Laura Dern — Academy Award, Emmy Award, BAFTA Award, and Golden Globe Award winner — was forced to drop out of UCLA film school at age 17 after being offered the role of Sandy Williams in David Lynch’s 1986 masterpiece “Blue Velvet.”
Dern had already appeared in several films, but “Blue Velvet” was her breakthrough role and launched a career-spanning collaboration with Lynch.
Dern had been on campus for just two days when she was offered the role in “Blue Velvet,” but when she went to speak to the head of her college department about getting a leave of absence so she could make the film, she was told, “Absolutely not.”
After some pestering, the head of UCLA’s film department finally agreed to read the script. When Dern was called back a few days later, she was told that if she left school to make the film, she would no longer be welcome at UCLA.
She was also told that surrendering her college career for a film like “Blue Velvet” was insane.
So Dern left UCLA to make the film, which scored an Academy Award nomination for Best Director and launched her acting career.
Today, if you want to earn a master’s degree in film from UCLA, you must research and write a thesis on one of three films.
One of them, of course, is “Blue Velvet.”
Success is always the best form of revenge, but the ability to say, “I told you so,” is pretty fabulous, too.
Laura Dern has one of the best “I told you so” moments ever.
I’m so jealous.
