CULTURE

Laura Dern Wears Her Cry Face on a Shirt After Realizing Her “Cry Face” is a Meme

Laura Dern just realized the internet loves her crying face, so she responded accordingly.


Laura Dern by Juergen Teller

Laura Dern is a lot of things: acclaimed actress, wine lover, David Lynch muse, Academy Award board of Governors member, Reese Witherspoon BFF, all-around national treasure, and, as she just found out herself, sort of a meme.

Indeed, the actresses’ signature “cry face,” most memorably deployed during her work in Lynch’s 1986 film Blue Velvet and her dearly departed HBO series Enlightened, is a go-to reaction .GIF amongst some of the more discerning and culture meme-lovering circles of the internet. It’s a perfect way to illustrate not just run-of-the-mill sadness, but utterly shocking and complete devastation. Such is the power of Dern’s face.

Dern, however, only learned of this fact a day ago. In fact, she only learned what a meme is a day ago. After posting a rainbow-enhanced screen grab of her emotional work in Blue Velvet on Instagram, the 50-year-old actress mused, “Wait. I’m a meme? Uh, what’s a meme?” Which prompted one of her fans to comment, “this is everything I’ve ever wanted.”

A day later Dern returned to Instagram, as Vulture pointed out to deliver her fans more than everything they’ve ever wanted, but something so wonderful they could never have dreamed it possible: a picture of Laura Dern wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with a photo of her own crying face on it. This time the photo is of Dern’s other iconic crying face from Enlightened. Fittingly enough she’s wearing the photo with her production partner and Enlightened producer Jayme Lemons.

Dern, however, has no problems finding t-shirts to wear that celebrate her career and collaborators lately. Just a few weeks back she proudly displayed a shirt with Lynch’s mug on it.

Naturally she has a Twin Peaks shirt as well.

In addition to wearing great tees, Dern is pretty busy this year. She kicked it off with a bang by stealing scenes in Big Little Lies as Renata, starred opposite Woody Harrelson in Wilson, is adding all sorts of extra strangeness to the always weird Twin Peaks, dropped by for a cameo in The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and continued her voice work on Netflix’s animated F is For Family. The second half of 2017 will find the release of her films Downsizing, which reunites her with director Alexander Payne, The Tale, and, perhaps most excitingly, her debut in the Star Wars universe as Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo in The Last Jedi (all this amidst hush hush rumors that she may be running for President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences).

May at least one of these projects bring us another version of the patented Dern crying face. Could you even imagine Laura Dern crying in space?

Related: (Why Renata is the Real Star of Big Little Lies, According to Renata)[https://www.wmagazine.com/story/big-little-lies-finale-renata-laura-dern]

Laura Dern, Naomi Watts, Patricia Arquette, and Hailey Gates Open Up About Working with Legendary Director David Lynch:

A Look Back at Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern’s Beautiful Instagram Friendship

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern enjoy a beach sunset while on vacation during the weekend of the Big Little Lies finale.

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern enjoy a beach sunset (and wine) while on vacation during the weekend of the Big Little Lies finale.

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern take selfies and drink wine while on vacation during the weekend of the Big Little Lies finale.

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern know how to have a good time while doing press tours for both Wild and Big Little Lies.

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern celebrate Mother’s Day together. Their mothers watched the movie premiere of Wild while holding hands.

Photo courtesy @reesewitherspoon.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern know how to have a good time while doing press tours for both Wild and Big Little Lies.

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern know how to have a good time while on set for both Wild and Big Little Lies.

Photo courtesy @reesewitherspoon.

Actors Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern became close with Cheryl Strayed, the bestselling author of Wild. (And her dog, clearly.)

Photo courtesy @lauradern.

Back in 2014, actors Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern became very close with Cheryl Strayed, the bestselling author of Wild.

Photo courtesy @reesewitherspoon.

Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern while on the press tour for their 2014 film Wild, in which Dern plays Witherspoon’s mother.

Photo courtesy @reesewitherspoon.
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