Therefore it was very exciting when it was announced some of the stars of the show would be coming to New Zealand and Australia for the first time for Twin Peaks: Conversation with the Stars. The panel discussion featured Sheryl Lee (Laura Palmer), Dana Ashbrook (Bobby Briggs), Kimmy Robertson (Lucy Moran), Michael Horse (Deputy Hawk), Al Strobel (Phillip Gerard) and executive producer Sabrina S. Sutherland.
Tonight Sally and I headed down to the Palais Theatre as the doors opened in order to catch the music of Twin Peaks being performed by Brisbane's Electric Moon while photos from the show were shown on a screen at the back of the stage. The cast then came out onto the stage to big cheers from the crowd before we were treated to David Lynch himself on the screen as he skyped into the event to answer questions posed by fans who bought VIP tickets. His answers to each question were short and cryptic, with interesting tidbits about letting things go into the air, and that he wants to take up sewing.
After saying goodbye to David the panel discussion began in full. It was hosted by Melbourne writer and Twin Peaks super fan Andy Hazel. He started back at the very beginning and asked everyone how they were originally cast in the show and what it was like to shoot the pilot episode. They then talked about what it was like for them during the first season as the show became super popular. I found it interesting that Dana thought it was the marketing of the show by ABC around "Who Killed Laura Palmer?" that drove that to be the main focus of the first season, because he felt it wasn't the key story line when they were shooting the show. Al spoke about the woods almost being like another main character in the show (despite the fact they shot most of the series on a sound stage in LA).
The panel spoke fondly about those cast members that have died over the years. Michael and Al talked about Jack Nance (Pete Martell and a longtime Lynch collaborator) and how they would go to him to interpret what the script meant when they didn't understand it. Sabrina also discussed Catherine Coulson (the Log Lady) and how they had to send up a film crew to her house to film her scenes for Twin Peaks: The Return because she was terminally ill with cancer (she ended up dying four days later).
Sabrina shared that on the original series she was responsible for numbering all the scripts for each actor so they could prevent any leaks. The cast members often didn't have a full picture of the storylines until they watched the show because they only knew what happened in their own scenes. It was lovely to hear the different stories from the cast, with Kimmy Robertson being particularly funny. You can tell they all have a great fondness for each other and felt honored to get to work with David Lynch on all the various incarnations of Twin Peaks.
When the panel discussion was finished we were treated to a half hour of short films by David Lynch. This one for David Lynch Signature Coffee featuring Barbie was my favorite:
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