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    ‘The Devil on Trial’ Review: Whodunit? Satan?

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    This documentary revisits a 1981 homicide that the defense tried to attribute to demonic possession.It isn’t for me to say whether Arne Cheyenne Johnson really killed his landlord Alan Bono because he was possessed by a demon, as his lawyers tried to argue in a landmark 1981 trial in Connecticut known as the “devil made me do it” case. But on the basis of the spurious, crudely sensational documentary “The Devil on Trial,” it isn’t for the director, Christopher Holt, to say what really happened, either.The film strives to present a credible account of a disturbing story, which also involves the supposed possession of a young boy and an exorcism conducted under the guidance of the self-declared ghost hunters and demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren — events loosely depicted onscreen in “The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It,” a fictionalized account.The story is that Johnson accidentally summoned the demon possessing the child to enter his own body, igniting the mayhem that followed.While the documentary’s opening credits insist that “all the audio recordings and photographs” used are real, the film appears to have little interest in the truth and even less in reportorial integrity.The photographs, which purport to show evidence of possession, have been so heavily filtered and processed that “real” seems misleading. The old, garbled audio recordings are not compelling testimony either, and the filmmakers know it: They’ve goosed them up with sound effects and dramatic theme music.Firsthand accounts of the events from Johnson and others are used as fodder for slick re-enactments, which is where Holt really goes to town: Houses shake, lights shudder and shadowy figures lurk mysteriously, all in the style of a third-rate horror movie. The desperation to be scary, rather than engaging or provocative, is an intellectual failure, and an artistic one — a failure of imagination. Instead of challenging assumptions, exploring implications or discussing the difficult questions here, Holt merely mines the material for superficial shock value and lurid titillation.The Devil on TrialRated TV-MA for disturbing imagery and violence. Running time: 1 hour 21 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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      in Music

      Alvin Lucier, Probing Composer of Soundscapes, Is Dead at 90

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      His experimental music was rooted in the physics of sound and might yield unpredictable results — in one instance a Beatles song emanating from a teapot.Alvin Lucier, an influential experimental composer whose works focused less on traditional musical elements like melody and harmony than on the scientific underpinnings of sound and of listeners’ perceptions, died on Wednesday at his home in Middletown, Conn., where he had taught for decades at Wesleyan University. He was 90.His daughter, Amanda Lucier, said the cause was complications after a fall.Unlike composers who have the goal of painting an aural picture, evoking particular emotions, creating a dramatic narrative or exploring carefully plotted rhythmic interactions, Mr. Lucier seemed to approach his works as experiments that might yield unpredictable soundscapes.A finished work could sound like howling feedback, electronic crackling or — in the case of his best-known piece, “I Am Sitting in a Room” (1969) — a spoken text that with repetition becomes increasingly distorted and overlaid with reverberation until it is transformed into a symphony of dancing overtones.And though his music was rooted in the physics of sound, variables like the size and shape of the performance space or the alpha wave patterns a performer generates made his pieces sound different from one performance to the next.Mr. Lucier began many of his projects by wondering what kinds of sounds would emerge from a specific process, like tapping a pair of pencils or detecting brain waves. He would then reduce the variables into a single focus.Mr. Lucier in 1967. He would sometimes employ high-tech gadgetry in composing.via Lucier family“My main activity composing is to eliminate many different possibilities in a piece,” he told the producers of “No Ideas but in Things,” a 2013 film portrait of him by Viola Rusche and Hauke Harder. “When I start, I have so many different ideas about how to put the piece together, and I have to work and think hard until I get to the point where only the essential components are there.”In “I Am Sitting in a Room,” Mr. Lucier began by quietly reading a short statement describing what he is doing. “I am sitting in a room different