The Daily Zeitgeist - Icon #30 - David Lynch: He's Magically De-Lynch-ious

Episode Date: July 20, 2026

In this edition of The Iconograph, Jack and Miles are joined by artist/musician Janie Danger to discuss the man who taught Americans that this whole world is wild at heart and weird on top: David Lynch! They’ll explore his baffling rise to fame, his inspirations, his introduction to poppers and much more!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Listen to Raiders of the Lost podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And for more, follow at Raiders of the Loders. Plus podcast and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. Hello the internet and welcome to this spin-off episode of Dirtyly Zekeist, which we're calling the iconograph instead of looking at the Zykeyes through the current events on Monday mornings, we look at the Zich guys through the powerful pop culture deities that are our icons. This week we're talking David Lynch, another first ballot hall of fame.

on the list of people. You'd be least surprised to learn they were an alien the whole time. What a run. Bjork last week. Lynch this week. Lynch is also like Bjork, a beloved icon, despite making challenging,

occasionally upsetting, artistic fever dreams. Both weeks, but particularly with Lynch, there are just these moments. We were like, this was a mainstream, this was a mainstream success.

his movie blue velvet is probably one of the most upsetting surrealist works of art that most Americans had ever seen up to that point, 1986. I looked at the 1986 box office and Blue Velvet came in in between Space Camp and Highlander.

We ought to go back. Wow. We have lost so much. Those are two movies with standard three-act structures, Hollywood endings, and nowhere in space camp does Dennis Hopper

say, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, baby wants the fuck. Daddy's coming. Yeah, and that's why it sucks. And that's why it's not good. But yeah, I check the IMDB quotes page for Space Camp and Thailand, just to be sure. What the fuck is Space Camp? Can we talk about space camp instead?

Isn't that the Matthew Broderick one, where they accidentally go to space? I didn't know we were talking about David Lynch. I was looking about war games. I was looking up a bunch of a clavicular facts when you ask you about icons. I had all these like reels of a clavicular

in Tel Aviv, but I guess we're doing David Lynch, that's fine too. How have we not done clavicular yet? That's the question the kids are asking. He has, he's still alive. I think when that changes me. Well, you said you did Bjork. She's still alive. Yeah, but Bjork's given

way much more than clavicular. You know what I mean? What? I guess more it would be interesting, you know, if York maxing. I mean, we're all trying to bork max out here. My name is Jack O'Brien. I'm one of the founders

of Crack.com, and I'm thrilled to be joined as always by my co-host. I don't know if he's a detective or a pervert. It's Miles Gray. Oh, inshallah

ari-a-a-orgazimus. I am from the Islamic Republic of Japan. That was like the verbal equivalent to the coexist sticker coming out of your mouth. Inshala,

thank you. Oh, Anyway, yeah, I'm here. I'm here. I'm here to talk Lynch. Backed by a photograph of David Lynch, huffing through an oxygen mask. Do we know what that,

there's a lot of theories, right? Is it poppers? I know what it does. All right. We'll talk about it. Let's introduce our guest in our third seat, an artist and creator of music that's been described as hypnotic, power violence.

One of our favorite guests, she's smooth as shit from a duck's act. ass. It's Jamie Danger. Baby! Nice, hey, hey, guys. Thanks for having there. Oh my God, thank you for joining.

To break the K-Fabe of you thinking that this episode was about clavicular, this one was, you know, we have two types of icon episodes. Sometimes there are the ones where we send out a list and people choose from the list and there's

some where our guests are like this is my pick. and this is one where you came to us with Lynch and we were very, very happy to oblige. But you're a Lynch, you're a Lynch fan. Yeah, absolutely. Every time I've been on here, it's funny. I feel like I've referenced, like,

I always referenced a lot of movies, but Cronenberg's been, every time I check the Reddits or discords or whatever, and I do, and I read every single comment, I see everything you say about me. Oh, wow. It's all nice. It's all great.

It's all good. Most of the time. What do they say about us? I've never read them. Sounds terrifying. Honestly, dude, they love y'all. They love y'all. I can't even joke.

They're obsessed with y'all. It's great. It's good. Touch and go there. You all have cultivated one of the most positive kind of like fan bases I've seen. A good community. Yeah, I must say.

I'm always touched by that. Through being Stalin like in our erasing. of anybody who says anything negative about either of us. Yeah, sending it with cease and desist letters. We make it so they've never existed online. No, you're increasing the literacy rate, like, for everyone. And you're bringing, you're uplifting people out of poverty. It's amazing.

But what is your relationship? Oh, yeah. You always bring it up on the show. Free-go references to David Lynch on the show. Yeah, so when you all reached out to me, I was like, there was a few people I had in mind. Lynch was the very obvious one. Cards on the table.

