Farrah Fawcett and Ryan O’Neal were going to get married the day she died.
“The priest at St. John’s Hospital arrives to marry us — but administers the last rites
instead,” he wrote in his book. This Hollywood’s golden couple survived all the drama and tragedy
in their three-decade-long romance. The only thing that tore them apart was death.
And it was O’Neal who held Fawcett’s hand as she took her last breaths.
It all started when Lee Majors unwittingly introduced his wife to the man she’d spend
her last days with. Lee Majors and Ryan O’Neal had sparked up a friendship in the 1960s, and they got
together again in 1979. Majors was scheduled to shoot a movie in Toronto, where O’Neal’s
daughter Tatum lived. At the same time, O’Neal would be working in Los Angeles, near Fawcett.
The men made a deal to look in on each other’s loved ones and keep them company.
Lee had worried Farrah might feel lonesome while he was away, but thanks to O’Neal,
she wasn’t lonely for long. The two quickly began an affair that would last for three decades.
“They were saying the marriage was over, and I was saying they were terrific together,” O’Neal
recalled later on. “She said, ‘Lee, remember when we were first married, and we were in Nevada,
and you’d leave me in some dinky cabin and go to a bar? You’d tell me to get undressed and get in
bed and wait for you, but you never came back.’ His answer was, ‘Same man now as I was then.’”
It wasn’t long after this that Majors had asked O’Neal to take Fawcett to dinner, but it just
didn’t sit right with O’Neal. A week later, he saw there was a Ry Cooder concert, according
to his book. Knowing Farrah was a fan gave him the excuse he needed to invite her to the show.
“I thought I’d hear from you,” she answered the phone. O’Neal extended the invite, but Fawcett
said she’d have to call him back with an answer. Eventually, she agreed to go, but talked to
Majors right before. “I let him know that Ryan asked me out. He said,
‘I told him to. But you’re not going.’” Around this time, Majors started calling
O’Neal’s house and hanging up — finally one time saying, “Stay away from my woman!”
Instead, O’Neal confessed his love for her. “It was a situation I’d never been in
before — committing to a woman before I’d even talked to her about it,” he said.
That tumultuous start foreshadowed much of how the couple’s eventual relationship turned out to be.
By 1980, Farrah and Lee were separated but still technically sharing their mansion
where they had spent seven years of their lives together. Meanwhile,
Ryan and Farrah’s romance was blossoming, and the new pair was the talk of the town. If
Farrah and Lee Majors had been considered a power couple, Farrah and Ryan were a superpower couple.
As she embarked on a new relationship with O’Neal, Fawcett was already disillusioned
with Charlie’s Angels, which had quickly become a cultural phenomenon. Fawcett’s assessment of
the show was brutally honest: “When the show got to be Number Three, I figured it was our acting.
When it got to be Number One, I decided it could only be because none of us wears a bra.”
The actor then did something unheard of at the time — she quit the hugely successful
show after just one season. Determined to escape the sex symbol stereotype,
Farrah spent a few years honing her craft and working in theater.
Finally, in 1984, she got some recognition for her dramatic acting chops. The actor was
nominated for her first Emmy Award for portraying an abused woman in the TV movie The Burning Bed.
Her performance was critically renowned and spurred a national conversation about domestic
violence. “Miss Fawcett gives an admirably strong performance, progressing from spirited
teenager to a trembling shell of a woman with harrowing conviction,” The New York Times said.
All the while, O’Neal’s career faltered, and he struggled to fulfill his early acting promise.
Some blamed substance abuse for his declining acting work and increasingly volatile temper.
On January 30, 1985, Farrah gave birth to her first and only child,
their son Redmond O’Neal. Despite years of rumors, she had no plans to wed his father. Marriage was
never something either of them needed. There was the time Farrah and Ryan were on their way
to a church in Nevada, but got a flat tire — and never felt the need to walk down the aisle again.
There were times they were the idyllic couple, showering each other with love. They were also
brutally honest and real. And when it came down to it, they were protective of one another.
The couple's stormy relationship weathered career missteps, erratic behavior, and family drama. But
the last straw for Fawcett was walking in on O'Neal in bed with another woman.
In his 60s, Ryan began an affair with Leslie Stefanson, an actor still in her 20s. As
he tells it, “I just don’t think Farrah liked me very much. So I excused myself,
and I was lucky enough to meet this young girl. She was more a daughter to me than a lover,
and my own daughter had flown the coop, so here was this replacement.”
