Still finding trouble in the woods: ‘Blair Witch Project’ star at center of Maine road dispute

FREEDOM, Maine (AP) — Heather Donahue is walking through the woods once again. The star of the successful low-budget horror movie “The Blair Witch Project” has an on-screen history of getting into scary situations in a forest.

But this time she is merely picking up an old soda can someone carelessly left on a trail. And she wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.

“For me, reading fairy tales, I always wanted to live in the forest,” said Donahue, 51, who moved on from acting long ago and now lives in rural Maine. “It is absolutely as magical as it seemed in those storybooks.”

But the last several months of Donahue’s time in the Maine woods have been anything but magical, or peaceful.

In a twist of fate harkening back to her long ago movie career, Donahue has been embroiled in a spat with locals in her tiny, 700-resident town of Freedom that hinges on her marking trees with the kind of orange blazes that help people find their way in the dense forests.

Donahue had been a member of the town’s governing body, its Select Board, but lost a recall election recently after a controversy about whether a rural road that cuts through the woods is public or private. The matter remains unresolved, with the town and abutting landowners fighting it out in court.

The road at the center of the dispute

The road in question is Beaver Ridge Road, a narrow, partially hilly stretch flanked by wild plants and songbirds that goes from paved to gravel to dirt as it stretches deeper into the forest. Several abutters of the road say the unimproved section is private and to use it for activities such as all-terrain vehicle riding constitutes trespassing. Donahue, and the town itself, hold that the entire road is public.

Donahue painted the orange blazes using historical maps to show what she holds is the center of a public easement. Abutting property owners were incensed and the first successful recall petition drive in the town’s 212-year history followed. Donahue was removed in April and an election to pick her successor is planned for next month.

Tyler Hadyniak, one of the abutting property owners, said the recall wasn’t just about the orange blazes or the woodland trail. He said it addressed a pattern of behavior by Donahue that chafed longer established residents in the year since she took office.

“I was relieved that the recall was successful. I thought Heather’s demeanor and behavior toward others was just unbecoming of a town official,” Hadyniak said.

Life after ‘The Blair Witch Project’

Donahue, who is originally from Pennsylvania and has spent long stretches of time living in California and traveling abroad, said she is aware of her status as what she called “a lady from away.”

She arrived in Maine after a winding journey in which she struggled with alcoholism, left acting, became a medical marijuana farmer and wrote a memoir.

Donahue said she came to the Pine Tree State eight years ago, overcame her addiction and bought land in Freedom in 2020. Recently, she has worked as a life coach and shared her passions for gardening and medicinal plants with anyone who will listen.

She isn’t especially interested in reliving the glory of starring in “The Blair Witch Project,” which was released in 1999 and is one of the most successful independent movies of all time. The film sparked a resurgence of interest in “found footage” style horror movies, wowed critics and polarized audiences with its homespun take on terror. It also led Donahue to years of legal wrangling over compensation and the right to her likeness.

Donahue makes occasional tongue-in-cheek references to the movie in passing, but also said it struck her several years ago that her life was inseparable from the film in ways that weren’t entirely comfortable: “I had this really difficult moment of realizing my obituary was written for me when I was 25.”

Ordinarily, the hottest gossip in Freedom concerns the peskiness of the local blackflies or the quality of the fishing on Sandy Pond. But the row over the road has become the talk of the sleepy town some 30 miles (48 kilometers) northeast of the state capital of Augusta.

Donahue has defenders in town, including Bob Kanzler, who served on a local roads committee and agrees the disputed path is public.

“Heather has done a wonderful job in researching these discontinued roads in town,” Kanzler said. “I know the road is public.”

Despite the ongoing battle over the road, Donahue said she has found peace in Maine. And she’s not going anywhere.

“I mean, this is where humans flourish,” she said of the Freedom woods. “I’ve figured out a way to do a lot with very little. That was all kind of centered around being able to walk in the woods.”