David Lynch is like my guy. Like he's my favorite director. I would say he's the greatest American artist. Handily, his death last year really affected me quite a bit. I discovered David Lynch at a young age, sort of kind of like how we were talking about before we were recording. I grew up as an only child. my parents both worked two jobs and they were away all the time and my my mom was like kind of

weird about things like she I was the kind of kid that wasn't allowed to like wasn't allowed to watch like Harry Potter because it had like wizards in it or whatever oh like religious religious objections goes against the second commandment right there yeah yeah but I was the only child so I kind of just had free reigns to do whatever because I was home alone all the time I discovered this little website app thing called Netflix. And at the time, since I'm 67 years old, I remember Netflix used to mail you movies in the mail. And they had all of them.

They had all of them. They had a great stock, yeah. And so I would just make, I would go online and I would make like a queue of movies. And that was kind of how I got really into movies. I saw 2001 a Space Odyssey at a really young age. I remember sitting in my room and watching that movie in 2001 is, I'd say up until the ending, a fairly straightforward film. But the ending like blew me away.

And that like was a very like formative experience for me. watching that movie because I think it was the first time I ever saw something that like I didn't understand but I just like felt it like viscerally. Yeah. And that's why you've always wanted to create a human zoo. A zoo. Yeah, absolutely. Where you keep humans that are captured. Yeah. No. We're kind of living in one if you think about it. Low key. No. Yeah. High key. High, uh, high curculely. So low curcule and I'm sitting in my room and I'm, I'm, you know, I'm going through the Like I get really nerdy about it I'm going on like a early

Like 1.0 Rotten Tomatoes and stuff like that And I'm going like what's what's the big stuff? Scorsesey loved it Fucking Spielberg's early stuff loved it Like all the stuff that like a budding young Sineophile and mind you I'm like 12 years old Like a lot of it like I shouldn't have been watching taxi driver this young Sure.

And the weird thing is um if it didn't have like wizards My mom didn't really give a shit if I was watching taxi driver. What's they say it's about a man who's in love with a child? Yeah, right. Good Christian values, exactly. So, and my dad thought it was cool because my dad is a lot more

cultured a little bit by comparison. And he likes Scorsese and he likes movies and he would take me to R-Aid movies and stuff. He thought it was fucking cool. But that's, anyway, I remember David Lynch was like a guy that I should be put on to. I kept hearing about this movie Eraserhead.

I rented it. And it was an experience watching it. I remember sitting in my room in front of my TV. And I watched it. I felt uncomfortable the entire time. Yes. And I fucking hated it. And I hated it.

And I couldn't stop thinking about it. It was probably the first time I ever was like feverishly like, like ending explained. What is this? What? Like, why do people? like this. Right. It is really like a fever drink.

It makes you feel sick. Like it's not in a like, oh, I'm going to throw up. But like in a way, it's just like, ugh. I feel like I've got like bugs on me or something. Yeah. No, it feels like you're just stuck in this sick, sick world. And she's apparently meant to be Philadelphia. Yeah, it's Philadelphia.

We can get a little more on that later. Yeah. Apparently they call eraserhood, which is funny. They do. I hate it. I didn't like it, but it really, really stuck with me. And I remember later in life, I watched Blue Velvet, and I liked that a lot more, but I still don't think it, like, did it for me.

And then I watched Mahal and Drive when I was, like, a teenager. And this was when I was, like, a lot more of an adult. I'm fucking, I'm doing drugs, and I'm bad Janie. And I remember sitting down watching that movie. And it just immediately blew it. me away. And it gave me that feeling that the first time I watched 2001 where like, I didn't understand it, but I loved it. And I felt it. And that was when I think that I, it really clicked for me what David Lynch is trying to do. And that is so much more about like how it

feels to you, the vicerra of, of film and cinema. And I also, I'll say, I think movies, I think cinema is like probably the highest form of art. It is moving pictures. It's acting. It's music. It's photography. Yeah. It's everything coming together.

Yeah. And that's not to degrade any other form of art at all. Oh, they're in there too. Yeah. Yeah. We like that. Yeah. And I think it's specifically.

as American art, I think David Lynch, and we'll get into this more, I think the big two through lines in all of his films is how horrifying it is to be an American and how horrifying it is to be a woman. And, yeah, and, yeah, later I ended up watching everything. Loved it all, Twin Peaks, Twin Peaks their turn. You mentioned

how upsetting Blue Velvet it was it's like a fucking Rugrats movie compared to Fire Walk with me like Jesus It ain't shit Compared to FireWalk

So yeah I'm really happy That y'all Ask me to do this Thank you Yeah And we're thrilled to have you here And I think it's an important

Point about just like Movies I always talk about Being like A record We're very lucky to have this record Of America's unconsciousness Like it's like They are like, you can view them as like America's dreams, whether that be like their wishes for themselves or, and, you know, it's a two-way street where it's like people trying to reflect to America what their dreams look like.

