Donna Marie Hayward

Donna Hayward is a good girl in a small logging town, best friend to Laura Palmer and quietly in love with Laura's boyfriend James. In the wake of the murder that upends Twin Peaks, she starts asking questions no one expects sweet, dutiful Donna to ask, drawn into danger she doesn't fully understand.

Lara Flynn Boyle plays Donna's transformation with real delicacy — the wide-eyed sincerity never quite curdles, even as she starts wearing Laura's sunglasses and telling lies to get closer to the truth. The show uses her as a measure of how deep grief and curiosity can pull an ordinary teenager off her own path.