In 1997, Farrah finally walked in on Ryan and Leslie together, catching them in the act. Ryan
recalls, “Leslie dived under the covers. I thought Farrah was going to attack her,
but she said, ‘What’s your name?’ Leslie said, ‘Leslie.’ And Farrah walked out.”
The actor remains impressed by Farrah’s composure and her ability to navigate that difficult
time with grace despite her anger and pain. “I didn’t have a change of life; I was always a
jerk. But they’re hard work, these divas; I was sick of it, and I was unappreciated,” he said.
That was the breaking point. After two decades together, they split in 1998.
With that, Farrah and Ryan began their first and only separation during their three-decade-long
romance. Though the two continued to stay in close touch with each other,
they each saw other people during this time. And when O’Neal was diagnosed with leukemia in
2001, they reunited. Now older, the couple rekindled their romance, and this time they
built it in a way that had foundation and trust. “Farrah had her home here, and I had my home
at the beach, and she would only come on the weekends.
Our son was happy. And Farrah was mature. She didn’t get mad at me so easily. I had missed her.”
Luckily for the two lovers, O’Neal was able to get his leukemia into remission and begin living
a healthy life again. With Ryan back on his feet, the couple started getting back into the normal
rhythm of life. The two of them continued to live separately, but spent much of their days together.
They were very much in love again and enjoying their newfound relationship.
Unfortunately for the lovebirds, more dark days were just around the corner.
After all that they had been through, things were about to get much, much worse.
As fate would have it, the tables turned: Fawcett was diagnosed with anal cancer
in 2006 — and O’Neal dedicated himself to taking care of her.
Even then, looking ahead, he wasn’t sure how he’d cope. “It’s a love story. I just don’t know how to
play this one. I won’t know this world without her,” he said. “Cancer is an insidious enemy.”
After going through an aggressive course of treatments, including chemo and radiation,
Farrah was declared cancer-free. However, just a few months later,
another cancerous polyp was found during a routine checkup. According to Verywell Health,
only about 15% of patients who beat anal cancer will see a recurrence, so this turn of events
was disheartening and unexpected for Farrah. She declined surgery and instead traveled
to Germany for a treatment that combined chemotherapy with cutting-edge treatments
such as laser ablation, which uses a laser to heat the tumor, killing cancerous cells. Farrah
remained in Germany until April 2009, when she returned home to Los Angeles.
The star began filming everything she went through as a cancer patient during her treatment.
Her footage was eventually edited into the 2009 documentary Farrah’s Story.
Critics derided the documentary, which took an unflinching look at the actor’s ordeal,
as exploitative, but it was made at Fawcett's insistence on sharing
her experience with a disease that had received little attention in the media.
As her friend Alana Stewart said, “If she was going to have cancer,
she was going to use it to do good.” Toward the end of Farrah’s life,
Ryan began to doubt if their decision not to tie the knot had been correct. “We never
really considered it. We didn’t want to do what other people wanted us to do. We were rebels. But
now I would do it in a second — if I can get her to wake up long enough. Our son would love it.”
As time began to run out for the lovers, regrets and thoughts of marriage came up
more and more for Ryan. And in those final dire days, O’Neal proposed, and Fawcett accepted.
Sadly, their wedding day would never come. This time it was more than just a flat tire.
“The priest at St. John’s Hospital arrives to marry us — but administers
the last rites instead,” he wrote in his book, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Farrah Fawcett passed away from anal cancer on June 25, 2009, at 62 years old. She had
spent her last day surrounded by friends and her longtime love Ryan by her side.
Farrah’s fight against cancer continues to inspire others to keep fighting too, and her foundation,
The Farrah Fawcett Foundation, funds HPV research and gives money to patients in need.
After Fawcett's death, O'Neal struggled to pick up the pieces of his life.
In 2012, O'Neal published Both of Us: My Life with Farrah. O'Neal said writing the book was
"cathartic," giving him an opportunity to explain his life with Fawcett and "paint a
clearer picture to everyone, including me." Looking back, it’s hard for him not to have
regrets of what could have been. “I would have been much kinder, more understanding,
more mature,” he said, wishing he could have a do-over. “I’d lose some of the savagery. I don’t
know how she got cancer; maybe some of it was me.” 12 years after her death, Ryan continues to
love Farrah. “There was never a day that I did not love her.”