Shannen Doherty is dead: Her honest podcast is her legacy

How does it feel to live with death in sight? Since 2023, actress Shannen Doherty has been telling her fans about it, using her podcast “Let’s Be Clear” to talk about the exceptional situation she found herself in. In 2015, she first made her breast cancer diagnosis public, and since 2020 it has been known that the cancer is incurable. Now Doherty has died at the age of just 53.

For years, the American continued to undergo treatment despite the poor prognosis and shared many details with her fans. For example, she spoke to her surgeon about her operations or announced that she was selling her belongings and clearing out houses and garages. She wanted to make things easier for her mother in the event of her death.

Harmless banter or the eulogy of the good old days, which is often common in podcasts by TV stars, was almost never found in her podcast. Instead, she made sure that she left a legacy of her own with honest conversations about her health and formative and controversial moments in her career. Sometimes she sat alone in front of the microphone, more often she invited guests: former colleagues, friends, even an ex-husband. Doherty took her podcast motto “Let’s Be Clear” refreshingly seriously.

Shannen Doherty had announced a new project

Ironically, in her last podcast episode she announced that she would now be taking part in a more superficial chat project: she was joining the “Charmed” podcast “House of Halliwell” as co-host. Her “Charmed” colleague Holly Marie Combs joked when she was a guest on Doherty’s show: “My husband said right away: If Shannen is in it, it will be a success!” Because Doherty had something about her that attracted viewers. For better or for worse: for a long time she was considered one of the most hated TV stars. She later made it clear again and again that it didn’t take much for a young, successful woman in the 90s to achieve this. In fact, it is rare for series stars to be able to boast two big hit shows in their career, as in the case of Doherty with “Beverly Hills, 90210” and “Charmed”. It is probably even rarer that they were fired by both like Doherty – despite their success factor.

The actress also spoke about this in her podcast, with a radical honesty that did not always resonate with everyone. When it came to her departure from “Charmed,” for example, it was important to her to make it clear that it was not voluntary, as she claimed at the time. “No one in their right mind would leave a hit show that pays very well and is fun to work on,” Doherty said in an episode from December 2023. Her series colleague Alyssa Milano made sure she had to leave, she said together with Holly Marie Combs in the podcast.

Shannen Doherty was known for her clarity

When Milano tried to refute the story, Doherty was clear at an event: “At this point in my life, with my health prospects – sorry if I start crying – with the daily battle against a terrible disease, it is incredibly important to me that the truth is really told, rather than a story that others put on for me.” It was perhaps the courage of someone who has nothing left to lose that made her say it so clearly. But Doherty was already famous and notorious for finding clear words before her illness. She apologized for some things, but she went even further on other topics – “Let’s Be Clear” was the stage for both.

When she spoke to actress Katherine Heigl on her podcast two weeks ago – Heigl also often labeled her “difficult” – she once again paid tribute to her for her courage: “You were the original,” said Heigl when it came to how difficult it is, especially as a young woman, to stand up for yourself in your professional life. Shannon Doherty, however, has done exactly that again and again throughout her career. And perhaps never as consistently and touchingly as in her podcast. It was to be her unique farewell project.

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