Model and actress Anjelica Huston wrote about her childhood and string of early love affairs with older men in the first part of her autobiography "A Story Lately Told: Coming of Age in Ireland, London and New York."
When Huston was only 18, she had an affair with the 42-year-old celebrity photographer Bob Richardson after they met at a photoshoot in 1969. The shoot was for Harper’s Bazaar as publicity for the film “A Walk with Love and Death,” which her father directed and in which she starred. Huston became Richardson’s muse.
Richardson suffered from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and would spend days in a vile mood. Huston’s memoir reveals that four days into what she called one of his ‘vile moods’ she slit her wrists in desperation, according to excerpts from her biogrpahy published in the Daily Mail.
“I never felt so fragile or vulnerable as when Bob became demonic and flew into a rage, or worse, when afterward he retreated into his shell.
“One morning, four days into one of these ordeals, I walked into the bathroom at the Chelsea [Hotel] and, in desperation, drew a razor blade across my left wrist. I ran back into the bedroom, blood spurting from the vein, crying to him: ‘Will this make you love me?'”
Richardson took her to the emergency room where she was stitched up and questioned about her injury. The two took a vacation to try to work on things, but they were nearly killed by police in Mexico. Huston soon left Richardson.
Her first encounter with a celebrity admirer was when she was just 16 in County Galway, where she spent most of her youth. Her father had invited 53-year-old Marlon Brando to the family estate at St. Clerans:
“I went up to the Big House one morning and found a tanned, even featured man in a maroon velour sweatshirt standing on the upstairs landing, talking to Dad, who introduced me to him.” She continued, “That afternoon in the study, Marlon gave me a tortoise shell ring from Tahiti, inlaid with silver and asked me if I’d like to visit him there some day.”
The following year, when she was 17, she was seduced by the then 28-year-old actor James Fox, who was already dating American Andee Cohen. Huston was impressed by his celebrity friends and skipped afternoon school to be with him. Their affair ended when she realized he was in love with his girlfriend and he was just using her. She wrote, “Willy Fox had broken my heart.”
Huston later dated Parisian aristocrat Baron Arnaud de Rosnay, Ryan O’Neal and iconic photographer David Bailey, who considered proposing to her. She modeled for Vogue in Britain and France and was photographed by Helmut Newton.
Huston has had a successful acting career including: "The Addams Family," "The Golden Bowl," and "Prizzi’s Honour," for which she earned the Best Supporting Actress Oscar. She was recently seen on NBC in “Smash.”
Huston married sculptor Robert Graham in 1992 and stayed with him until his death in 2008. She is currently writing the second part of her autobiography titled “Watch Me,” which she has already revealed will discuss her acting career, life in LA, and her seventeen year on and off again relationship with actor Jack Nicholson. “Watch Me” is tentatively due for release a year from now.
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