After being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015, Shannen Doherty meticulously documented every step of her treatment on Instagram, from shaving her head to the horrors of chemo \u2014 and eventually her remission in April 2017. The actor, best known for \u201cBeverly Hills, 90210,\u201d \u201cHeathers\u201d and \u201cCharmed,\u201d would post multiple times each week, also peppering her feed with her workouts, dinners with friends and family and \u2014 one of Doherty\u2019s passions \u2014 images of dogs in urgent need of adoption. \u201cAt that time, I think I needed it,\u201d she says now about chronicling her treatment. And having been a fixture in the tabloids for decades, Doherty wanted to be in control of the narrative: \u201cI wanted to own my life. It\u2019s my life!\u201d The social engagement carried her through, especially as other people shared their own stories in her Instagram comments. \u201cIt was empowering,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
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\nDoherty\u2019s cancer recurred in early winter 2019, and is now metastatic Stage 4 cancer. She can be treated but not cured; she\u2019s living with this disease for the rest of her life. And right now, on Instagram, though she still posts once or twice a week, she\u2019s very much not detailing what this experience has been like. \u201cI\u2019m in a hermit phase?\u201d Doherty says with a laugh, using upspeak. \u201cI\u2019m sort of taking all that energy and giving it to myself at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
What she\u2019s concentrating on is not only working, but proving to Hollywood that people with cancer can work. \u201cThe best example that I can continue to set for other people with cancer, and to the outside world who doesn\u2019t have cancer,\u201d Doherty says, \u201cis to show them what a cancer patient looks like. We are employable.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo for me, I\u2019m just trying to live the best I can, to be the best example at this moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
And she\u2019s doing just that. Doherty, who turned 50 in April, filmed three movies back to back this year. Two of them will air during the same weekend \u2014 on Oct. 9 and 10 \u2014 on Lifetime. The first, \u201cDying to Belong,\u201d is a remake of a 1997 TV movie (with Hilary Swank) about the dangers of sorority hazing, and it is archetypal Lifetime: an issues-oriented examination of a tragedy that also manages to entertain. In it, Doherty plays the mother of the girl who\u2019s been hazed to death; she won\u2019t accept the university\u2019s account of the events, and turns investigator with the help of her daughter\u2019s best friend. The second movie, \u201cList of a Lifetime,\u201d is about a woman (Kelly Hu) who\u2019s been diagnosed with breast cancer, and gets in touch with the adult daughter she\u2019d placed for adoption to tell her she may have the BRCA gene. Doherty plays the young woman\u2019s adoptive mother, who at first is less than enthused about the intrusion \u2014 but comes around. The third project, a Bruce Willis action extravaganza called \u201cThe Fortress,\u201d will be released next year in theaters.<\/p>\n
Since October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the creative team behind \u201cList of a Lifetime\u201d was \u201ctossing names around\u201d with the network about who might direct the special content that would air after the film. Doherty, who has directing experience, including three episodes of \u201cCharmed,\u201d volunteered. Lifetime agreed, and Doherty\u2019s call to action \u2014 featuring herself and her co-stars, and shot in an empty warehouse \u2014 will accompany the movie.
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Doherty loves directing, especially working with actors. \u201cI\u2019m a total nerd when it comes to cameras and lenses and lighting \u2014 creating a mood and a tone,\u201d she says. \u201cWhen I direct, I\u2019m probably at my absolute happiest.\u201d<\/p>\n
She wants to do more of it, and is currently optioning books she might direct. After spending most of her life in front of the cameras \u2014 Doherty\u2019s first on-screen credit was in 1981 at age 10, in the NBC drama \u201cFather Murphy\u201d \u2014 she has plenty of people behind her saying they\u2019ll help her raise money, and produce whatever she wants to do. She\u2019d like to find the right project: \u201cYou have to find your own voice and your own vision, and pursue that.\u201d<\/p>\n
James Cullen Bressack, who directed Doherty in \u201cThe Fortress,\u201d says she\u2019s well-suited for the role. \u201cI can easily see Shannen being a director,\u201d he says. \u201cShe sees things that a lot of people don\u2019t see, especially when you\u2019re having to move quickly on these indie projects.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Bressack first worked with Doherty in 2013, he was \u201ca little nervous meeting her,\u201d because of \u201cstories about Shannen being difficult.\u201d But, he says, \u201cwe got along amazingly from the moment we met.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ah yes, stories about Doherty being difficult. In the early \u201990s, she developed a reputation as a hellion when \u201cBeverly Hills, 90210\u201d became a youthquake phenomenon. Back then, Doherty became a pre-internet template for what we now recognize as misogynist expectations projected onto young female celebrities. The way she was treated by the press \u2014 which salivated over her every misstep, especially feuds with her co-stars \u2014 would be unacceptable today. Not that she would have it. In 2019, when there were rumors about her misbehaving on the set of the meta revival \u201cBH90210,\u201d Doherty took to Instagram to shut the ill-informed gossip down immediately, writing in part, \u201cPlease stop trying to tell your wildly inaccurate, exaggerated story of me. I promise\u2026 you don\u2019t know me.\u201d<\/p>\n
It worked \u2014 there wasn\u2019t another peep about it. Asked about that post, Doherty says simply, \u201cIt\u2019s something I will not allow in my life anymore.\u201d And yes, she does wish that a direct line to the public had existed when she was in her 20s. \u201cPerhaps it would have been a bit harsher of a shutdown,\u201d she says. \u201cBut I\u2019m very much of the opinion that you can\u2019t look back. Only move forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
That philosophy has brought her to the present moment. When her cancer returned, \u201cI don\u2019t think there was ever even a thought that I wouldn\u2019t work,\u201d Doherty says. After she got through her initial feelings of fear and devastation, she thought about \u201cthe things that I love in life\u201d \u2014 such as spending time with her husband, mother and friends, and riding horses and playing with her dog. And staying employed: \u201cWhen you can\u2019t imagine not doing them, you just go, \u2018Well, I\u2019m gonna continue to do all of it!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Convincing employers that she\u2019s hirable hasn\u2019t always been easy, though. \u201cStage 4 cancer, it doesn\u2019t mean the end of your life,\u201d she says. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t mean that you\u2019re not viable in the workplace. It\u2019s quite the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n
With \u201cThe Fortress,\u201d Bressack wasn\u2019t sure whether to approach her. \u201cI called her and I said, \u2018Hey, I\u2019d really like to have you play this role. Are you up for it? Do you want to work?\u2019\u201d he remembers. \u201cShe\u2019s like, \u2018Fuck yeah!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Doherty just wants to work. And having cancer, she says, has also made her a better actor. It\u2019s broken down the defenses that she\u2019d put up as a young woman. \u201cI obviously had a lot of walls around me,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
And now? \u201cI think there\u2019s a wisdom and a vulnerability, and a deeper understanding of life now than I ever had.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Shannen heeft een interview gehad met Variety! Galerij Links: http\/\/: 2021: Kurt Iswarienko (Variety) After being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015, Shannen Doherty meticulously […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,16,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fotoshoots","category-shannen-doherty","category-tijdschriften"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7856"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7857,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7856\/revisions\/7857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.charmed-online.nl\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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