This is an outrageously screen ready story of brutal, crushing mental illness against a backdrop of the decadence of 1960s ultra rich. The incest could be a lie, but there are so many moments of her life that just read like fiction:

She walked barefoot across central park, in the snow, wearing only a lynx fur coat, at the age of 48, to speak to a guy who had made it amply clear he didn’t want anything more to do with her.

Her son goes to take hallucinogens in Morroco with his boyfriend and she drives from Switzerland to “save” him from his homosexuality, having previously hired prostitutes to de-gay him. They get thrown in jail after trying to get into France without his passport.

Then Barbara tries to set her son up with a woman, Sylvie, but Sylvie sleeps with Barbara’s husband instead - marrying him after they divorce.

This was someone’s life! So many scenes of glorious tragedy.

Upon his release, Antony, then aged 33, flew directly to New York City to stay with his 87-year-old maternal grandmother, Nini Daly. Only six days after his release, on July 27, he attacked her with a kitchen knife, stabbing her eight times and breaking several bones. He was then arrested by the New York City Police Department, charged with attempted murder[7] and sent to Rikers Island prison.

Wow, he tried the first time to kill his mother, his doctor at the asylum said “he’s going to kill his mother”, he tries a second time and succeeds, and they still release him!?

Schizophrenia or severe dissociative disorder from abuse? Sad thing is, she was probably abused and acted out her own abuse. We need to focus, as a society, on deep trauma healing.