Mia Farrow addresses 'vicious rumors' about her children's deaths
Mia Farrow wrote a 300-word tweet dealing with the deaths of three of her 14 children. Credit: Getty Images for ELLE Magazine / Neilson Barnard
Following speculation that arose after the recent documentary series "Allen v. Farrow" avoided mentioning Mia Farrow's three deceased children, the actress on Wednesday wrote about the trio in a heartfelt Twitter post.
"Few families are perfect," Farrow, 76, said in part in a 300-word post across four graphical-text images, "and any parent who has suffered the loss of a child knows that pain is merciless and ceaseless. However, some vicious rumors based on untruths have appeared online concerning the lives of three of my children."
The mother of 14 biological and adopted children, Farrow wrote that Tam Farrow, a blind Vietnamese orphan she adopted in 1992, "passed away at 17 [in 2000] from an accidental prescription overdose related to the agonizing migraines she suffered, and her heart ailment." Tam's adoptive sibling Moses Farrow wrote in a 2018 essay that Tam suffered from depression, and after a fight with Mia "committed suicide by overdosing on pills."
Lark Previn, a Vietnamese infant adopted by Farrow and second husband André Previn in 1973, died at age 35 in 2008 after having been treated for AIDS-related pneumonia. Mia Farrow called her "an extraordinary woman, a wonderful daughter, sister, partner and mother to her own children." Explaining that Lark had contracted HIV/AIDS "from a previous partner," Farrow said she nonetheless "lived a fruitful and loving life with her children and longtime partner."
Finally, son Thaddeus Farrow, a paraplegic from Kolkata, India, whom Farrow adopted in 1994, committed suicide in September 2016. While his age was reported as 27 at the time, Mia Farrow wrote Wednesday: "My courageous son Thaddeus was 29 and happily living with his partner; we were all anticipating a wedding, but when the relationship abruptly ended, he took his own life."
The star of films including "Rosemary's Baby" (1968), "The Great Gatsby" (1974) and many with former partner Woody Allen, including "Zelig" (1983) and "Hannah and Her Sisters" (1986), Farrow called the deaths "unspeakable tragedies. Any other speculation about their deaths is to dishonor their lives and the lives of their children and loved ones." She concluded, "Everyone has their own battles to fight; their own sorrows that gnaw. I send you my best hopes and my love."