from the one you are in now,” the text begins. “I am recording the sound of my speaking voice and I am going to play it back into the room again and again until the resonant frequencies of the room reinforce themselves so that any semblance of my speech, with perhaps the exception of rhythm, is destroyed.”The room’s acoustics, as well as audio distortions that occur when a tape is rerecorded over and over, yields a gradually changing sound in which, after 10 minutes, the spoken text is buried in reverberation and overtones, and unintelligible. During the final section, high-pitched overtones coalesce into eerie, slow-moving melodies.Other works are tempered by a wry sense of humor. In “Nothing Is Real” (1990), Mr. Lucier has a pianist play the melody of the Beatles’ “Strawberry Fields Forever,” scattering the song’s phrases throughout the piano’s range. The performance is recorded and immediately played back through a small speaker inside a teapot, which works as a sound-altering resonant chamber. Mr. Lucier then has the pianist open and close the teapot’s lid to further manipulate the tone of the recording.Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr., was born in Nashua, N.H., on May 14, 1931. His father was a lawyer who was elected mayor of Nashua when Alvin was 3. Alvin Sr. was also an amateur violinist who met his future wife, Kathryn E. Lemery, when he filled in with a dance band in which she was the pianist.The Luciers encouraged their son’s interest in music, but although he picked up the rudiments of piano playing from his mother, he refused to take lessons, preferring to play the drums. His principal interest at the time was jazz, but he became interested in contemporary classical music when he found a recording of Arnold Schoenberg’s “Serenade.”“I bought it and it was shocking,” Mr. Lucier said in a 2005 interview with NewMusicBox. “It didn’t make any sense, but there was something about it that kept my interest. At that point I decided I was interested in challenging things.”Mr. Lucier in 1997. His best-known work was “I Am Sitting in a Room,” a spoken text that, with repetition, becomes increasingly distorted and overlaid with reverberation until it is transformed into a symphony of dancing overtones.Joyce Dopkeen/The New York TimesHe studied composition and music theory at Yale University, where his teachers included Howard Boatwright and Quincy Porter. He received his bachelor’s degree there in 1954 and his master’s in 1960 at Brandeis University, where he studied with Arthur Berger and Harold Shapero. During those years he composed in a neo-Classical style, a preference reinforced by his studies at the Tanglewood Music Festival in Massachusetts with Aaron Copland and Lukas Foss during the summers of 1958 and ’59.Mr. Lucier’s change of heart occurred during a two-year stay in Rome as a Fulbright scholar, from 1960 to 1962. Attending a 1960 concert by the composers John Cage and David Tudor and the choreographer Merce Cunningham at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Mr. Lucier was at first outraged by the chance processes that Cage and Tudor were exploring. But as he thought about the concert in the days that followed, he began to understand Cage’s and Tudor’s rejection of conventional musical formats as both important and necessary.“Something about it was so wonderful and exhilarating, I decided that I wanted to involve myself in that,” he told The New York Times in 1997. “I was literally exhausted by the neo-Classic style, and I had a couple of teachers that were at an impasse. They were getting bitter, and they were sort of losing their enthusiasm. And I was just at that age where I was ready for something new. But I didn’t know what to do.”He found an answer in 1965, when he met Edmond Dewan, a physicist who had invented a brain wave amplifier. Mr. Lucier was by then on the Brandeis faculty and had won considerable attention in new-music circles by presiding over programs, both at Brandeis and in New York, that included premieres by Cage, Earl Brown, Christian Wolff and Terry Riley. Dr. Dewan offered the use of his invention to Mr. Lucier, who explored its possibilities in what became the breakthrough work in his new style, “Music for Solo Performer” (1965).For that piece, the performer sits before an audience with sensors strapped around his forehead, closed eyes and a clear mind. The waves are amplified and sent to loudspeakers, the vibrating cones of which cause percussion instruments to sound.The brain wave amplifier gave way to other high-tech gadgetry. Mr. Lucier created “Vespers” (1968) using echolocation devices — pulse oscillators used by the blind and others to determine distances. He had the gear operated by blindfolded performers moving through a space, the devices clicking at different speeds and intensities