Costume designer Dorléac recounted an unsettling experience while working with Shannen Doherty on the 1994 television movie A Burning Passion. He recalled creating a blue suit for Doherty, noting how it accentuated her eye color. “I always go to the set to establish the costume before it’s shot and make certain everything was right,” Dorléac said. “I told her, ‘Oh, Shannen, it just turned out to be so wonderful. It makes your eyes so blue.’ And she replied, ‘Yeah, they are, aren’t they?'”
The following day, however, Dorléac noticed a change; Doherty’s eyes looked brown when she wore a tan outfit with a hat. The day after that, her eyes appeared vividly green. Curious about these changes, Dorléac asked Doherty how her eye color varied so drastically. Her response was curt: “Just I’ll keep your f—— mouth shut. I’m doing this.” When he inquired further, she expressed disdain for the movie, saying, “I hate this g—— movie, and I don’t want to play this Margaret Mitchell. Jesus! Who wants to play an old cripple like Margaret Mitchell?”
Dorléac also claimed that Doherty, known for her role in Little House on the Prairie, was in conflict with the film’s producer, Renée Valente. To disrupt the production, she allegedly changed her eye color deliberately. Dorléac described Doherty as “a very unhappy girl” who smoked incessantly and ate very little. “She was so tiny and thin. She swore like a workman. I mean, I’ve never seen anybody who had a filthier mouth than she did,” he commented.
