Lost in the Movies: January 2023

*Links to Mountie Preston King // Judge Clinton Sternwood // Emory Battis (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #83 // #82 // #81)

Visit the TWIN PEAKS Character Series directory for all entries as they are published or re-introduced.

Following Sylvia Horne at #84, there are several characters who have over ten minutes of screentime in the original series but no new material in The Final Dossier or the third season. As such, these 2017 entries don't need to be revised; I can just link them here. Mountie King is a stock character used for one of the most conventional genre turns of the second season and Emory Battis is a classic heel. Judge Sternwood is also an archetype, but one treated with a bit more color and a hint of complexity...especially when you consider what happens after he exits the stage (to use his own parlance). That consideration results in one of my favorite character studies.

The next entry will be a revision, kicking off February by covering a character who appeared in the film and then showed up in the new season in very different form...

Mountie Preston King (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #83)

Judge Clinton Sternwood (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #82)

Emory Battis (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #81)

Sylvia Horne (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #84)

• indicates passages added or revised since 2017, if you want to skip directly to fresh material; this is a revision of an earlier piece written before the third season.

•In the depths of familial hell, Sylvia neither knows nor seeks any escape; her only relief is to return her family members' fire when possible.

Phil Bisby (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #85)

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Phil may be low in the Lucky 7 pecking order, but he relishes his role as all-around assistant especially when it comes to guiding his perpetually dazed co-worker.

Steven Burnett (TWIN PEAKS Character Series #86)

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Steven is doomed to failure from the moment we first see him, the only question being how spectacularly he'll fail and what the fallout will be.

Johnny Horne (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #24)

Mulholland Drive as Twin Peaks Cinema #21 - The Lynchverse (podcast)

A new year brings new seasons for two podcasts: Lost in the Movies (which groups monthly episodes into six-month periods) and Twin Peaks Cinema (which groups them by three-month-long themed miniseries). And the first episode of each links back to the last season: in Lost in the Movies' case, I published Sofia Coppola's 2006 Marie Antoinette a couple weeks ago, echoing the 1938 version of Marie Antoinette which ended my Classic Hollywood theme in December. In Twin Peaks Cinema's case, I'm launching "The Lynchverse" season with perhaps his most acclaimed film, Mulholland Drive - however, this clearly links back to my October-December season too with its theme of "Disordered Stories". Like Rashomon, The Vanishing, and Back to the Future Part II, Mulholland Drive infamously turns what could be a straightforward narrative - a woman survives a car accident with no memory of who she is, while another woman (arriving in Hollywood to become a star) endeavors to crack this mystery - and turns it inside out. Often cited as the greatest film of the twenty-first century, initially it earned a reputation as the crown jewel of the turn-of-the-millennium "puzzle films" although Lynch was going for something more ethereal than some of the other filmmakers grouped in that category. Mulholland's process also differed notably from movies conceived to lead to a certain point: this was supposed to be an open-ended pilot and only after being rejected by ABC and commissioned as a feature by a French production company did Lynch create the "key" to open this mystery box. Twin Peaks may have inspired much of Mulholland Drive (whose series conception was initially a direct spin-off); regardless of how conscious Lynch was of the many connections between the works, they create a resonant echo chamber. In this episode, I combine a longer-than-usual discussion of the Mulholland/Peaks crossover with several pieces of feedback (and my own responses to them), expanding this topic - including aspects like the troubled history of Rita Hayworth, who explicitly inspires the name of one of these characters.

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You can also listen on Pinecast and Spotify

(and most places podcasts are found)

LINKS FOR EPISODE 21

Vivian Niles (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #23)

The TWIN PEAKS Character Series surveys one hundred ten characters from the series Twin Peaks (1990-91 on ABC and 2017 on Showtime as The Return), the film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992), and The Missing Pieces (2014), a collection of deleted scenes from that film. A new character study will appear every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday although patrons will have immediate access to each entry a month before it goes public. There will be spoilers.
• indicates passages added or revised since 2017, if you want to skip directly to fresh material (in this case, just in the "Books" section near the end); this is a revision of an earlier piece written before the book Twin Peaks: The Final Dossier.