as they approach walls and other objects.Mr. Lucier earlier this year. He taught composition at Wesleyan University from 1968 to 2011.Jillian Freyer for The New York TimesIn 1966, Mr. Lucier formed the Sonic Arts Union with a group of like-minded avant-gardists, among them the composers Robert Ashley, David Behrman and Gordon Mumma. The group toured in the United States and Europe, with each composer performing his own music, until 1976. They were joined at times by visual artists, including Mr. Lucier’s first wife, Mary Lucier. Their marriage ended in divorce in 1972.Mr. Lucier later married Wendy Stokes, a former dancer and a psychiatric advanced-practice registered nurse. She survives him along with their daughter, Amanda.. In addition to their Middletown home, Mr. Lucier and his wife owned a studio apartment in Manhattan.He joined the Wesleyan faculty in 1968 and taught composition there until his retirement in 2011. Starting in the mid-1980s, he devoted himself increasingly to instrumental and ensemble works. The Bang on a Can All-Stars, Alter Ego, Ensemble Pamplemousse and ICE are among the groups that commissioned works from him.“I don’t really enjoy listening to my own music,” Mr. Lucier told NewMusicBox. “But maybe it’s good because it keeps me thinking and it keeps me from getting complacent.”Maia Coleman contributed reporting. More

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      in Theater

      ‘Walden’ Review: Getting Away From It All

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      Amy Berryman’s three-character drama, set in a one-room cabin as crises rage outside, asks how much we owe to ourselves and our world.We don’t know exactly how many years into the future Amy Berryman sets “Walden,” her incisive three-character drama. But the climate emergency has already worsened, along with a refugee crisis. Synthetic foods are now widespread. Cloning, too. War rages somewhere. (Everywhere?)“The bombs on Christmas? We could see them through one of our telescopes on the moon,” Cassie (Jeena Yi), a NASA astronaut, says by way of casual conversation.Cassie, recently returned from a lunar mission, has arrived at a secluded cabin in an undisclosed location to visit her twin sister, Stella (Diana Oh), and Stella’s partner, Bryan (Gabriel Brown). Stella had also trained as an astronaut, but she failed NASA’s physical fitness test. Bryan is an avowed Earth Advocate. He holds that the government should put money toward problems on Earth rather than investing elsewhere in the solar system. So the visit, though lubricated by bartered wine and home brew, isn’t an entirely cozy one.TheaterWorks Hartford and the director Mei Ann Teo have given the play, which runs through Aug. 29, an environmental staging, locating it in a functional one-room cabin, ringed with chicken coops and a vegetable garden, in a meadow alongside the Connecticut River. (The set, rough-hewed and ingenious, is by You-Shin Chen; Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew provides the inspired lighting.) If you can’t travel to Connecticut, TheaterWorks has made the play available for streaming, also through Aug. 29.That’s how I saw it. And if it felt wrong to watch a drama so concerned with environmentalism from a laptop, on my sofa, with a window unit whirring quietly in the background, tensions like this interest Berryman. She doesn’t situate herself as smarter than her characters, and distributes her sympathies equally among them. Still, go to Connecticut if you can, especially if you can get there by emissions-friendly means. Because that meadow looks beautiful. And birdsong and crepuscular rays are best experienced in person. Then again, there are no mosquitoes in digital theater. The filming is deft enough, and the performances — layered, unshowy — land even through the screen.“Walden” borrows its name from Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden; or, Life in the Woods,” a memoir, harangue, self-help manual and work of autofiction rolled into one clothbound volume. “Walden,” which extols solitude and self-reliance, was a favorite text of Cassie and Stella’s father, also an astronaut. And Walden is the name that Stella gives to the habitat she has designed for Mars. “I sort of think it reads like a whiny hipster’s blog from 19whatever,” Cassie says dismissively of the book. She isn’t exactly wrong.Thoreau went into the woods, he wrote, “because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” While Berryman loads her play with vivid details and plenty of plot mechanics, it’s Thoreau’s question of how to live and what constitutes a good life that animates her. Should we live for ourselves or for others? Engaged with the present or focused on the future? What do we have to sacrifice to live in community and what do we have to forfeit