At PaleyFest New York on Thursday, Oct. 8, Jessica Lange sat on a panel after a screening of American Horror Story: 13 and brought up a grievance she’s clearly kept warm for years: the drives home after shooting in New Orleans.
“We had to drive ourselves, and that’s still a bone of contention,” she said. “We would drive ourselves home at like 4 or 5 in the morning, park on some street in the French Quarter, and find our way home, because they were too fucking cheap!”
She named FX and gave a sarcastic salute. Sarah Paulson, beside her, said “Oh, yeah!” then laughed and covered her face.
Lange joined the show in 2011, stayed four seasons, and left in 2015. As recently as February 2025, she said of a return: “Oh Christ, no.”
She came back for season 13 on one condition: “I said I’ll come back if I can do all four characters.”
She also told the room she has “never watched any of” the show, and that it isn’t a standing arrangement: “We’re not going to keep bringing these old bitches back.”
