The way David Lynch`s
mind works is God`s own private mystery. Interviewing the man Mel Brooks
once (accurately) described as "Jimmy Stewart from Mars" is like driving
on a lost highway at night, somewhere in the American West, when suddenly
you pull up into a gas station where instead of pumps you find a jukebox,
a dwarf and a column of fire. You are just about to remark upon this to
the pump attendant, who is unwisely smoking as he siphons petrol out of
your car, when he suddenly anounces, in a voice too loud for this earth,
"You know, I`ve really been getting into snooker!" David Lynch has always
been a mass of contradictions.
A polite, well-spoken and mild-mannered 'Gee,
whizz' Eagle Scout from Missoula, Montana, Lynch somehow transmuted an
idyllic childhood of blue skies, green lawns and white picket fences into
the kind of art which doesn`t just turn heads, but stomaches as well. From
early works like The Amputee, The Grandmother and Eraserhead, through Blue
Velvet, Wild at Heart and smallscreen phenomenon Twin Peaks, Lynch`s
oeuvre is filled with indelible images, unforgettable characters and
disturbing elements, best exemplified by the line the late Pauline Kael
overheard from someone who had just seen Blue Velvet: "Maybe I`m sick, but
I want to see that again."
Meeting David Lynch, in the suitably Lynchian
city of Prague - Franz Kafka`s hometown - certainly fulfills expectations.
His improbably quiffed grey hair looks like it has been slept in by three
different people, his tie-less shirt is customarily buttoned to the
neck.("I don`t like wind on my collarbone, " he explains of the fashion
trend he set in the `70s), and his voice is pure Gordon Cole, the shouty
FBI chief Lynch played in Twin Peaks. Unlike most Empire Hall of Fame
candidates, Lynch arrives five hours early for our interview, informing
most of Prague that. "WE COULD DO THE INTERVIEW NOW IF YOU WANT, BUT WE
HAVE TO DO IT IN THE BAR. `CAUSE I`M A SMOKER, SEE?" Indeed, during the
next two-and-a-half hours of short sentences and long silences, Lynch will
smoke his way through most of a pack of American Spirits, pausing only to
nibble a cheese sandwich - cherry pie not being indigenous to the Czech
capital - and slug back - what else? - a cup of damn fine
coffee.
It has been difficult for David Lynch to make
films. The making of his first feature, Eraserhead, stretched over four
years, plagued by a variety of problems, most of which had to do with
money. The making of his latest feature, Mulholland Drive, took almost as
long, but or entirely different reasons - it began as a pilot for a TV
series, was hated and shelved by the same network that found success with
Twin Peaks, then bough and revived by Canal Plus, and finally finished off
as a feature which won Lynch the Best Director prize at this year`s Cannes
Film Festival. The problem tends to be that, despite being acclaimed as
one of America`s most stylish and avant-garde directors, Lynch has never
enjoyed commercial success anywhere but the small screen. Eraserhead was
an underground success with a strong (though often retrospective) critical
response; The Elephant Man and Blue Velvet received multiple Academy Award
nominations, but were only modestly successful; the critically-reviled
Wild at Heart found an audience in some territories and won Lynch the
coveted Plame d`Or in Cannes; Lynch`s other films - including Dune, Twin
Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. Lost Highway and the lovable The Straight Story
- were flops.
His films have also courted controversy. Both
Eraserhead and Blue Velvet were dismissed as 'sick' by some critics, the
latter earning a knee-jerk reaction from feminists who object to the
characterisation of Dorothy (unflinchingly played by Lynch`s then
girlfriend, Isabella Rossellini) as a masochist; the
quart-into-a-pint-pot adaptation of Dune outraged the book`s legion
of fans, a fate which also befell the Twin Peaks movie; Wild at Heart was
rendered more mild by censors; Lost Highway was described as exploitative
in many quarters - and if the lesbian scenes in Mulholland Drive don`t
attract the same criticism, the film`s dreamlogic and abstract denouement
may well prove to be its undoing, notwithstanding its growing critical
reputation. Although Dune was a disappointment, Lynch was most hurt by the
accusations of misogyny. "People have an idea that Dorothy was Everywoman,
instead of just being Dorothy," he has said. "If it`s just Dorothy, and
it`s her story - which it is to me - then everything is fine. If Dorothy
is Everywoman, it doesn`t make any sense... It`s completely false, and
they`d be right to be upset. When you start talking about 'women' versus
'a woman', then you`re getting into this area of generalisation, and you
can`t win. There is no generalisation. There`s a billion different stories
and possibilities."
