Sachi MacLaine is Regan MacNeil *forever *

I wish more people knew that Sachi was the model for Regan MacNeil. People nowadays don't even know what Sachi had to go through because of The Exorcist and her life wasn't exactly easy after the novel was published and the movie got released. Linda was crucified in the press but so was her. At the time, various columnists, hearing that Shirley was the model for Chris, published irresponsible innuendoes saying that Sachi was “possessed” and that the novel was her story. Shirley had to take her out of one school and enroll her in a boarding school outside London because her classmates thought she actually was possessed. In 1974, Shirley told the Tattler magazine that she feared the movie had ruined her daughter's life and that people on the streets would come up to her and tell her they'd prayed that Sachi would recover! And yet Sachi never saw refuge in drugs, alcohol, none of that stuff… She's a true inspiration.

There wouldn't be any Regan MacNeil if it wasn't for Sachi. She was the one who Blatty had in mind while writing the novel. By that I mean that he based Regans' mode of speaking, personality, physical appearance on her, too: a thin, reddish-blonde haired little freckled girl with braces.

I love to make 'clones' of her as being Regan, and I feel this “resentment” towards Linda & Ellen Burstyn for having played Chris and Regan. How would you feel if the lives of your idols were being played by somebody else? 😉