if we live without it?It’s probably that last question, which became a lot less rhetorical during the pandemic, that lends the play its poignancy. The humans of “Walden,” thrust together for this visit, are responding to various disasters — natural, unnatural, interpersonal — and trying their best to treat one another decently.The play never fully resolves its philosophical dilemmas, except to suggest that no philosophy will fit everyone comfortably. Even Thoreau, who preached self-reliance while famously bringing his laundry home to his mother, might have agreed. “Heaven,” he wrote, “is under our feet as well as over our heads.” So why not have both?WaldenThrough Aug. 29 at 100 Meadow Road, Windsor, Conn. and online; twhartford.org/events/walden. Running time: 1 hour 40 minutes. More

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      in Television

      ‘Allen v. Farrow’ Episode 3 Recap: Investigations and a Custody Trial

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Allen v. Farrow’ Episode 3 Recap: Investigations and a Custody TrialFilmmakers delve into dozens of boxes of records that documented the investigations into Dylan Farrow’s accusation of sexual abuse.Mia Farrow with her daughter Dylan in “Allen v. Farrow.” Episode 3 focuses on police and court documents, much of which had never been made public.Credit…HBOMarch 7, 2021In the previous episode of “Allen v. Farrow,” the HBO documentary series that examines Dylan Farrow’s accusation of sexual abuse against her father, Woody Allen, the filmmakers introduced viewers to key video footage of a 7-year-old Dylan explaining events to her mother.Although the footage, shot by Mia Farrow, had not been released publicly before this series, its existence has been the subject of controversy. Allies of Mr. Allen saw it as proof that Mia, Dylan’s mother, had coached Dylan. Others saw it as clear evidence that the accusations were true.Episode 3 revisits this footage and delves into the investigations, court proceedings and familial turmoil that followed.Mr. Allen has long denied the accusations of sexual abuse, and, after the first episode aired, a spokesperson for him said that the docuseries was “riddled with falsehoods.”This episode is built largely off police and court documents, much of which had never been made public, including a trove of more than 60 boxes of documentation that was in a lawyer’s storage room.Frank S. Maco, a state’s attorney in Connecticut, who worked on the case. He asked the child abuse clinic at Yale-New Haven Hospital to evaluate Dylan Farrow.Credit…HBOA high-profile police inquiryIt was Dylan Farrow’s pediatrician who first reported her allegations to the authorities, leading to investigations by the Connecticut State Police and the New York City Child Welfare Administration. (Dylan Farrow said the sexual assault occurred in the attic of the family’s Connecticut summer home.)In an extensive interview, Frank S. Maco, then a state’s attorney in Connecticut, says that he intended to investigate the accusation “quietly,” but that Mr. Allen held a news conference at the Plaza Hotel, where he shared the news of the investigation. Mr. Allen called the allegations a “gruesomely damaging manipulation of innocent children for vindictive and self-serving purposes.” He also declared his love for Soon-Yi Previn, Mia Farrow’s daughter, suggesting that the allegations were a result of Mia lashing out over that relationship.“They were doing a great job painting Mia Farrow as a scorned woman who would say anything,” said Rosanna Scotto, a broadcast reporter who covered the news at the time.Armed with that narrative, Mr. Allen went on a media campaign, while Ms. Farrow stayed relatively quiet. She told filmmakers that she was trying to establish some semblance of normalcy for her children.The Yale-New Haven reportMr. Maco, the prosecutor, said that he asked the child abuse clinic at Yale-New Haven Hospital to evaluate Dylan Farrow, to determine whether she would be traumatized by taking the stand at a trial and whether there were any “impediments” to her ability to testify — including any ability to “perceive, recall and relate.”During a seven-month inquiry, experts interviewed Dylan Farrow nine times, a number that child abuse and legal experts tell the documentary filmmakers was excessive for a child subject.