylan O'Sullivan Farrow (also known as Eliza Farrow, current name is Malone)
Later adopted by Mia Farrow as a single mother
- Tam Farrow (1979–2000)
- Isaiah Justus Farrow (c. 1991)
- Quincy Farrow (now known as Kaeli-Shea, adopted 1994)
- Frankie-Minh (1991, adopted 1995)
- Thaddeus W. Farrow (c. 1988, adopted 1994)
- Gabriel Wilk Farrow
Filmography
References
External links
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