Woody Allen, Soon-Yi Previn call new documentary a 'shoddy hit piece'
HBO aired the first episode of Allen v. Farrow on Sunday night. The four-part documentary series closely examines the sexual abuse allegations made against filmmaker Woody Allen by his then-seven-year-old adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, in 1992.
The project opens with a clip from Allen's initial press conference refuting everything, but the 85-year-old has added renewed denial.
Allen's exclusively gave a joint-statement with his wife, Soon-Yi Previn, to The Hollywood Reporter on Monday:
"These documentarians had no interest in the truth. Instead, they spent years surreptitiously collaborating with the Farrows and their enablers to put together a hatchet job riddled with falsehoods. Woody and Soon-Yi were approached less than two months ago and given only a matter of days 'to respond.' Of course, they declined to do so.
"As has been known for decades, these allegations are categorically false. Multiple agencies investigated them at the time and found that, whatever Dylan Farrow may have been led to believe, absolutely no abuse had ever taken place. It is sadly unsurprising that the network to air this is HBO—which has a standing production deal and business relationship with Ronan Farrow. While this shoddy hit piece may gain attention, it does not change the facts."
Allen began a relationship with actress Mia Farrow after first meeting in 1979. The two, who never married, would go on to feature together across 13 films, but their family became the crux of media attention.
Farrow had previously been married to musician Andre Previn, with whom she adopted Soon-Yi in 1977. Dylan was adopted by Allen and Farrow in 1985. Allen and Farrow's only biological child is Satchel, born in 1987 and now known as Ronan Farrow for his work as an investigative reporter. (Ronan and Fletcher Previn were also interviewed for this episode.)
Mia and Dylan both set the tone in the first 15 minutes for a scathing, vulnerable recollection. Dylan sat down with a family photo album that Mia had made for her, detailing photos that have since been cropped to erase Allen. "I think, in a lot of ways, I've come to understand my feelings as an adult than I did as a child," she said. "At the root of it, what I was really feeling was that I had let down the little girl that I was before when I couldn't speak about it."
Her 76-year-old mother later added: "I haven't spoken publicly about him for decades, but that's the great regret of my life—that I wasn't perceptive enough. It's my fault. I brought this guy into our family. There's nothing I can do to take that away."
Allen's voice is featured through audio excerpts from this 2020 memoir Apropos of Nothing.
Elsewhere in her straight-to-camera interview, Farrow detailed coming to the decision to adopt Dylan. The couple first tried to conceive their own child, despite Allen telling her he had "zero interest in a kid." Allen then made it clear that her deciding to adopt another child wouldn't ruin their relationship, but "he wanted nothing to do with it." Farrow continued: "He knew the kind of children that I adopted were all from different countries with different needs. He said 'Well, I might be more kindly disposed it it was a little blonde girl.' I thought if he cares about that, I should try to find a little girl like that, and then maybe he'll love her."
Allen eventually lost custody of Dylan in 1993 when the court ruled, in part, "We will probably never know what occurred on August 4, 1992...[but] Mr. Allen’s behavior toward Dylan was grossly inappropriate and...measures must be taken to protect her" (h/t HuffPost).
Allen married Soon-Yi in December 1997 when he was 62 years old and she was just 27. Soon-Yi broke a decades-long silence in an interview with Vulture in September 2018. There, she vehemently defended Allen and described her relationship with her adoptive mother as "oil and water" from the beginning.
A teenaged Soon-Yi will appear in the second episode, which HBO has already teased:
Allen v. Farrow will continue Sunday nights at 9 p.m. EST on HBO and HBO Max.
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