On screen and off, Farrah Fawcett lived a life of drama

Farrah Fawcett's fame was fueled by heightened coverage of her personal dramas.

She had many: a failed marriage to actor Lee Majors; a stormy, long-term relationship with actor Ryan O'Neal; a son who fought drug addiction; a writer-director boyfriend, James Orr, who was convicted of assaulting her.

Majors married her in 1973 and became "The Six Million Dollar Man" on ABC a year later. Her contract for "Charlie's Angels" stipulated that she had to be home every night by 6:30 to make Majors' dinner, but the domesticity didn't last. While on location in 1979, Majors arranged for his dashing buddy O'Neal to look in on his wife. By fall, she had moved into O'Neal's Malibu beachfront home.

They were together for 17 tumultuous years but never married, although O'Neal said this week that Ms. Fawcett had said yes to his latest marriage proposal. In 1985, she and O'Neal became parents of a son, Redmond. From age 13, he has been in and out of drug-treatment programs and has admitted abusing heroin. Now 24, he has had several drug-related arrests in the past year and is in jail.

When Ms. Fawcett and O'Neal broke up in 1997 — she attributed it to conflicts over parenting — it was the beginning of a troubled time for her.

Orr, a sometime boyfriend, was convicted of slamming her head to the ground and choking her. She admitted smashing windows at his mansion with a baseball bat. The couple reconciled but broke up before he was sentenced to three years' probation in 1999.

Ms. Fawcett's relationship with O'Neal was on-again, off-again after their breakup. She helped nurse him back to health after he was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia in 2001; and he was there for her soon after she was diagnosed with anal cancer.