The 78-year-old director of Blue Velvet, Mulholland Drive and Twin Peaks has not produced another feature film since 2006, partly due to his deteriorating health.
David Lynch is an inimitable figure of American cinema. The two-time César award-winning director is widely known for his surreal, dream-like films (Radírfej, Kék issony, Útvésztóben, Mulholland Drive), although some of the general public prefer his more traditionally structured, “cleaner” works (The Elephant Man, The Straight Story – The true story) favors it. And then we haven’t even mentioned Twin Peaks, the crime series woven with mystical elements that culminates his entire career, and its impact on pop culture that has been reverberating for decades. It is striking that the 78-year-old Lynch has not directed a feature film since 2006, and his last work, Inland Empire, was not a huge success either.
With the famous director now a Sight and Sound conducted an interview: Lynch honestly confessed to the newspaper that due to emphysema, he practically cannot even leave his home.
Even a minor illness can push the director into a life-threatening condition, so it is not at all surprising that he pays special attention to health preservation. “I’ve been smoking for too long, so now I’m addicted to my apartment whether I like it or not. I can’t even go among people. I can only go a short distance, because after that I run out of oxygen. I used to absolutely love smoking, but eventually I licked back ice cream. This was part of the art for me, the tobacco and its smell: to light it, smoke a cigarette, come back, sit back, then light it again and stare at my work; there is nothing more beautiful in the world. At the same time, I started destroying myself beyond a point, so I had to get used to it. Due to the coronavirus, I would be in big trouble if I got sick, including the common cold. I like to be in the thick of things and come up with new ideas. But if it comes down to it, I’ll give remote work a try,” Lynch said.
The director later on the X surface published a short post in which he stated that, despite his health problems, he is not flirting with the possibility of retirement. “I stopped smoking two years ago. I recently had some tests and I’m happy to say that apart from my emphysema I’m in great shape. I feel incredibly happy and I will never retire,” promised Lynch, who has not appeared on television with a major project since the 2017 sequel to Twin Peaks, which was considered a trend-breaker in every respect.