David Lynch, the groundbreaking director of “Blue Velvet” and “Mulholland Drive” and the creator of “Twin Peaks,” says that it’s unlikely that he’ll direct again after being diagnosed with emphysema.
In an interview with Sight & Sound magazine (via The Independent), the 78-year-old director said, “I’ve gotten emphysema from smoking for so long and so I’m homebound whether I like it or not. It would be very bad for me to get sick, even with a cold.” He is afraid of catching COVID and doesn’t “go out” anymore. He also said that he can “only walk a short distance” before he’s “out of oxygen.”
Still, the director, who last helmed the ambitious third season of “Twin Peaks” for Showtime in 2017, leaves the door open for directing remotely. “I would do it remotely if it comes to it,” Lynch told the publication, although he did say, “I wouldn’t like that so much.”
The publication brought up his 2010 script for “Antelope Don’t Run No More,” which was his first original script since 2010’s “Inland Empire.” The script, full of Lynch-ian touches like talking animals and space aliens, was rumored to be at Netflix back in 2018 but nothing came of it. (The streamer did end up putting some of his short films on the service.) Lynch told the publication, “Well, we don’t know what the future will bring, but we remain hopeful.”
Lynch has only made 10 movies in his entire career, beginning with 1977’s “Eraserhead,” oscillating between more mainstream “The Elephant Man” and Disney’s “The Straight Story,” and truly bizarre freakouts like “Wild at Heart” and “Lost Highway.” He has also created offbeat series like “On the Air,” which lasted for a single season, and HBO anthology “Hotel Room,” which only aired three episodes. Along the way, he has flirted with a number of projects, including a sequel to his version of “Dune,” biographies of Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Short, and a movie about three guys who used to be cows.
Update: Lynch has taken to X, formerly Twitter, to clarify matters.
In the tweet (see below) he confirms he suffers from emphysema “from many years of smoking.” “I have to say that I enjoyed smoking very much, and I do love tobacco — the smell of it, lighting cigarettes on fire, smoking them — but there is a price to pay for this enjoyment, and the price for me is emphysema,” Lynch wrote, somewhat defiantly. He then said that while he quit two years ago (and that he is in “excellent shape”), the emphysema remains. “I am filled with happiness, and I will never retire,” Lynch wrote on the platform.
Now, he could not retire and still not make another movie. Lynch could paint and release music and make short films featuring his Woody Woodpecker doll collection, after all.