You once said that Eraserhead was perfect.
Do you still feel that way?
No, it was just that day. I might`ve been very
relaxed, and it was a long time ago, and it just struck me as, y`know,
perfect. Nothing is perfect. You can shoot for it - you`ve gotta shoot for
it - but there`s no such thing as a perfect film.
Stanley Kubrick screened Eraserhead for the
cast and crew of The Shining, because that was the mood he wanted to
achieve. Are you a Kubrick fan?
I love The Shining. If I see it on TV, no
matter what else is on, I have to watch it. It just gets better and
better. And yet, when it cameout, it didn`t make that much of a
noise. But that`s the way it always was with Kubrick`s stuff. It`s pretty
amazing how they grow. But I like everything he`s done. I love Barry
Lyndon - it`s a great, great film.
There`s a rumour you once considered
remaking Lolita, with John Hurt or Anthony Hopkins as Humbert Humbert.
Total baloney. Why remake a perfect film? One
of my all-time favourites? a classic? Nobody can touch it. When [Adrian
Lyne] did it, it was a joke. I refused to see it.
Anthony Hopkins has admitted he gave you a
hard time on The Elephant Man, because he thought you were unsure of
yourself.
(Ninety-second pause) I would never say
anything about those kinds of things.
With The Elephant Man and The Straight
Story, was it more important for you to capture the essence of the true
story than the literal truth of the story?
Oh, yeah. It`s true of any true story. The
essence is the stuff, and the essence holds the little micro-particles
that dictate the action and the thing that drives it. You`ve got to be
true to the essence of it.
Was that true of your stalled Marilyn Monroe
project, Goddess, based on Anthony Summer`s book?
I don`t know what would have happened if
had directed that. But when we said to the people in the studio who we
thought killed her, they didn`t want any part of it. It was an interesting
thing to think about, but nobody knows. Well, a couple of people
know.
In effect, though, you and Mark Frost 'stole
from the corpse' with Twin Peaks - the beautiful girl with a dark
side...
Well, it`s a phenomenon that`s not just Marilyn
Monroe - there`s a lot of girls like that, it`s human nature. But I think
that whatever it was about Twin Peaks and Marilyn Monroe, that was a
thing, you know, that - speaking for me - I was real interested in.
You acted in Dune and Twin Peaks, but you
haven`t done much lately. Why is that?
Twin Peaks is my best work [as an actor]. It
wasn`t gonna be a character at all, but there`s a scene where Kyle - Agent
Cooper - talks to his boss, and the character was born because I needed to
have him to talk to somebody, so I did the voice that he talked to, and I
talked loud `cause sometimes I talk loud on the phone, so it just happened
like that. And then it became a character. It was really fun. And also the
mood on the set of Twin Peaks - at least from my point of view; I wasn`t
there when others were working - was so fantastic, so there was a lot of
experimenting and a lot of goodwill, a great working atmosphere.
You fell out with Kyle MacLachlan over his
and the Twin Peaks` cast sense of abandonment during the second series,
which is why Chris Isaak took the principle role in Fire Walk With
Me.
(pauses to smoke entire cigarette) Kyle is a
good guy, and I wouldn`t like to say anything about that. Kyle`s my
neighbour, he`s a really great person, but, you know, when you`re in a TV
show, the first year is golden, and the second year, things get strange,
and Twin Peaks was no exception.
Were you disappointed you couldn`t have more
of Dale Cooper in Fire Walk With Me?
I love restrictions, and I believe in fate. So,
what he did worked out just fine.
Are you pleased that Fire Walk With Me,
almost universally panned on its release - except, notably, by Empire - is
enjoying a critical reappraisal?
