Did you know that Woody Allen has been a controversial figure in Hollywood for decades? His relationships, particularly those with younger women, have sparked intense discussions and debates. From his marriage to Soon-Yi Previn, who is the adopted daughter of his former partner Mia Farrow, to his various affairs, Allen's personal life is filled with intrigue and complexity. This article delves into some of the most unusual and surprising aspects of Woody Allen's romantic relationships that have captivated the public's attention.
Iconic filmmaker Woody Allen has been married to Soon-Yi Previn for 20 years, which in itself is unusual, because most Hollywood marriages don't even last half of that time. However, there are a lot of even stranger aspects to this coupling, some of which are at least slightly disturbing. We will start with the obvious: Allen is married to his ex-girlfriend's daughter.
Before dating Allen, actress Mia Farrow and ex Andre Previn adopted a Korean daughter named Soon-Yi Previn. After Farrow and Andre split, Woody Allen dated Farrow from 1980 to 1992. Though Allen and Farrow never lived together nor married, they shared one biological child, son Satchel (now Ronan Farrow), as well as adopted daughter Dylan Farrow and adopted son Moses Farrow. Farrow and Allen's relationship ended when she discovered him taking up with Soon-Yi Previn, and that's just scratching the surface of Woody Allen's unusual relationships.
He Was Married to His First Wife as He Courted His Second
Woody Allen was married to Harlene Rosen from 1956 to 1962, and during that time, he met his second wife, actress Louise Lasser, who was seeing a friend of his when they met. Lasser told The Toast that her relationship with Allen developed before he divorced Rosen, and that she and Allen married "five or six years later." They wed in 1966, which would mean they began their affair in 1960 or 1961.
Similar to Allen's relationships with teenagers and current wife Soon-Yi Previn, Lasser said Allen would "show me everything he knew." She also described Allen as "possessive" and said their relationship never truly ended until several years after they divorced. "It's all some mish-mosh because you’re at those ages that you don’t know what's going on anyway. You don't string it together yet. We'd break up. We lived right around the corner from each other," she recalled.
His Daughter Accused Him of Molesting Her
In 1993, Woody Allen and Mia Farrow's daughter, Dylan Farrow, then 7, accused the director of molesting her. Allen vehemently denied the allegations, accusing Mia of coaching Dylan to get revenge on him for his relationship with her adopted daughter, Soon-Yi Previn. The Los Angeles Times reported that law enforcement and sexual abuse experts at Yale-New Haven Hospital investigated the accusations.
Dylan recalled the allegations again in 2014 in The New York Times and in a CBS This Morning sit-down in January 2018. Allen issued a statement to CBS News in 2018, reasserting that investigators had "independently concluded that no molestation had ever taken place." He added, "I never molested my daughter — as all investigations concluded a quarter of a century ago."
He Says He's a 'Pariah' of the #MeToo Movement
In September 2018, the typically reserved Soon-Yi Previn agreed to participate in a profile written by an admitted fan and close friend of Woody Allen in New York magazine's Vulture. In that piece, Previn accused Mia Farrow of abusing her as a child and denied that Woody Allen did anything untoward during their courtship. When asked how their relationship began, she said, "I think Woody went after me because at that first basketball game I turned out to be more interesting and amusing than he thought I’d be."
Previn later added, "We talked quite a bit and to the best of my memory I came in from college on some holiday and he showed me a Bergman movie, which I believe was The Seventh Seal." Elsewhere in the piece, Previn slams Mia and Dylan Farrow's allegations against her husband, and Allen refers to himself as a "pariah" of the #MeToo movement.
He Dated a High School Student When He Was in His 40s
Stacey Nelkin dated Woody Allen when she was a 17-year-old high school senior and Allen was 42, but she doesn’t believe their relationship was predatory. "I do believe that Dylan believes that this actually happened to her, so she’s clearly in a lot of pain and very troubled about it," Nelkin told HuffPost Live in 2014. "But I chose to speak out because I was very disturbed by this and I’ve known Woody for a really long time."
Despite defending Allen against Dylan's allegations, her position on his relationship with Soon-Yi Previn is less glowing. "I think a lot of people, including a lot of my friends and some close family members are failing to make the distinction that a man who likes younger women is not necessarily a man who is going to molest a child," Nelkin said.
Mariel Hemingway Says He Tried to Seduce Her When She Was a Teen
Stacey Nelkin wasn’t the only teenager Allen allegedly attempted to seduce. Mariel Hemingway, who starred in 1979's Manhattan, claimed in her memoir that Allen tried to woo her when filming wrapped. "Our relationship was platonic, but I started to see that he had a kind of crush on me," she wrote, adding that she told her parents she wasn’t sure what Allen’s motives were for the trip.
Hemingway said she realized, "No one was going to get their own room. His plan, such as it was, involved being with me." She told Allen, who was staying in her family’s guest room at the time, that she wasn’t going to Paris with him, and he supposedly left her family’s Idaho home via a private jet the next morning.
He Allegedly Romanced a 16-Year-Old While Dating Mia Farrow
In December 2018, a woman named Christina Engelhardt told The Hollywood Reporter that she had an eight-year-long affair with Woody Allen that began in 1976 when she was 16 years old to his 41. Engelhardt claims she approached Allen first, giving him her number when she spotted him at a restaurant. She alleged Allen knew she was in high school when they began seeing each other.
Engelhardt claimed in her memoir manuscripts that she was deeply hurt when Allen introduced her to Mia Farrow as his girlfriend. "It wasn’t until after it was done when I really had time to think of how twisted it was when we were together," Engelhardt said. "That said, Engelhardt says she has no regrets and views their relationship as a 'love story.'
He Thinks Frank Sinatra May Have Fathered Ronan Farrow
During Woody Allen’s relationship with Mia Farrow, they welcomed son Ronan Farrow (then known as Satchel) — but since their split, both Allen and Mia have expressed doubts that Allen is Ronan's biological father. "I think he is [my child], but I wouldn’t bet my life on it," Allen told Vulture in September 2018.
Mia admitted to Vanity Fair in 2013 that Frank Sinatra is "possibly" Ronan’s father. A year later, Allen also addressed the issue in The New York Times: "Is he my son or, as Mia suggests, Frank Sinatra's?" What does Ronan think of all this? "You know, I wasn’t there, so I don’t have a lot more to offer than you," he told Vulture.
