Some forty years ago I first met David Lynch in a setting that could have come from an episode of Twin Peaks: the now-defunct Studio City branch of DuPar’s, an all-American coffee shop where he had come to enjoy a well-crafted chocolate milk shake. He seemed to appreciate my enjoyment of seeing him at the cashier’s counter.
Our next meeting was more productive, as Entertainment Tonight had sent me to the press junket for The Straight Story. My first interview was with its costar, Sissy Spacek. Trying to be cool, I said, “I’ll bet it isn’t every day you get a phone call from David Lynch.” She replied, “Actually, yes it is. He and my husband Jack Fisk are close friends.” Boy, did I feel foolish—and underinformed. In fact, Fisk was the production designer on The Straight Story.
It had been arranged for me to show the film to my class at USC, and I mustered up the courage to ask David Lynch if he would come down to campus the following week. He hesitated before answering and I thought perhaps I had disrupted the protocol of corralling guests. Then he said, “Can I smoke?”
I said, “Absolutely,” having no authority to do so. With that, he agreed. On the night of the screening I tried to prepare my 20-somethings, who had so loved Blue Velvet, by explaining that this would be a very different experience…yet still “Lynchian.” Just as he was devoted to DuPar’s milkshakes he was enamored of what I’ll call Americana, for want of a better term.
If you haven’t seen it, The Straight Story is a charming, low-key story about a man named Alvin Straight (played by the wonderful Richard Farnsworth) who’s getting on in years. When he learns that his long-estranged brother (Harry Dean Stanton) has had a stroke, he decides to visit him while he still can. He’s going to make the journey, hundreds of miles away, on his gas-powered lawn mower. This leads to a series of amusing, surprising, sometimes poignant vignettes.
The class responded well to the movie, and to our guest. After I asked one or two questions he blurted out, “You said I could smoke.” “Yes, I did,” I responded, and he took out a cigarette and lighter. I trust that the statute of limitations has run out on my misdeed. And how ironic that smoking took down the quixotic filmmaker, who issued anti-smoking statements in the later part of his life.
Here is a p.s. to this story. In 2017 Harry Dean Stanton’s longtime assistant Logan Sparks cowrote a disarming character portrait called LUCKY. He got the talented actor John Carroll Lynch to direct and used Harry Dean’s Rolodex to cast all the supporting roles with old friends: Ed Begley, Jr., Ron Livingston, Tom Skerritt, Barry Shebaka Henley, James Darren, Beth Grant et al. One scene at a local hangout required a “regular” to stop in and deliver a long, angry speech to anyone who would listen. The scene is a standout in a film full of wonderful moments and the man who delivered the screed was David Lynch. An actor of long experience would have considered memorizing this dialogue a challenge, but Lynch nailed it; I believe he did two takes altogether.
So few people saw LUCKY (which is readily available online) that his appearance has now been eclipsed by his cameo as John Ford, of all people, in Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans, where once again he strikes just the right note.
Anyone who wants to pigeonhole David Lynch is welcome to try, but they will be missing the big picture. He was many things to many people.