Yes, because I love that film, and I say now
that The Straight Story is my most experimental movie, but up `til then,
Fire Walk With Me was my most experimental fim, and some of the things,
you know, sequences... There`s such a magic to just the word
'sequence', I`m not kidding ya. There`s something about the word
'sequence', it`s what I`m fixated on now. And it`s just the whole power of
everything.
Could you explain that a little
better?
No.
Critics are notoriously fickle, but were you
surprised Peaks fans didn`t like the movie?
Not really. There was a shift going on, and who
knows all the reasons, but it was just in the air. It was unfortunate,
but... And also, it was a dark film, and it was too much in people`s faces
and didn`t have the humour of Twin Peaks. It was what it was supposed to
be, but it wasn`t what people wanted. It was supposed to be stand-alone,
but also the last week of Laura Palmer`s life. All those things had been
established, but they could be pleasant on one level to experience, but on
another level, not.
Would you ever go back to Twin
Peaks?
No. Uh-uh. It`s as dead as a doornail.
Did you get the sense - after the
triple-threat of Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart and Twin Peaks - that whatever
you made next, the critics would slate?
When you go up, you gotta go down, and I think
it happens to everybody.
How do you feel when your films are 'gutted'
by the censors? Wild at Heart was cut, as was Blue Velvet...
Those were cuts I didn`t wanna make. They told
me if I didn`t want an X I had to take out one hitfrom Frank onto Dorothy.
And now you see the beginning of it, Jeffrey in the closet looking out and
you hear it, and it`s way worse than it was because your mind kicks
in.
But didn`t you cut Wild at Heart yourself
after people left the test screenings?
We had three test screenings of Wild at Heart,
and only when I cut one tiny part did people stay in the theatre. Well, a
lot of people stayed, but about half left, usually. I`ve been very lucky
on every film except Dune, that what you see is the director´s cut -
except for censorship, I`ve never had to make any changes that I didn`t
wanna make.
Do the external forces acting on your work -
release dates, studios - frustrate you?
(pauses to order and drink third cup of coffee)
See, there`s the doughnut and there`s the hole. The doughnut is the film.
The hole is all the things you`re talking about, so they say, "Keep your
eye on the doughnut, not the hole." And the doughnut is so much better
than the hole, so it`s not that hard to do. There`s never any outside
force that keeps you from making the film the way it wants to be. If there
is, you should stop. You always think you`re gonna get it into Cannes, but
if [it`s] at the expense o fthe film, then you`ll hurt the film and kill
yourself.
You found it hard to get backing for another
film after Blue Velvet, unable to get either One Saliva Bubble or Ronnie
Rocket off the ground.
Yeah. Blue Velvet made money, but it wasn`t the
kind of film that had studios calling [me] to do somethin for them. And I
was with Dino [De Laurentiis], he bankrolled One Saliva Bubble, and we
were gonna shoot it (with Steve Martin and Martin Short). We scouted
locations, then Dino`s company went bankrupt.
One Saliva Bubble was one of many
comedy projects you never made. Can you tell me about the
others?
With The Lemurians, it was the idea that
Lemuria sunk, like Atlantis, and the essence of Lemuria began to leak
because Jacques Cousteau bumped something on his explorations and caused a
leakage of "essence of Lemuria". And this essence worked its way and did
certain things. It was a comedy and pretty absurd, but it never got
anywhere. But it made us laugh. The Dream Of The Bovine was for the comedy
channel. [Robert Engels] and I wrote three episodes, and then sort of
realised that it was a feature, but in re-writes it got off-track. And
then I re-read some parts of the original, and there`s defiitely something
there, but it needs a lot of work. It should be very bad quality, whatever
it is. Extremely bad quality. Which is not hard to do.
Are you frustrated at not being able to make
comedies, at least so far?
I really have a respect for comedy. People have
said comedy is like mathematics: two and two is four; this and this; you
gotta get a laugh. And it`s really difficult, and yet comedies are
throwaway things.
You`re a big fan of Jacques Tati, but what
contemporary comedy have you enjoyed?
