Arlene Fowler has had her fair share of tragedy on HBO‘s True Blood. Things finally seemed to be looking up for her after a very rough few years. She had a vampire glamour her husband Terry Bellefleur (Todd Lowe) to help him get past his post traumatic stress disorder and be happy for once. It worked for a few short moments before Terry was shot and died in Arlene’s arms in one of the saddest moments we have seen on the show. Carrie Preston, who plays Arlene, spoke to Vulture recently about how Arlene will cope with Terry’s death and how she found out that Todd Lowe was leaving the show.
During last Sunday’s episode Arlene found out that Terry committed suicide and while meeting about Terry’s funeral she had a full outburst, freaking out on the Bellefleur’s. You can’t really blame Arlene she has been through more than most people and Preston says that it was overwhelming for Arlene to realize that his death wasn’t just a senseless crime. She says it shows how desperate Terry must have been feeling and gives the writers of the show kuddos for how they handled the subject of PTSD.
The powers that be for the show revealed before Season 6 even started that a major character was going to die and Preston reveals that Todd texted her after he found out saying “Adios Terry in episode six” and she started freaking out. She says that while the cast trusts the writers, everyone was really sad that he was leaving because they all loved Lowe. Preston says that she is very proud of the show and loved the scene where Arlene sang to Terry as he died:
It was quite a lovely gift that the writers gave me because there’s something really transformative about song. It really elevated it, and it was beautiful. You notice they didn’t even put any score underneath it. I got a lot of texts afterwards from people saying they cried over it. I mean, I was certainly in tears! [Laughs] The makeup artists have to come in and retouch you every time you cry. If you’re supposed to burst into tears in the middle of the scene, they have to set you back to before you start crying. It can be challenging, when the false eyelashes start to lift up! Salty tears just wipe away the glue, you know?
While Arlene was grieving she couldn’t handle the pain anymore and got completely drunk in the middle of the day. Preston says that Arlene earned the right to have extreme emotions, going from her grief to the comic portions while she was drunk. When asked if she thinks Arlene could go “dark” after all that she’s been through, Preston responds that she thinks the character has the ability to go that route, as she does in the books, but that Arlene provides a lot of humor on the show so she doesn’t think that is likely. She goes on to say:
At one point, I really wanted Arlene to become heavily involved in witchcraft. I thought that would be interesting, even though she would be scared of it, that she might engage in something in order to protect herself. How are you going to fight something as powerful as vampires? But they didn’t choose to do that. I thought it would have been cool, because Arlene’s a very controlling person, and she could have put spells on people to control them.
To read the entire interview with Preston, including how Arlene will adjust to having all that money and how the character is overcoming her prejudices, click here.
Source: Vulture.com – True Blood’s Carrie Preston on Arlene Going Dark
Image Credit: HBO
