Moses Farrow speaks out

Moses

People Magazine talked to Moses Farrow, Dylan Farrow's older brother who was fourteen or fifteen when Mia and Woody split. Moses and Dylan were adopted by Woody.

From the article:

"My mother drummed it into me to hate my father for tearing apart the family and sexually molesting my sister," Moses, 36, tells PEOPLE in the magazine's new issue. "And I hated him for her for years. I see now that this was a vengeful way to pay him back for falling in love with Soon-Yi." 

 ...

"Of course Woody did not molest my sister," says Moses, who is estranged from Farrow and many of his siblings and is close to Allen and Soon-Yi. "She loved him and looked forward to seeing him when he would visit. She never hid from him until our mother succeeded in creating the atmosphere of fear and hate towards him. The day in question, there were six or seven of us in the house. We were all in public rooms and no one, not my father or sister, was off in any private spaces. My mother was conveniently out shopping. I don’t know if my sister really believes she was molested or is trying to please her mother. Pleasing my mother was very powerful motivation because to be on her wrong side was horrible." 

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Moses accuses Farrow of bullying him as well. "Our mother has misled the public into believing it was a happy household of both biological and adopted children," he says. "From an early age, my mother demanded obedience and I was often hit as a child. She went into unbridled rages if we angered her, which was intimidating at the very least and often horrifying, leaving us not knowing what she would do."  

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Moses, a family therapist, says that his own life has been made better by spending time with Allen.

"I think my sister is missing a great deal in life in not reconnecting with her father, who had always adored her," he says. "It’s important that she assert her independence from our mother and not go through life with the false impression that she has been molested by my father. I am very happy I have come into my own power, separating from my mother, which has led to a positive reunion with my father."

People got Dylan's reaction, which I thought was bizarre on a couple of points:

"I will not see my family dragged down like this. 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. My mother is so brave and so courageous and taught me what it means to be strong and brave and tell the truth even in the face of these monstrous lies."  

Her family needs her? I thought she was supposed to be the victim and they were all doing it for her. Mia and Ronan needed her to repeat the accusations against Allen? Why?

Michael Wolff in The Guardian wrote:

Indeed, the larger context for this rehashed scandal is not a pattern of abuse or the ongoing dysfunctions of a celebrated family but rather the demands of a publicity rollout. Twenty-one years after the event – all parties long quiet – a story is revived. It is an old scandal for a new generation.

The impetus seems to be to establish Mia Farrow as a celebrity activist worthy of the world stage, and, as well, to launch a public career for her son Ronan.

The campaign began in the November issue of Vanity Fair in a profile of Mia Farrow by Maureen Orth, a long-time friend (Orth is the widow of NBC's Tim Russert), in which Farrow offered the headline grabber that Frank Sinatra, rather than Woody Allen, might be Ronan's father. In a demonstration of Farrow's famous media acumen, that's all she said, Sinatra "might" be – worldwide titillation followed.

The terms of the article would have been negotiated beforehand. Mia Farrow is, at this point in her career, not a Vanity Fair worthy subject. Hence, in return for laudatory press coverage of her charitable work, and near sycophantic treatment of her yet-to-be-employed son, she would have had to agree to revisit her legendary scandal. That, and then some. The price of publicity for her and Ronan was, in effect, Allen.

Read Wolff's entire article here.