Something About Mary - all the dog bits. I like
that. And I like the guy with the crutches who tried to get his keys -
that physical gag, I thought that was really, really good, the timing of
what he did, and the little sound effect they put in there. I thought he
did a really good job.
Lee Evans.
Is that his name? He`s really good. And I liked
the dog stuff a lot.
What other films have you liked
recently?
I haven`t seen that much. I`m not really a film
buff, I like to work on my own stuff. Not that something doesn`t exist
that I would really like - I just haven`t seen it.
Well, let`s talk about Mulholland Drive.
When they shelved the pilot, did ABC simply not 'get' what you were trying
to do?
They hated it. They hated the story, the
acting. They thought it was too slow, that`s for sure. Basically they
hated verything about it.
You started writing it with Joyce
Eliason,
who scripted The Last Don...
Right. I started, though, way before that, when
it was gonna be kind of a spin-off of Twin Peaks, but it didn`t go
anywhere. And just the words 'Mulholland Drive' always got something
going, but I never knew what, so all the times it started to go, it never
really went, until this last thing. And then it wasnothing but trouble
with ABC, and it was just more fuel for the [theory] that a thing is not
finished until it`s finished.. It wants to be a certain way, and you don`t
know all the twists and turns in a road that are coming up - you just
drive dow the road and, you know, pay attention.
Like Mulholland Drive itself - the road and
the film. Did you predict that the outcome of the whole ABC/shelved pilot
fiasco would be a happy one, an award in Cannes and a strong critical
response?
When you`re in the middle of something, it`s
not impossible to let go of [it], but it`s an injury if you don`t finish
something, and part of your mind is always going back to it if it`s not
finished. So I don`t know whether it was being hopeful, or I had a
feeling, but many people involved in the project had feelings that it
wasn`t gonna die. Then it got revived and almost died, and revived and
died many, many times. Because of the nature of it, I don`t know how to
say it, but it would be like there`s a key to something - your brain kind
of kicks in to finish something, and you don`t know how it`s going to end.
It`s pretty interesting how the mind can go to work, and ideas come in.
It`s a real interesting experience.
The only explanation you ever gave for Lost
Highway was that it is a "psychogenic fugue". Would you care to elaborate
on that a little?
No. I think it`s [a] beautiful [phrase], even
if it didn`t mean anything. It has music and it has a certain force and
dreamlike quality. I think they call it a "psychogenic fugue" because it
goes from one thing, segues to another, and then I think it comes back
again. And so it is [in] Lost Highway.
Is it necessary that you understand
seomething if you`re going to film it?
No, not one bit. The reverse is true. My
understanding of Wild at Heart, the book... Again, it was a lot like The
Elephant Man - the essence was Sailor and Lula, and many things were one
line, or one paragraph, or one thing that shot a bunch of studio stuff
into me that got expanded. Some things were dropped, but it`s like they
triggered [other] things. But then at a certain point you have to go and
make it your own.
Your first two features were in black and
white, and rumour has it you initially considered shooting Lost Highway in
monochrome, to heighten the film noir sensibility.
No.Some films are black and white films and
some films are colour films. They tell you pretty much straightaway. I
love black and white, but Lost Highway wouldn`t work in black and white,
just like The Elephant Man wouldn`t work in colour.
You know your ad for PlayStation 2 is black
and white...
No it`s not.
Yes it is. You filmed it in colour, but it
was only shown in black and white.
Really?
Really. How do you feel about
that?
I do not feel good. It`s supposed to be in
colour. You see, there`s a total disregard... Once they have it, they do
what they want. And if that happened in film, then I`d have to quit making
films.
There are university courses taught, and
academic texts published, about the deeper meanings of Twin Peaks and Lost
Highway. Why do you think that is?
Human beings are detectives, and mysteries are
magnets, and once you discover something, the mystery`s over. And I think
that some knowing is completely fulfilling, but most knowing you`re just
onto the next thing, and it`s done. It`s like me; I wanna know where
things go, but we can all maybe get to maybe a different place, but a very
satisfying place. And you`re not very sure of the place, but it`s still
very lively.
From Bright Lights Film
Journal
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