She is in town filming a David Lynch movie and said the locals are too busy to pay much attention.

``It's refreshing to meet people who aren't completely swept away by a film production,'' Ms. Spacek said. ``It's a very busy time here since this is the harvest season, but still, people have been very helpful, very friendly.''

Ms. Spacek lives on a farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Her first impression of Iowans was on an airplane stuck on a runway because of mechanical problems.

``It was a plane full of Iowans, and for that entire hour nobody complained, nobody said a word,'' she said. ``When I got on the new plane, I said to the stewardess, `Have you noticed how patient everyone is? They haven't made a peep.' The stewardess responded, `Well, they're Iowans.' Iowans are very sensible people.

Copyright September 1998 by The Associated Press