why are they famous?; Soon-Yi Allen

Sunday 12 April 1998 00:02 BST
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MAIN CLAIM: Lolita of the 1990s, child-bride player in the most ill-advised mid-life crisis since Humbert Humbert's. Now Mrs Woody Allen, formerly Soon-Yi Previn, adopted daughter of Sir Andre and Mia Farrow, has been enjoying Donatella Versace's latest show with her husband. She was appropriately attired in a short, pleated frock with schoolgirl-style collar, topped with two plaits. Politely referred to as Allen's "young wife", the pigtailed one resembled an enthusiastic sixth-former on a work- experience placement with Help the Aged.

APPEARANCE: Dish-faced teenager from inner-city high school. Hallowe'en pumpkin. Demonstration model of the moon's topographical features.

SEED TIME: Abandoned on the streets of Seoul, Soon-Yi was adopted at the age of seven, sent to a private school run by psychiatrists, and then to Drew University, New Jersey. She was brought up by Mia along with siblings called things like Moses, Satchel, Dylan and Lark, and including among their number a cocaine-addicted black American and a blind Vietnamese. Soon-Yi's age is debated, but universally agreed to be on the young side. That's it, folks.

CHILD BRIDE: Implications that Soon-Yi may not possess an over-abundance of grey cells churlishly abound. Our tender heroine's comments on her affair and her mental capabilities: "I was not raped, molested or manipulated. Nor am I retarded or mentally slow; I'm a psychology major at college who fell for a man who happens to be the ex-boyfriend of Mia." A simple matter, then, not a seething can of worms, not a monumentally gothic horror story for our times. "I admit it's offbeat, but let's not get hysterical," advises Soon-Yi.

PRETTY BABY: Mr and Mrs Allen-to-be enjoyed their first date at a basketball game, the kind of thing you do with teenagers, and then followed up with a trip to Burger King. "I didn't feel that just because Soon-Yi was Mia's daughter, there was any great moral dilemma," said Woody. "The heart wants what it wants." Evidently, girls in plaits want a neurotic, hypochondriac introspective in a beige tweed jacket. "There's no logic to these things," as Woody said.

FAME PROSPECTS: Soon-Yi has one scandal to her name, but shows no signs of designing her own junior clothing range or appearing as a schoolgirl baby-sitter in a Woody Allen film. Time for an affair with Stanley Kubrick.

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