Vivian is crisp, calm, and articulate – she will destroy your confidence with artfully phrased passive aggression rather than overt hostility.

Heidi (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #22)

*Links to TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus entries #1-21

Visit the TWIN PEAKS Character Series directory for all entries as they are published or re-introduced.

When kicking off the character series in 2017, I wrote full-length entries on twenty-one characters who wouldn't make the cut anymore; in fact, some would be slotted to a line or two in the "minor characters" line-up from a few days ago. These are characters who speak in at least three scenes (my old rule for inclusion), but whose screentime is less than ten minutes (my new rule for inclusion). Fortunately for these folks, they are essentially grandfathered into the new character series as "bonus" entries; however brief their appearances, they got the full treatment back then and I can't take that away now. What follows are links to all of these less-than-ten characters, a pure dip into the waters of seasons one and two (and Fire Walk With Me) before we plunge over the waterfall into season three - including, after these twenty-one entries, a few revised bonus entries updated to reflect those characters' roles in The Return. (Update 2024: The only addendum to the entries below is the Julie character's last name which I did not catch until now.)

Here are the unchanged ones:

Julie Duvic (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #1)

Louie "Birdsong" Budway (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #2)

Trudy Chelgren (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #3)

Randy St. Croix (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #4)

Nancy O'Reilly (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #5)

"Little Nicky" Needleman (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #6)

Daryl Lodwick (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #7)

Rusty Tomaski (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #8)

"Dougie" Milford (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #9)

Einar Thorson (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #10)

Jones (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #11)

Invitation to Love (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #12)

Thomas Eckhardt (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #13)

Tim Pinkle (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #14)

Teresa Banks (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #15)

Jonathan Kumagai (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #16)

Sheriff Cable (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #17)

Malcolm Sloan (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #18)

FBI Agent Roger Hardy (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #19)

Room Service Waiter (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #20)

Deputy Cliff Howard (TWIN PEAKS Character Series Bonus #21)

Top 30 Runners-Up of the New TWIN PEAKS (4th Preface to TWIN PEAKS Character Series)

The TWIN PEAKS Character Series surveys one hundred ten characters from the series Twin Peaks (1990-91 on ABC and 2017 on Showtime as The Return), the film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992), and The Missing Pieces (2014), a collection of deleted scenes from that film. A new character study will appear every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday although patrons will have immediate access to each entry a month before it goes public. This entry is a preface surveying characters who won't get standalone treatment. There will be spoilers.

Despite the brevity of their appearances, and the very little we often know about them, these characters frequently make a sharp impression. Some are among the most memorable faces of The Return - Ike the Spike, the bleeding, drooling prisoner, and of course the "he's gotta mean something, right?" Red. Even on many narrow lists of favorites, the warily resourceful Jade, the unsettling "ONE ONE NINE!"-screaming mother, and the unforgettable Wally Brando would probably find a place above regulars who have five or six times their screentime. On the other hand, several of these characters were more nondescript, stealthily assembling more or longer scenes than more prominent individuals.

As the third season of Twin Peaks earnestly informs us, ten is the number of completion. Those characters who don't quite make the ten-minute cut-off for a standalone entry (and some of these folks came really close) will get some satisfaction here, with at least a couple paragraphs each for thirty individuals, pairs, or groups who cut memorable figures onscreen in The Return. These are the runners-up, the people who almost made the eighty-six-seat podium but a few snips of editor Duwayne Dunham's figurative scissors left them, well, eighty-sixed. Had I stuck with the original character series criteria - dialogue in three scenes - eighteen of them would have gotten their own entry. Humorously, to me at least, the much-vaunted Red still would have been left out since he's mute in one of his three appearances.

All characters are featured exclusively in the third season, and therefore are only written by Mark Frost and David Lynch, and directed by David Lynch.

*Link to Top 30 "Hidden" Characters (3rd Preface to TWIN PEAKS Character Series)

Visit the TWIN PEAKS Character Series directory for all entries as they are published or re-introduced.

