Love Letter to John Boylan, Mayor Dwayne Milford from ‘Twin Peaks’

During my visit to Washington state in August 2025, I stopped by the gravesite of John J. Boylan, the actor who played Mayor Dwayne Milford in David Lynch and Mark Frost’s Twin Peaks. Boylan passed a little over three years after the second season finale aired on the ABC Television Network. From the moment he appeared at the Twin Peaks town hall scene in the pilot, I’ve always enjoyed his portrayal of a bumbling small town mayor in the show. So here is my love letter to a manufacturing manager turned stage and screen actor.

WHO IS JOHN J. BOYLAN?

John J. Boylan was born to Irish immigrants in Canton, Ohio on Jan. 31, 1912. According to his Seattle Times obituary from Nov. 20, 1994, Boylan was “lured into fights by kids who knew Irish boys had been told not to fight during Lent.” After repeated visits to the priest’s office for detention, he turned to books and later discovered acting in community theatre.  During the Great Depression, he road the rails looking for mill jobs and was cast in “She Stoops to Conquer” during a stop in Philadelphia, PA.

“He later loved telling how the lead actor forgot his line in Act I, came in with a line from Act III, and ended the play an hour early,” wrote Carole Beers about Boylan’s life in The Seattle Times. “The local critic, unaware of the enormity of the cut, wrote, ‘ . . . an adept treatment of a wordy play.’

In the 1930s and ’40s, Boylan spent time in Greenwich Village in New York City where he knew actors Burgess Meredith and John Ireland. While in New York City, he also met his wife Jeanne at the Empire State Building. Decades later, he would play an elevator operator at this historic landmark in the romantic film Sleepless in Seattle. Jeanne and he were married in the 1930s and would have one daughter, Kathleen.

Boylan worked in several mills such as Copperweld Steel Company and Timken Roller Bearing Company before joining Milton Manufacturing Company in Milton, PA as a melt shop superintendent in 1955. Nine years later, he was promoted to Works Manager and would continue in that role until his retirement on Nov. 1, 1975. He was a long time member of the Electric Metals Makers Guild and the Iron and Steel Division of the American Institute of Metallurgical Engineers.

While in Pennsylvania, he continued acting in productions of plays such as “Twelve Angry Men,” “Stalag 17,” and a dinner theatre show, “Bus Stop.”

Three years after retirement, John and Jeanne moved to Bellevue, Washington in 1978 (or 1979 as some reports listed) to be close to their daughter and grandchild.

By the 1980s, he found an agent and spent time on the stage in a production of “On Golden Pond” as the Henry Fonda character, and he acted in other shows at The Empty Space, Seattle Repertory Theater, Bathhouse Theater and Tacoma Actors Guild. In television commercials, he played a stately butler or a grandfather.

A Jan. 21, 1990 interview with Boylan by John Betchel from The Daily Item noted he had been a character actor in 11 movies including The Experts with John Travolta, “‘Twin Peaks,’ a possible television pilot,’ and Waiting for the Light with Shirley MacLaine.

His obituary in The Seattle Times said he was cast in Twin Peaks while appearing at the Seattle Repertory Theatre’s production of “Much Ado About Nothing” in 1991. This fact would be repeated in other Associated Press obituaries. His part at the Twin Peaks Town Hall meeting from the pilot was shot in March 1989, so I’m guessing the 1991 date refers to his reprisal as Dwayne Milford later in the show’s second season.

“He continued at the Rep, but every Sunday night would fly to Los Angeles, film all day Monday, then return to Seattle in time for the Tuesday matinee. He was 79 at the time,” wrote Beers.

He loved literature and read to people in nursing homes. And he loved being read to by fellow actors who visited him at bedside. He also stayed informed on current events, reading the New York Times at a Bellevue cafe every morning.

Boylan died on Nov. 16, 1994 at the age of 82 after a bout with lung cancer and pneumonia.

“I’ve always had the love for the theater in the back of my mind. My great attraction to acting is the satisfaction that I receive from doing a credible job on stage,” he said in an 1991 interview with The Daily Item.

A gathering to honor him was held on Wednesday, Nov. 23, 1994 from 5 to 8 p.m. at the East Shore Unitarian Church, 12700 S.E. 32nd St., Bellevue. He was buried in Sunset Hills Cemetery in Bellevue.

VISITING JOHN BOYLAN’S GRAVE AT SUNSET HILLS CEMETERY IN BELLEVUE, WA

After dropping off a friend at Seattle-Tacoma airport, I drove to Sunset Hills Memorial Park located at 1575 145th Place SE in Bellevue. This cemetery began serving families in the Greater Eastside in 1936.

Thanks to FindAGrave.com, I learned Boylan was buried in the park’s Olympic View section, Lot 2000, space 20. I downloaded a map from DignityMemorial.com and set out to find the exact location.

The Olympic View area was rather expansive. Tiny silver metal markers with lot numbers were placed throughout the section. I walked down several rows trying to locate the 2000s. As I got to the end of this section pictured above, I looked down and found Boylan’s grave.

The red arrow shows the exact location adjacent to the sidewalk.

The plot contains the remains of both John and his wife Jeanne who passed in 2006. I pulled out grass that had grown over the marble headstone and poured water to clean it. I wasn’t prepared for any of this so I needed to wait until the water dried to take a photo.

He attended the 1993 Twin Peaks Fan Festival in Snoqualmie Valley, Washington so a handful of fans would get to share their appreciation with this actor. I was a little over a year into my obsession with Lynch and Frost’s show at the time of Boylan’s passing, so I missed meeting him.

Robin Lively, who played Lana Budding Milford in Twin Peaks, remembered Boylan in Brad Dukes’ “Reflections: An Oral History of Twin Peaks.”

“He [John Boylan] was so delightful. What a charming, wonderful man he was. He was a bit exaggerated of a character, but he was kind and sweet and old and wonderful. I do remember being horrified – the script said they walk in on us as we are making out and I almost died. I just thought, ‘Oh my gosh, you’ve got to be kidding me. There’s no way. I can’t do that.’ So I was kissing his forehead and he had kiss marks all over his forehead. [laughs]”

More than 35 years later, fans continue to discover this small town mayor who regularly wonders “if this thing is on?”