“I would repeat the story over and over and over again,” Dylan Farrow says in the episode. “It was grueling and it was intense.”The final report stated that there were “inconsistencies” in Dylan Farrow’s statements and that she had “difficulties distinguishing fantasy from reality.” It found that her accusations were “likely reinforced and encouraged” by her mother. The clinic shared the results with Mr. Allen and Mia Farrow without telling Mr. Maco they were doing so, he said, and Mr. Allen announced the determinations at a news conference.Later on, during the custody battle between Mr. Allen and Ms. Farrow, the director of the clinic said in a deposition that its practice was to destroy notes; experts interviewed in Episode 3 say that this is antithetical to common practice in their field.The New York investigationThe inquiry by New York City’s Child Welfare Administration was being spearheaded by Paul Williams, a caseworker who interviewed Dylan Farrow and found her to be credible.Within two weeks of the investigation, Mr. Williams determined that there was sufficient information to open a New York-based criminal investigation, but he was told by superiors that in high-profile cases like this one, it was customary for the “big wigs” to take responsibility and for the welfare administration to relinquish control, according to case records reviewed by the filmmakers.A lawyer for Mr. Williams, Bruce Baron, says in the documentary that at the time, his client “wouldn’t shut up” about the case at work, and he was fired for insubordination. Mr. Williams sued the city over the firing, arguing in part that the city had suppressed information about the case; he won in court and got his job back..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-rqynmc{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:1.25rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-rqynmc{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc strong{font-weight:600;}.css-rqynmc em{font-style:italic;}.css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1pd7fgo{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1pd7fgo{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-1pd7fgo:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1pd7fgo{border:none;padding:20px 0 0;border-top:1px solid #121212;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-k9atqk{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-k9atqk strong{font-weight:700;}.css-k9atqk em{font-style:italic;}.css-k9atqk a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ccd9e3;}.css-k9atqk a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ddd;}.css-k9atqk a:hover{border-bottom:none;}Understand the Allegations Against Woody AllenNearly 30 years ago, Woody Allen was accused of sexually abusing Dylan Farrow, his adopted daughter. A new docuseries re-examines the case.This timeline reviews the major events in the complicated history of the director, his children and the Farrow family.The documentary filmmakers Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering spoke about delving into this thorny family tale. Read our recaps of episode 1 and episode 2.Dylan Farrow wrote an open letter in 2014, posted by the New York Times opinion columnist Nicholas Kristof, recounting her story in detail.Our book critic reviewed Mr. Allen’s recent memoir, “Apropos of Nothing.”A.O. Scott, co-chief film critic, grappled with the accusations and his complicated feelings on the filmmaker in 2018. In looking through Mr. Williams’s case files, the filmmakers found notes about a conversation he had with Jennifer Sawyer, a social worker who had interviewed Dylan Farrow for the Yale-New Haven report. According to the notes, Ms. Sawyer told Mr. Williams that “she believes Dylan” and believed that the child had “more to disclose.”In a seven-month period, Dylan Farrow was questioned nine times by clinic workers.Credit…HBOThe custody battleOn Aug. 13, 1992, nine days after the alleged sexual assault, Mr. Allen sued Mia Farrow for custody of their three children: Dylan Farrow, Moses Farrow and Ronan Farrow.In a taped phone call between Mia Farrow and Woody Allen, Ms. Farrow brings up his lawsuit against her and accusations that she was an unfit mother, to which he responds, “And I’m going to make them stick.” Ms. Farrow begged him to drop the case.During the trial, which started in the spring of 1993, Mr. Allen testified that he believed Ms. Farrow had “brainwashed” her daughter and that he was not alone with Dylan on the day that she said he assaulted her.The judge ultimately sided with Ms. Farrow, saying that Mr. Allen exhibited grossly inappropriate behavior toward Dylan and that “measures must be taken to protect her.” The judge called the Yale-New Haven report “sanitized,” considering the destruction of the notes and the team’s unwillingness to testify at trial.Expert analysisAt the end of the episode, the filmmakers return to the footage of Dylan Farrow taken by her mother, and show child abuse experts analyzing the video for the documentary. At the custody trial, where the footage was entered as evidence, Mr. Allen said that Ms. Farrow had asked her daughter “in a leading way about molestation.”But after seeing the footage, one of the documentary’s interviewees, Anna Salter, a child abuse expert and psychologist, said that Ms. Farrow did not make any “overt suggestions” in her questioning. One “implicit” suggestion Ms. Farrow makes, Dr. Salter said, is asking her daughter if Mr. Allen took her underpants off. (Dylan responds that he hadn’t done so.)“From my point of view, what’s important is Dylan’s response: Does she go along with the suggestion?” Dr. Salter said. “But she doesn’t.”As Ms. Farrow says in a taped phone call between her and Mr. Allen played at the top of the episode: “Dylan’s a baby; how could you do that to her?”Mr. Allen’s response is inaudible.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      in Movies

