Tatum O’Neal covers the latest issue of Variety. I didn’t realize that Tatum is in such poor health these days. She overdosed in 2020 and suffered a stroke, and five years later, she’s still walking with a cane and she has noticeable memory lapses. She’s 61 years old, and she has three adult children – all with her ex-husband John McEnroe – and she’s surprisingly close to all of them, even though she had major substance abuse issues throughout their childhoods. This Variety piece is, at times, a real downer. Tatum is clean, she’s been drug-free since 2020, but she admits to drinking alcohol several times since her stroke, like on Election Night last year (I feel her on that). Some highlights from this Variety piece, including her conversation about being cut out of her abusive father’s will:
Her parents: Her parents were both actors, and addicts — they were careless with her, abusive and neglectful. She was given alcohol at age 6 at her mother’s house, then endured years of physical and verbal abuse from Ryan O’Neal after he gained full custody of her in 1970. He punched her, for instance, after learning she was nominated for “Paper Moon” and he wasn’t. O’Neal, who died in 2023, openly did drugs in front of her when she was a child. “Pills and painkillers, cocaine,” she says, ticking them off on her fingers. “And then, of course,” she says of the procession of women who came and went from their home, “girls, girls, girls.”
Her 2020 overdose: Pills nearly ended her life in May 2020, when she overdosed in her Century City apartment, causing a severe stroke. During the lockdown period of COVID, while suffering from chronic pain from rheumatoid arthritis, O’Neal had been prescribed morphine by a doctor who either didn’t know or didn’t care about her addictions. Isolated, she remembers not wanting to be here anymore, even for her kids. “I love them so much, but I’d already given so much,” she says. “Part of me just didn’t want to make it, you know?”
The stroke changed her: “Now I don’t want to hurt myself. Now I don’t want to f–king take drugs again — I really don’t.”
Ryan O’Neal cut her out of his will: She never did get an apology from her father — in fact, his coup de grâce was when she learned after his death that he’d cut her out of his will. But he has given her something after all, something priceless: She’s now free from the malignant shadow he cast over her life.
Starring alongside Richard Burton when she was in her early teens. “He was brilliant — and the movie we did was terrible,” O’Neal says. Through today’s lens, the whole enterprise was utterly repellent — just wrong on every level. She had to appear topless in it (“I was horrified”), and says that Burton, a famous drinker, offered her booze and then propositioned her with the salvo, “Would you like to have a kiss?” O’Neal was always treated like a little adult. “‘Yikes’ is the right word,” she says. “I loved Richard Burton, but I was like, nah, I ain’t going to do that.”
She visited her father three times after her stroke: After years of bitter fighting and estrangement, Tatum had actually seen him three times after her health crisis, including a visit to the Malibu house right before his death. He had been in poor health for years, and she didn’t know that he was dying, though “he didn’t look well at all.” During her final visit, he offered her drugs. “I know he was drinking, smoking a lot of pot, and he was like, ‘Here, take a pill,’” she says. “I was like, ‘No, thank you.’” [Her son] McEnroe, who is also sober and intent on accountability, says: “She drank that day though. Every single time she’s seen her dad my entire life, something happens.”
She thinks Ryan cut her out of his will after she wrote her first memoir: “The first book that I wrote was just a f–king honest book. And that’s what got him.” Naturally, O’Neal was devastated to find out she wasn’t in her father’s will. Yet she soon felt a steely resolve emerging out of Ryan O’Neal’s final fuck-you from beyond the grave: “Keep it, motherf–ker.”
Sobriety remains a struggle: Her birthday, Nov. 5, was election night, and when it became clear that Donald Trump was going to win, she began drinking. “I was with my gay friends, and was like, ‘I’m going to have a glass of wine — maybe two,’” she says. “And then I was like, ‘OK, damn: I have one day of sobriety.’”
The concern, I’m sure, is that it’s a slippery slope for so many addicts who have issues with multiple substances. While I believe Tatum when she says she’s done with drugs, if she continues to drink a couple of times a year, you never know what else she might feel like doing or taking when she’s one bottle of wine into the night. I wish her peace though, and I’m glad that she’s finally done with the drugs and that she’s managed to salvage her relationships with her kids. The sh-t with Ryan O’Neal though… he was such a piece of sh-t to all women throughout his life. What a completely slimy thing to do, cutting the daughter he abused out of his will.
Photos courtesy of Getty, Backgrid, cover courtesy of Variety.
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Chickens are coming home to roost for Tatum. Karma is a she-dog.
Generational trauma is real. Makes me wonder what kind up bringing Ryan O’Neal had.
I agree Whatnow. I often wonder what did my parents endured that made them do the things that they did. They are both long gone so I’ll never know.
She has been portrayed in the media as a self created mess. The adults in her life were never held accountable. It’s good to see such a sympathetic portrayal.
that’s not surprising, male icons of her day are still lauded as heroes despite the fact they were sexually abusing young teenaged girls out in the open because it was perfectly acceptable for a male rock star in his 20s or 30s to have sex with a 13-15 yo girl. The girls, however, were all responsible for the emotional (and physical) trauma inflicted on them and for saying yes to the adult man who plied them with drugs and alcohol, and any addictions that plagued them into adulthood
Hardly self- created. All his children have had issues with substance abuse, and Redmond, Farrah’s son is in prison for attempted murder. His other son was connected to the death of Francis Ford Coppola’s son.
There are bad parents then there are epically damaging parents.
It’s a whole family tree of disaster:
Redmond Fawcett O’Neal – in state hospital for life, schizophrenic
Griffin – driving the boat during accident that killed Gian Carlo Coppola (Sophia’s brother)
Patrick is the only steady one as a sports broadcaster.
Ryan’s son with Leigh Taylor Young – Patrick – somehow didn’t inherit the gene that caused his siblings to spiral.