When I created the original TWIN PEAKS Character Series six years ago, I used different criteria than I'm employing today. First of all, of course, The Return had not yet been released. As a result some of the characters from the old series who didn't make the cut back then would now. My "Hidden Characters" entry, one of my favorite pieces in the whole series (which is why I'm simply re-sharing it rather than attempting to revise/update), surveys characters who did not speak in at least three scenes and/or didn't technically appear at all. Two of these re-appeared (or, in once case, made her official debut) in season three: Gersten Hayward and Diane Evans are both featured on the "hidden characters" list and in individual, upcoming entries. Otherwise, though, these are characters who won't be covered anywhere else.

Top 30 "Hidden" Characters of the Original TWIN PEAKS (3rd Preface to TWIN PEAKS Character Series)

A Collection of Minor Characters in TWIN PEAKS (2nd Preface to TWIN PEAKS Character Series)

If you want to focus on new material only, • indicates additions to the original entry.

When crafting character studies, I knew I had to draw the line somewhere. Twin Peaks includes many who leave a strong mark, sometimes in just a few seconds, without uttering a single line of dialogue. Others play a crucial role in a particular scene, maybe two, but are never seen again. My cut-off rule for standalone character studies was: "speaks in three scenes" (for the original series and film) and "at least ten minutes" (for the new series). Nonetheless, I wanted to pay some sort of tribute to the remainders. I have gathered one hundred eight of them here on a roughly chronological list - actors, episodes, writers/directors, and a brief notation on their role, relevance, or trivial interest.

On Friday and Monday I will follow up with the elite of the also-rans: in the latter case, the top thirty Return runners-up ranked purely based on screentime; in the former case, thirty favorite "hidden" characters from the original series and Fire Walk With Me, ranked by me to form a subjective top thirty (written before the third season, it includes a couple characters whose profiles were boosted by the new episodes, and will also get standalone entries in the official series). So if you don't see your favorite cameos today, stay tuned.

The curtain rises on the characters of Twin Peaks...

(by the way, major kudos to this dugpa thread for identifying many of the bit players!)

Marie Antoinette from 2006 (LOST IN THE MOVIES podcast #49)

With 2023 we begin a new season of my main public podcast, one that returns to the random assemblies of episodes throughout 2021 as opposed to the themes uniting seasons in 2020 (Ethan Hawke roles) and 2022 (first director couplets and then classic Hollywood). Though all these films will be twenty-first century releases, they span genres, forms, and modes of production. Ironically then, the film that kicks off this sixth season may not have a connection to the what follows, but Marie Antoinette certainly does have a connection to the episode that ended the previous season...Marie Antoinette. Last month, I discussed the 1938 Hollywood production in which the queen was played by Norma Shearer; this month, I'm moving onto the 2006 Sofia Coppola project casting Kirsten Dunst as the ill-fated ruler. Both of these episodes were originally recorded five years ago (in the reverse order), and it's interesting to listen back on how I viewed Coppola's Marie as something of a mid-2000s time capsule given its aesthetic and lack of engagement with the impending revolution, in contrast to the heated populist discourse of 2018. Now that very context itself seems, sadly, like something of a time capsule. In addition to teasing out the film's apolitical tenor, I examine Coppola's place among her Gen X peers, celebrate Marie Antoinette's celluloid texture, and hear back from a listener about why the director may have chosen the more compressed approach she did. This review also makes a nice companion to my current Patreon podcast trends, where I've been covering a wide swath of 2000s films in a recent episode (an approach that will conclude in the episode scheduled for late January).

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You can also listen on Pinecast and Spotify

(and most places podcasts are found)

(Extremely) Brief Appearances in TWIN PEAKS (1st Preface to TWIN PEAKS Character Series)

There are many faces and voices in Twin Peaks, dozens (even hundreds) we see or hear for just a few seconds. Sometimes we can't place them afterwards (and sometimes they're even hard to represent in pictures - hence Andy's two medical phone calls); on other occasions they're among the most memorable icons of Twin Peaks even if we only glimpse them for a moment. (Update: The masked mystery man in the woods, initially overlooked, was added in August 2024. Incredibly, I also forgot to include the bird from the opening credits but in April 2025 I added this very first "character" we see.)