      ‘Allen v. Farrow’ Episode 2 Recap: A Family Torn Apart

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Allen v. Farrow’ Episode 2 Recap: A Family Torn ApartSeven months after the shocking discovery of Woody Allen’s relationship with Soon-Yi Previn, he was accused of sexually abusing Dylan Farrow.From left, Moses Farrow, Soon-Yi Previn, Dylan Farrow and Woody Allen.Credit…HBOFeb. 28, 2021At the end of Episode 1 of “Allen v. Farrow,” the HBO documentary series that investigates the decades-old sexual abuse accusations by Woody Allen’s adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, the family has just started to cope with the revelation that Mr. Allen and Soon-Yi Previn were involved in a secret relationship.In January 1992, Mia Farrow, Ms. Previn’s mother and Mr. Allen’s girlfriend, discovered nude photos of Ms. Previn, who was then in college, at Mr. Allen’s apartment.The second episode examines the fallout from that discovery and Dylan Farrow’s allegations that her father sexually assaulted her in August 1992, when she was 7 years old.After the first episode premiered, a spokesperson for Mr. Allen and Ms. Previn, who have been married for more than 20 years, released a statement saying the series was “riddled with falsehoods” and suggesting that the filmmakers did not give them ample notice to respond to it. The publisher of Mr. Allen’s recent memoir, “Apropos of Nothing,” also objected to the inclusion of snippets from the audiobook, which it says were used without permission.The filmmakers said in a statement on Wednesday that Mr. Allen and Ms. Previn were approached in December and were given two weeks to confirm their interest in an on- or off-camera interview. A representative confirmed that they had received the request but did not respond to it, the statement said. Mr. Allen has denied ever having been sexually inappropriate or abusive toward Dylan Farrow.Here is what we saw on Sunday night, in Episode 2.A fixation on a certain kind of romanceThis episode, using interviews with journalists and clips from Mr. Allen’s films, explores Mr. Allen’s focus on romantic relationships between older men and younger women.In addition to the films with that theme that have been produced (“Husbands and Wives,” “September”), the episode considers those that did not make it to the screen and that reside in the Woody Allen archive at Princeton University. The archive contains multiple versions of film scripts and pages of ideas with notes in the margins. Richard Morgan, a freelance journalist who examined the archive for The Washington Post, said in the documentary that it reveals a “focus” on “very young women.”The episode includes an interview with Christina Engelhardt, a woman who says she started a relationship with Mr. Allen when she was 17 years old and he was in his early 40s. Ms. Engelhardt, who was a model as a teenager, said she believes their relationship was the basis for “Manhattan,” Mr. Allen’s acclaimed 1979 film that centers on a romance between a high school girl and a man — played by Mr. Allen — who is older than her father.She says in an interview with the filmmakers that her relationship with Mr. Allen, which she said lasted until she was 23, has “taken a toll” on her, affecting her later relationships. She says the experience also made her a “supervigilant mother.”Dylan FarrowCredit…HBOThe aftermath of the photosAfter Ms. Farrow discovers the nude Polaroids of Ms. Previn, the family is in shock. Daisy Previn, one of Ms. Farrow’s daughters, recounts how she told her sister, Soon-Yi, that she should come back to the family — that their mother would forgive her — and how Soon-Yi went in another direction, to Mr. Allen.Ms. Farrow recalls a moment that she was “not proud” of from around this time: She found Soon-Yi talking to someone on the phone and, assuming it was Mr. Allen, Ms. Farrow said she “pounced on her,” slapping Soon-Yi on the side of the face and the shoulder. (In 2014, Moses Farrow, Mia and Woody’s son, told People magazine that his mother bullied the children and hit him. Moses, who has sided with his father in saying that he does not believe that Dylan was molested, has not participated in the docuseries.)Part of a taped phone conversation between Ms. Farrow and Mr. Allen from the summer of 1992 is included in the episode. Ms. Farrow says she decided to record it because she thought Mr. Allen had already taped one of their phone calls. In the conversation, Ms. Farrow and Mr. Allen argue about what they should say to the media if his relationship with Ms. Previn becomes public.Fletcher Previn, one of Ms. Farrow’s older children, tells the filmmakers that during this time, his opinion of Mr. Allen shifted dramatically.