DYLAN FARROW, WHO was adopted by Woody Allen and Mia Farrow as a child, has renewed allegations that the film director sexually abused her when she was 7 years old.
In an open letter published in The New York Times today, the 28-year-old wrote publicly about what happened for the first time since the allegation surfaced in 1993.
Allen was questioned but never prosecuted over the case and has denied any wrongdoing.
In the letter, Dylan Farrow writes that Allen had brought her into the attic in their house, told her to play with her brother’s electric train set, and then sexually assaulted her.
“For as long as I could remember, my father had been doing things to me that I didn’t like,” she wrote.
She says that the director would take her away from her mother and siblings to be alone with him and would place his head in her naked lap.
Farrow says that what happened in the attic was a tipping point.
“These things happened so often, so routinely, so skillfully hidden from a mother that would have protected me had she known, that I thought it was normal. I thought this was how fathers doted on their daughters.
“But what he did to me in the attic felt different. I couldn’t keep the secret anymore”.
Farrow is strongly critical of the film industry for protecting and celebrating Allen in the face of the allegations, describing the director as a “living testament” to the way society fails survivors of sexual assault.
“What if it had been your child, Cate Blanchett? Louis CK? Alec Baldwin? What if it had been you, Emma Stone? Or you, Scarlett Johansson? You knew me when I was a little girl, Diane Keaton. Have you forgotten me?” the letter says.
There has been renewed focus on Allen after he was given a lifetime achievement award at the Golden Globes last month. Ronan Farrow, who is the son of Allen and Mia Farrow, was publicly critical of the celebration of Allen’s career.
Allen and Mia Farrow split up in 1992, soon after revelations that he had begun a relationship with her 22-year-old adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn, who he has since married.
The letter comes ahead of the Academy Awards, where Allen’s film Blue Jasmine has been nominated for three awards.
The New York Times reports that Allen declined to comment.
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