Shannen Doherty Shocked ‘Little House’ Castmate with ‘Disgusting’ Note on ‘Heathers’ Set
What To Know
- Shannen Doherty passed away on July 13, 2024, at age 53 due to cancer complications.
- Patrick Labyorteaux, Doherty’s co-star from both Little House on the Prairie and Heathers, shared a humorous story about their time on the Heathers set.
- During filming, Doherty surprised Labyorteaux and others by responding to their prank notes.
On July 13, 2024, beloved actress Shannen Doherty died at the age of 53 from complications related to breast cancer. Best known for her iconic roles as Brenda Walsh in Beverly Hills, 90210 and Prue Halliwell in the supernatural drama Charmed, Doherty was a former child actor who got her start on Little House on the Prairie before breaking out in teen and young-adult roles. She later scored a pivotal part as Heather Duke in the 1988 cult classic Heathers, cementing her status as one of the defining faces of late-’80s and ’90s pop culture.
Patrick Labyorteaux — who played meathead jock Ram in Heathers — was actually Doherty’s co-star twice: first in Walnut Grove on Little House on the Prairie, and years later at the fictional Westerburg High School. He played Andrew “Andy” Garvey while on the Prairie, and Ram Sweeney, one of the two football jocks (alongside Kurt Kelly) who torment Veronica (Winona Ryder) and end up targeted by J.D.’s (Christian Slater) revenge plot.
Labyorteaux recently took to Reels to share a funny story about working with Doherty on both the classic frontier series and the cult ’80s dark comedy.
New World Pictures/courtesy Everett Collection
“So, when we were doing the movie Heathers, we had this big, huge sequence in the cafeteria, where all the different cliques were introduced. So I’m sitting there with my jock buddies, and the Heathers are walking around, and the nerds are at a table, and the country club kids are at a table. But everyone had to stay in this one room! And there was just a lot of waiting around,” explained the actor.
“Me and my other jock buddies were trying to kind of play that ‘method thing,’ where we were trying to be as jerky as we could possibly be, just like the characters,” recalled Labyorteaux.
So we were sending these horrible, outrageous notes to other cliques at other tables from the jocks. You know, like: ‘We think blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…, signed Kurt and Ram’ And they would send them back and we would get a laugh, and everything would be funny.
New World Pictures
“Well, we sent a bunch of letters to the Heathers, and we thought we were just hysterical. And it was just going to be a big laugh. Well, we got a note back from Shannen Doherty, my alum from Little House on the Prairie,” laughed Labyorteaux.
“It was the most disgusting piece of literature I have ever read,” said a bemused Labyorteaux. “She outgrossed us in every single respect. So, I gotta give it to her. She kind of turned the tables on us.”
Lesson learned. If Heathers taught us anything, it’s that the fiercest person in the room is rarely the one wearing the scrunchie.
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