“He went from a father figure to a person who is a predator that we have to keep out of the house and protect ourselves from,” Mr. Previn said.Aug. 4, 1992Amid this chaos, the family went to their Connecticut country house, and despite the rift between Ms. Farrow and Mr. Allen, he had a legal right to see Dylan and Moses Farrow because he had adopted them in 1991..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-rqynmc{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:1.25rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-rqynmc{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc strong{font-weight:600;}.css-rqynmc em{font-style:italic;}.css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1pd7fgo{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1pd7fgo{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-1pd7fgo:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1pd7fgo{border:none;padding:20px 0 0;border-top:1px solid #121212;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-1pd7fgo[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-k9atqk{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-k9atqk strong{font-weight:700;}.css-k9atqk em{font-style:italic;}.css-k9atqk a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ccd9e3;}.css-k9atqk a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ddd;}.css-k9atqk a:hover{border-bottom:none;}Understand the Allegations Against Woody AllenNearly 30 years ago, Woody Allen was accused of sexually abusing Dylan Farrow, his adoptive daughter. A new docuseries re-examines the case.This timeline reviews the major events in the complicated history of the director, his children and the Farrow family.The documentary filmmakers Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering spoke about delving into this thorny family tale. Dylan Farrow wrote an open letter in 2014, posted by the New York Times opinion columnist Nicholas Kristof, recounting her story in detail.Our book critic reviewed Mr. Allen’s recent memoir, “Apropos of Nothing.”A.O. Scott, co-chief film critic, grappled with the accusations and his complicated feelings on the filmmaker in 2018. The episodes include a mixture of interviews and court testimony from those who were present on Aug. 4, 1992, the day that Dylan Farrow says her father assaulted her. Mia Farrow had gone to the store with Casey Pascal, a family friend whose children and babysitter were at the house that day. Sophie Bergé, a French tutor staying with the family that summer, said that Mr. Allen arrived while they were running errands.On that day, there were about 20 minutes during which Dylan Farrow could not be found, according to 1993 testimony in the custody case from Kristi Groteke, the babysitter for the Farrow children. Ms. Groteke said in court that she looked for Dylan throughout the house but could not find her.When Ms. Farrow and Ms. Pascal returned home, Ms. Farrow said, she noticed that Dylan was not wearing underpants and asked her babysitter to get a new pair.The day afterOn Aug. 5, Ms. Pascal said that she called Ms. Farrow to tell her that the Pascals’ babysitter, Alison Stickland, had witnessed something that disturbed her: Dylan Farrow sitting on the couch, with Mr. Allen, on his knees, his head buried in his daughter’s lap.Ms. Farrow tells the filmmakers that when she asked her daughter what had happened, Dylan confirmed that Mr. Allen had put his head in her lap and that he had also taken her up to the attic and touched her “privates.” Ms. Farrow says she decided to film her daughter’s account because she wanted to tell Dylan’s therapist, who was away for the summer.That footage, which is being shown publicly for the first time in this series, later became the subject of controversy: Some thought it was clear evidence that Dylan Farrow was telling the truth, while others saw it as evidence that Ms. Farrow had coached her daughter on what to say.In the video, Dylan Farrow says that in the attic, her father told her, “Do not move, I have to do this,” and that if she stayed still, they could go on a trip to Paris.Dylan Farrow, now 35 years old, says in the documentary she remembers that during the assault, she focused her attention on her brother’s train set.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More