The character series is a meal of many courses, and there are naturally appetizers. You can scroll through the columns I've lined up here but probably the best way to explore is to click on an image and linger for a moment. Together they form a running Rosencrantz and Guildenstern sideline to the full Twin Peaks narrative, from pilot to season three finale, as seen by the shooting stars who crossed the horizon so briefly.

Who were these people? Did they frequently interact with the more familiar folks we see alongside them? Or did they just lightly glance off the massive narratives of Cooper, Laura, Audrey this one time...do they view those legendary characters as mere bit players in their own dramatic lives? What are their stories? From next week on, starting with a line or two and eventually reaching dozens of pages, we'll be diving into individual narratives. Today, however, your imaginations will have to fill in those gaps.

Introducing the (revised) TWIN PEAKS Character Series

Guide to all one hundred fifteen entries in the (revised)
TWIN PEAKS Character Series

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(Initially, this page included a directory which can now be found here.)

Introduction

There are so many different ways to experience Twin Peaks. We might tour its locations, from the cozy red-and-white checkered comforts of the RR Diner to the majestic, vaguely magical woodsy decor of the Great Northern to the brooding, bittersweet musical milieu of the neon-soaked Road House. We can sample its various motifs: sipping hot coffee, savoring a flaky cherry pie, jolting at the hoot of an owl. Or we could delve into each genre in turn, spinning the wheel to land on the cheerful tone of wacky farce, the sleek style of midnight noir, or the visceral chill of creeping horror.

This written and illustrated online series will focus on another aspect that is able to touch on all of the above. Character is how many viewers, probably a majority, develop a personal connection to the material they are watching. Despite its unique qualities - the eccentric setpieces, the prevailing ethereal mood - Twin Peaks has proven itself to be no exception. As often as they point to touchstones like the iconic Red Room or Angelo Badalamenti's ethereal score, fans will cite characters as the reason they keep coming back to Twin Peaks.

Who is your favorite? Agent Cooper, with his mixture of boyish enthusiasm and professional genius? Audrey Horne, slinking around corners with a diabolical grin? The Log Lady, speaking softly and carrying her big "stick"? Deputy Andy, crying when he finds a dead body; Big Ed, solid as a redwood while the one-eyed buzzsaw Nadine hovers nervously around his trunk; Gordon Cole, cheerfully shouting his way through the hearing world like a deaf version of Mr. Magoo; or Albert Rosenfield, cynically ripping apart the small town's sentimental platitudes before revealing the heart on his own sleeve?

Twin Peaks characters have a cartoonish quality; even the straight men - Ed, Sheriff Truman - are outlined with stark simplicity. Brad Dukes, author of Reflections: An Oral History of Twin Peaks, has described Cooper and the Log Lady as resembling Sesame Street characters in their appeal to him as a child viewer. Indeed, the ability to paint these figures in broad strokes perpetuates their iconography, endearing them to generations of fans. At the same time, Twin Peaks has a serious core, with nearly fifty hours to flesh out the complexities within these broad sketches. And the show makes the best of that potential, always delighting to reveal hidden sides of its citizens, leaving us uncertain about their demons and capabilities. This is especially true in the show's first fifteen episodes, dominated by the question "Who killed Laura Palmer?" Perhaps the most famous character of all, she's gone but still haunting the town before the pilot even begins.

• What to expect in 2023

The (revised) TWIN PEAKS Character Series reboots the Character Series I began but didn't finish in 2017, before the third season. This is scheduled to run three times a week through July 31 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The series consists of four prefaces, twenty-four bonus entries, eighty-six official character entries, and an extra surprise on the final day. These entries will be compressed into ninety individual posts. There will be three types:

NEW: completely original entries for new characters or old ones I didn't reach in 2017

LINKS: redirecting readers to old characters whose stories were not continued

REVISED: re-publishing old characters with new material reflecting changes in their stories

(revisions to the text will be marked with a gold ball • for the reader's benefit)

For further details, check out the extensive "Notes on the 2023 Edition" section below, following the methodology I mostly laid out in 2017.

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