Ailing Farrah Fawcett shaved own hair in video diary

By Jill Serjeant

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Actress Farrah Fawcett is shown shaving off her famous blond hair in a heart-wrenching personal video diary of her long battle with cancer that is reaching its end.

"Farrah's Story" -- effectively the self-written obituary of the "Charlie's Angels" star -- was given a semi-private premiere on Wednesday night ahead of a nationwide broadcast on NBC television on Friday.

The 90-minute film, much of it narrated by Fawcett herself, chronicles the highs and the lows of the actress's numerous medical treatments since her 2006 diagnosis with anal cancer and the recent weeks when she has been bedridden, heavily medicated and barely able to recognize her son.

Her long-time companion, actor Ryan O'Neal, called Fawcett a fighter and said the 62-year-old actress wanted to share her cancer journey with the public -- on her own terms.

Fawcett found international fame in the 1970s for her role as the tanned, blond private eye in the hit television show "Charlie's Angels". The film includes footage of a delighted young Prince Charles of Britain getting to meet her.

Unflinching in its detail, the film shows Fawcett sometimes vomiting from the side effects of her cancer treatments and on other occasions dancing with friends during times when her tumors had shrunk.

"I do not want to die of this disease. I want to stay alive," she said when the cancer spread to her liver in 2007.

"So I say to God ... it is seriously time for a miracle."