Beyond the Valley of Audrey Horne // The Sherilyn Fenn of Now
Sep 14, 2010 
Beyond the Valley of Audrey Horne // The Sherilyn Fenn of Now
By Sergio Cilli
Photo by Paula K. Shimatsu-U
It’s been twenty years since David Lynch’s northwestern mystery Twin Peaks permanently altered television’s airwaves. A bizarre slice of hometown Americana, with backwards-talking dwarfs and much darker (as in, insane) elements crawling beneath the town’s surface, people are still wondering how the show ever managed to get on the air in the first place. Images of fresh-baked cherry pie, Douglas firs waving in the breeze, a dead girl wrapped in plastic are evoked by the mere mention of the show. But Twin Peaks remains in a realm of timelessness because of something far greater than these inanimate objects. The Zen-like precision of Agent Cooper, the wisdom-spouting Log Lady, the sheer freakiness of Killer Bob have all evolved into cult-pop icons. And even the most casual fan will recall Sherilyn Fenn’s iconic portrayal of Audrey Horne, Twin Peaks’ sultry debutante.
In speaking with Sherilyn, it was hard to shake the image of Audrey swaying to doo-wop in a diner with her eyes closed, seducing Agent Cooper, or, yes, tying a cherry stem with her tongue. But the purpose of our interview soon became clear (and it wasn’t the extraction of Twin Peaks secrets—though she does reveal a few): Sherilyn is something of a Hollywood rarity. Ever since Twin Peaks went to black, she’s continued to work on high-profile shows (House, Gilmore Girls, CSI), but she’s remained firmly grounded in reality. She blogs regularly and openly addresses the bullshit of working in the entertainment business, and communicates directly with her fans. Her approachability is disarming.
If I had a band named after one of my characters, as she does with the Norwegian heavy metal outfit Audrey Horne, I wouldn’t give you the time of day. Thankfully, Sherilyn gave us hers.
SC: You recently wrote about your experience on Twin Peaks on your blog, and you thanked Lynch for believing in you from the start. As a young actress, how important was it to get that vote of confidence from someone like him?
SF: I think it was incredibly important. I was told at a young age that most of what you get in this business is rejection. I wouldn’t only limit that to the experience of a novice. With Twin Peaks, I was young. I had seen Blue Velvet and was like, “Oh my god, this is so weird.” I saw Eraserhead only after David told me to see it. I really liked the person that I had met [in Lynch]. He wasn’t what I expected. I felt the same way when I got the role in Of Mice and Men. [Director] Gary Sinise called me—which has only happened twice in my career that the director actually called—and he said [gravelly voice], “Would you be in my movie?” I was ecstatic. That was big time. I really felt like, “Oh my god, I’m ‘in the club.’ I’m working with John Malkovich.”
SC: I’m surprised that directors don’t call actors like that more often. You must have appreciated that.
SF: Yes, of course! Like I said, it has only happened twice.
SC: People know you best for playing Audrey Horne, this sort of overly sexualized girl. Have you had any weird, creepy fans write to you or approach you in person?
SF: By the grace of God, that hasn’t been my experience. I understand that the external perception of Audrey is one of being overly sexualized. I don’t think that’s anything that anybody can manufacture. Audrey was a virgin. David and I had talked about it. He said, “The perception is theirs, they’re going to say whatever they’re going to say. You just have to be truthful to you.” Audrey was somebody that had a huge need inside of her, a hole inside of her. Sex is never something that I ever worked on with Audrey. How boring would that be?! I never set out to be sexy. I set out to do my work, to explore things, to explore getting love and getting power. If you’re a girl licking an ice cream cone and trying to be sexy, then you just have a bad porno movie. But a girl who loves that damn chocolate ice cream with an open heart, that becomes sexy and sensual.
SC: Well, tying a cherry stem with your tongue is pretty damn sexual.
SF: But she was trying to get a job in a brothel! When I saw that in the script I said, “This is the dumbest thing ever. Who can do that?!” [Co-creator] Mark [Frost] and David told me that people do it in college, it’s like some college thing where they have these contests. I was the last person to know this. David Letterman tried to get me on his show three times, and I knew he was going to ask me to do that. I said there’s no way I’m going on his show to tie a cherry stem in a knot. [Laughing.] I get it, I know what it is—but no one would have responded to Audrey if I was just some exhibitionist.
SC: Was there ever a time when you didn’t want to be identified with Twin Peaks?
SF: No, I love being identified with it! The only thing that has bothered me is that it didn’t matter who you were or what interview you did, everybody tried to stick you in this “weird” box—“Twin Peaks is so weird.” And you’re like, “Oh come on. It’s not that weird.”
SC: Why didn’t you do [the Twin Peaks prequel] Fire Walk With Me?
