Bio cont'd

Prudence followed an early interest in meditation and yoga in 1966 at the age of 18 when she started Transcendental Meditation®.  In 1966-67, she studied with Swami Satchidananda to be a yoga instructor, eventually opening and running the Integral Yoga Institute in Boston.  In 1968, she went to India to study with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and was made a teacher of Transcendental Meditation®.  It was at this course that she met the Beatles and they wrote the song “Dear Prudence” about her. After marrying and while raising a family, she began working in film as Art Department Coordinator for Woody Allen, and as a producer with artists such as Andy Kaufman, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Paula Vogel, award winning directors Bruce Beresford and Alan Bridges and Tony award winning writer Hugh Leonard.  She is best known for originating and developing the feature film Widow’s Peak, starring her sister, Mia Farrow, Joan Plowright and Natasha Richardson.  She received co-producing credit. While continuing to teach Transcendental Meditation® over the many years, Prudence’s interest in yoga never wavered.  After raising 3 children, she returned to school receiving her PhD in South Asian Studies, Sanskrit, from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2007. She has published her memoir,Dear Prudence: The Story Behind the Song, a book on Ayurvedic pulse diagnosis along with articles on South Asian studies, world religion, Ayurvedic medicine and healthy living for academic journals and magazines.  She has presented at numerous conferences such as at Harvard University, University of Texas at Austin, University of Hawaii, University of California at Berkeley and taught courses at UC Berkeley and Rutgers University. She and her husband live in Seagrove Beach and have three children and four grandchildren.