I’m of the age where a lot of my friends have lost their parents. I’ve heard a lot of stories about wills and inheritance and am no longer surprised by what people choose to do with their money after they die. But, everyone is entitled to leave their money to whomever they want. After all, it is their money.
Did he cut all his children out of the will. He was estranged from griffin. I don’t know about his other two children.
Who did he leave it to? IIRC he was a crap parent to all his kids but the one he had with his second wife still seemed to have a relationship with Ryan. The other 3, Tatum and Griffin then Redmond he had with Farrah, have all had issues with addiction, and the brothers stints in jail amongst other things.
Even without money parents can still find ways to be cruel on their way to the grave. I will never understand that.
Farrah probably left her money to redmond. And patrick o neal Ryan’s son with leigh taylor young seemed to spend most of his time with his mother and was better off. He has two daughters with rebecca de mornay
IIRC she did leave it all to Redmond but it was in a trust because he’d already been having addiction issues so, in part, wanted to make sure he didn’t burn thru it using, and also knew Ryan well enough that he’d try to angle his way to get some.
If I recall Farrah left all her money to Redmond, and he was really mad that she didn’t leave him anything. I think the intent was that he and Redmond were going to stay high off that money. I didn’t know he had children with Rebecca. I watched the reality series Tatum did with Ryan. He was so checked out as a father. He wanted to be buddies with them. He had no concept of parenting.
There’s a picture of the family: Patrick O’Neal his ex Rebecca and their daughters on the Internet, where they attended some event. Patrick’s mother is Ryan’s former co-star (Peyton Place) Leigh Taylor Young. Their marriage lasted about 7 years.
I remember watching a heart-breaking documentary of Farrah while she went through cancer treatment. After she died the first thing Ryan did was take artwork from her home — I think it was a signed Andy Warhol silkscreen of Marilyn Monroe. Farrah was barely in her grave and he was ransacking her house for stuff. Why she wasted years on that monster is beyond me. Unfortunately their son inherited his father’s predilection for drugs, and has been in jail most of his adult life for drug trafficking and attempted murder. He’s currently hospitalized due to schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and antisocial personality disorder. He’ll likely never be allowed out again, he is beyond help.
Tatum had been making a comeback on the early 2000. I remember she was in a sex and the city episode called a woman’s right to shoes
It couldn’t have been much in his estate anyway, other than his house which recently burned in the wildfires. unless I’m mistaken he hadn’t acted in years. He had a major legal battle just to keep an Andy Warhol portrait of Farrah.
I read somewhere that he made really smart real estate investments over the years much kept him solvent. He lived for years in Malibu, buying before it was the Malibu of today.
I remember when she married John McEnroe, seemed such an odd pairing but also lots of commentary she was marrying someone quite similar to her father in that, at the time, he had the reputation for being volatile but without the addiction issues. You don’t hear much about, or from, their 3 kids together which hopefully means they have turned out ok and are doing well in their chosen paths.
Kevin McEnroe is an author , who wrote a novel based on the life of his actress grandmother, Tatum’s mother. Sean McEnroe is a businessman, and Emily McEnroe is an actress and singer.
Cool, thanks!
It is his money and he can do whatever he wants with it. For a child to assume it is theirs is entitlement. He was an abusive terrible man to her anyway so I dont understand how she would want to keep the money. It is blood money and at best she should donate it to a domestic abuse shelter so she never accepts this donkey’s money.
Or maybe he owes her for getting her addicted to drugs and for some of his money being made off her participation in things he was in also. Who said she assumed? Perhaps he promised and lied also. Maybe she needed money to help overcome the addictions he helped fuel. It also feels like the final FU from a parent who apparently already was emotionally distant.
Parents dangling money or an inheritance is a control issue. She should know that and as a final FU say i dont need your money … what now….
Lol at least thats how i imagine the conversation going
A parent’s rejection still leaves an emotional impact. It is very hard to completely disown a parent. Leaving nothing, not even a keepsake, has to be harshly felt. I can see a parent leaving things to charity instead or to help ones who need more help, but you discuss it and don’t blindside someone like a total a-hole. I have never understood how Farrah left Lee Majors for this jerk.
She should have stayed with Lee. He remarried after Farrah and had three children with her. And he has a son by his first wife–Farrah was his second wife. Lee and Ryan were supposedly friends, but in Lee’s absence, Ryan pursued Farrah.
The story was Lee Majors and Ryan were BFF’s. At the time Lee was more famous than Farrah; he was going on location to shoot a movie and asked Ryan to check in on Farrah while he was gone and Ryan checked in/moved in. By all accounts he could be charming as heck.
By all accounts, Ryan O’Neal was a horrible father and a horrible person. He also had several children with several women. A responsible dad takes care of his kids. Ryan was not that dad. Makes me wonder who is in Caitlin Jenner’s will.
I bet Ryan was just jealous of her for winning an Oscar, and never got over it.
Narcissists never accept any of the blame. It’s not surprising he took her writing the book personally.
Cutting her out was the last stab at making her pay for calling him out. In his mind her book was all lies.
O’Neal was a distinctly creepy character who insisted on resting his hand on Allegra Huston’s teenage thigh as he drove her to school according to her memoir called, “Love Child.” Allegra met him through his dating her older half sister. Angelica ended their brief relationship after he head butted her in a car park. Just a horrible man.
Eta this was supposed to be in reply to HillaryIsAlwaysRight’s post:
Yup, 100%. I read her memoir some years back and remember gasping out loud, when she recalled that he was so pissed off when he learned that she was nominated and he wasn’t that he PUNCHED HER IN THE FACE, his 10 year old child! She also had to go to the ceremony alone, as he refused to go with her. He was just a shitty human being, through and through.