JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
In a lot of ways, Shannen Doherty epitomized '90s pop culture. She starred in shows like "Beverly Hills, 90210" and "Charmed." Her characters were complex young women making their way through complicated rites of passage with friends and former friends, family and boyfriends. And at times, the line between her characters and her real life got blurry - for the public anyway. Doherty died over the weekend. She was 53 and had cancer. NPR pop culture critic Linda Holmes is here to remember her. Hi, Linda.
LINDA HOLMES, BYLINE: Hi, Juana.
SUMMERS: OK, Linda. So I know where I first saw Shannen Doherty, and we'll get to that, but where did she get her start in Hollywood?
HOLMES: She started as a child actor. She was on "Little House On The Prairie" the first time I saw her. She was in the high school classic film "Heathers" in 1988. She played one of the three titular girls named Heather, and she did and said a lot of pretty dark things in that movie.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "HEATHERS")
SHANNEN DOHERTY: (As Heather Duke) I prayed for the death of Heather Chandler many times. And I felt bad every time I did it, but I kept doing it anyway. Now I know you understood everything. Praise Jesus, hallelujah.
HOLMES: (Laughter) She became a star, though, when she played Brenda Walsh on "Beverly Hills, 90210," which was one of the biggest hits of the early '90s.
SUMMERS: And, I mean, Linda, that show was such a big deal. It was must-see TV when that was still actually a thing that happened.
HOLMES: Absolutely, it was. It was wildly popular. And it influenced shows like "Buffy" and "Dawson's Creek" and "The O.C.," all those kinds of things owe a lot to "90210." On the show, Brenda and her family moved to Beverly Hills from Minnesota. And it's a sort of fish-out-of-water premise. Brenda was our sweet heroine and did a lot of high school heroin kinds of things. She fell in love with the local bad boy. She survived various emergencies, had sex for the first time, all that stuff.
But Doherty could also really play the heck out of a big fight. So I brought this iconic scene from the show where she and her boyfriend, Dylan, who was played by Luke Perry, have broken up, and he and Brenda's best friend Kelly are confessing that they're now involved. And Brenda is horrified.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "BEVERLY HILLS, 90210")
LUKE PERRY: (As Dylan McKay) I mean, we could start again from someplace a little more honest.
DOHERTY: (As Brenda Walsh) Honesty? Is that what you think this is about, Dylan? I don't think so. Look, I hate you both. Never talk to me again.
SUMMERS: Woof.
HOLMES: Oo-hoh (ph). She's a good - she's such a good stomper. I'll tell you, she would stomp off. And that show ran for 10 seasons. Brenda stayed for four, but she was a huge deal. It was a really different environment, and network stars were popular in a way that's very hard to achieve anymore.
SUMMERS: I got to confess, Linda. This one was a little before my time. But even still, I know that Brenda, and Shannen Doherty herself, had a sort of tricky reputation in the press and among fans of the show. Can you just fill in the details of that story?
HOLMES: Yeah. There were a lot of stories about her being difficult to work with, a lot of stories saying she was late all the time, fought with people, that kind of stuff. There was even a kind of antifan club for people who hated Brenda or hated Shannen Doherty or both. There was a newsletter. They even had a tip line you could call with gossip about her.
SUMMERS: Oh, man.
HOLMES: And I think there's been an effort in the last few years not to excuse whatever on-set behavior she or anybody else might have engaged in, but at least to kind of put some context around it. In her case, how young she was, how much pressure is on child stars. And also the questions about, you know, out of all the people in Hollywood who are hard to work with, some get to be perfectionists, and others - often women, often women of color - are kind of turned into monsters. So, you know, attention is being paid to that, fortunately.
SUMMERS: Speaking of reexamination and attention, Doherty herself had been doing a little bit of that in recent years. I think she had a podcast?
HOLMES: Yeah. She had continued to work after she left "90210." As you said, she did "Charmed." She even appeared on the "90210" reboot. But her reputation had followed her around, and I think after she was diagnosed with cancer in 2015, she tried to take back some control over that, including that podcast, which was called "Let's Be Clear With Shannen Doherty."
SUMMERS: Linda Holmes, host of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour, remembering actress Shannen Doherty. Linda, thank you.
HOLMES: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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