SF: Of Mice and Men! I was already booked to do that movie. And let me tell you, David was not happy about it. I said, “Are you going to replace me?” And he said, “No way. They’d kill us!” [Laughing.] So that made me feel good. They didn’t end up replacing me.
SC: May I ask? Does Audrey die in the show?
SF: No! I asked that too. When I read that script, I screamed and called David. He said to me, “Do you really think that we’d kill Audrey Horne? It’s a cliffhanger!” [Laughing.] I can’t explain how, but she didn’t die, he promised. And in the beginning, when we didn’t know who killed Laura, I said to David, “It’s not Audrey, is it?” He was like, “I don’t know, Sherilyn, but I’m not gonna tell!”
SC: At what point did they know?
SF: I just don’t think they had decided yet. Some TV executive said something like, “Mark and David went fishing for barracuda and caught Jaws.”
SC: David Lynch seems like he’s a really nurturing director. Was it surprising to you to work on other shows afterwards and not have a similar experience?
SF: It wasn’t surprising. In your body, there are vital organs and there are fat cells. I’ve worked with some fat cells in my career. In the span of my whole career, being a single mother for so many years, often having to do jobs that were basically about money, there were many fat cells, and I just did the best I could. The last couple years, it started feeling kind of like being a whore, because no one else cares and you’re caring and you’re trying. And that’s really disappointing and frustrating. I started to get back in the business after my baby, but then I just regrouped and spent some time really being a mom. Now I’ll just do it more on my terms, if I do it. I don’t have to do it now for money, so I get to say, “Oh, no thank you.” [Laughing.] “Oh, I’ll pass on that.”
SC: You’ve been really fortunate to have such a long career. Do you have any personal philosophies about maintaining longevity in the business?
SF: After we shot the Twin Peaks pilot, I met my teacher Roy London. Roy changed my perspective about acting and what it was. People think acting is pretending, and on one level it is, but those lines are completely infused with your life experience and your truth. For me, it is a way to explore things in my life, things I’m not comfortable with, and to have the courage to illuminate my human struggle. Audrey worked because she was mischievous in the same way I was. My brothers used to say, “You were just like that as a kid, you were such a brat.” It was all very familiar. People would ask Roy what made a star and he’d say, “The extent to which you’re willing to reveal your soul.” I could infuse acting with my direct experience, which is far more interesting than my imagination. Your contradictions and your confusions, that to me is the most beautiful work, and that’s the work that always touches me. I think the blog I write is very much an expression of that.
SC: Early on, what was your biggest misconception of fame?
SF: I think it surprised me that Hollywood didn’t make better movies. It surprised me when a studio head just laughed at me when I told him I wanted to do good work. It surprised me that sometimes the business end is far more powerful than the creative end of it. It surprised me that seemingly creative people in a creative business can have no imagination. It surprised me that sometimes they’ll just throw millions of dollars at movies and not bother to put the actors together first to see if there’s any chemistry.
SC: Though this interview is for a New York magazine, we’re both based in L.A., and I think New Yorkers have this misrepresentation that L.A. is not unique—it’s just this fake place.
SF: I think it’s all true. But I like the space in L.A. I live in a small town outside of L.A., so I’m not where all the new species of women are, with their faces pulled back looking like aliens. I don’t function in those circles. But there’s also a lot of ripe fruit on the tree here. There’s an openness to certain spiritual concepts—it can be airy-fairy and ridiculous in its extreme, but there’s also an open-mindedness that’s actually kind of wise. I think that duality is really intense right now. And as much as people in New York want to say they’re so individualistic, they’re not. Look around. People look the same there. It’s the New York look. And in L.A., it’s the L.A. look. It’s the same thing, everybody following this tribe. But I don’t care. I don’t need to get Botox and I don’t need to see eight plays to be an important, relevant person. I don’t listen to any of those things, because they’re all silly—it’s just another form of sleep to me.
SC: That seems like a pretty healthy way of viewing things. Have you always felt this way?
SF: No, I think I came to it getting older. I grew up in Michigan. My mother was married a number of times, so I was often the new girl at school and I had to change my personality to see where I would fit in. I think I lost myself for a long time. As I got older and I kept going, “Gosh, why am I doing this?” or “Why didn’t I listen to myself?” Then I got to the point where I decided I’m not playing by those rules anymore, it’s stupid.
SC: That’s okay, though.
SF: It is. I mean, I could still go crazy and start thinking it’s not okay. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I’d like to tell some more stories, but only the ones I want to tell. I can’t be the whore anymore. Not to say that I wouldn’t do the role of the whore, because those can be cool. But doing roles that are just about money, where no one gives a shit and I’m left feeling emotionally bankrupt when I’m finished—I’m done with that.
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