And then, you know, those movies becoming like hugely influential. And I just feel like David Lynch, as we'll talk about, as like this person who is meditating all the time and just like seems to be like deeply plugged into the tap root. of America's unconscious and so like becomes this very important filmmaker because he is like so in touch with like the way the way movies come to him are not like I got this idea it's like I had an image of a ear in the dirt with ants crawling all over it and it's yeah it's just it's it's very similar to how agent cooper like solves or attempts to solve uh mysteries and twin peaks where it's literally it came to me in a dream it's yes it's arguing with people on twitter you know it's like well do you have a source for that and they're like i made it up bitch it's like he's it just it just comes to you i think that's fucking beautiful i think that's amazing and well you know there's a lot of contradiction like the you know beautiful

and ugly and that he himself is quite quite the contradiction in that he his personality and manner of speaking sounds like a not very subtle actor doing a Midwestern Rube character and like he's almost like the last person on the planet to still speak in a transatlantic accent like it's like the detritus of a a transatlantic accent it's very strange which is interesting because he is a notably a very big fan of Jimmy Stewart. Right. Who is like the epitome of that accent. Oh, I'm going to bust.

But he was an Eagle Scout. He was a frat boy. He, yeah. And like there, that duality of like, like there's a story about a reporter visiting the set of Blue Velvet expecting to meet some like dark torture genius. And they find David Lynch

riding around the set on a child's bicycle with like streamers flutter. from the handlebars and his pockets full of peanut M&Ms. It's always... It's always the creators that you think are going to be the most... I always see the dichotomy between

Haya Miyazaki being like this just absolutely miserable curmudgeon and Junji Ito being like this just delightful little like prankster, playful little guy. Right. Yeah, I don't know. It's just, it's always kind of like that. And if I find that very interesting.

Yeah. Um, but all right. So let's get to eraser head where it came from because, yeah, as mentioned, he, he grew up, David Lynch, as he put it in the post-war idol, uh, tree-lined streets, the milkman, building backyard forks, droning airplanes, blue skies, picket fences, green grass is how he, he says the only thing that disturbs him about his childhood is that psychopaths often say they had idyllic childhoods. And he's like, yeah, I did too. he's he's always like interested in art from a very young age and eventually moves to Philadelphia to go to art school and moving to Philadelphia seems to have really fucked him up thankfully he describes it as declining industrial Philadelphia lived across the street from the old city morgue and later recalled that all the buildings were black and soot covered very pure very very filthy. It was a beautiful mood. That's another thing. Like people, a lot of times,

like he hated Philadelphia. And he did say it is one of the sickest, most corrupt, decadent, fear-ridden cities that exists. But he also said that it was like, you know, he experienced beautiful imagery there.

Um, that, you know, you can't, he recalled that Philadelphia had a great mood, factory, smoke railroads diners the strangest characters in the darkest night i saw vivid images plastic curtains held together with band-aids rags stuffed in broken windows and there's a story from his time there that uh he was so freaked out by the city he would walk around carrying a stick with nails sticking out

of it in case he got attacked and a cop stopped him and was like damn that's good yeah you should keep that yeah he's like is that a thing you make and sell or it's like a business you got going No, just my Billy walking stick. Yeah, yeah, right, right. Exactly. By the way, so my family is from Philadelphia.

My dad, so I asked my dad about this neighborhood where he lived. Like the intersection is, I think like 13th in Hood. And my dad went to high school on the block that David Lynch lived on.

Wow. And like he grew up right, like right there. His whole, he didn't see it as a psychological horror movie since he lived there his whole life, but he did once tell, like there are these random anecdotes.

He was like, yeah, one time I got out of basketball practice late and I had to run home with a brick in my hand down the middle of the street to avoid getting jumped. So I don't think David Lynch was wrong.

Yeah. I don't think he was over, overreacting. I think Philadelphia is also an interesting like, Touchstone for this because it's Considered the birthplace of America

Sure And it's like if you have this place that's you know It's it's considered the birthplace of America And you see it as this Just like Like detritus of factories And garbage and You know it's it's also like

Kind of like the end place of America Yeah take a shot of itself Yes It's the birthplace of American decline It's like here's what we're facing 30 years from now. So he made some installations and short films there

and then decides he's interest in filmmaking. Like he's like, what if my paintings moved? And people are like, well, there are these things called movies. He's actually not a huge movie person. Like he's obsessed with the Wizard of Oz in like a certain handful of movies.

But he isn't like one of these filmmakers who's like, guy stole this shot from here and this shot from there. It's like he stole these shots from the, you know, deep mythical pool that we all drink from when we sleep, you know? And so he goes to AFI and is, like the people at AFI, it's kind of wild. Like, he's immediately, they're just like, whatever you want, man. You want here, you want $10,000 to make a movie, do it.

the dean is so supportive of Lynch at AFI, he threatens to resign if the financing of Eraserhead were to be rejected. Wow. And when it comes in like the first idea of it is a 21 page long script, oh, by the way, before this, he was working on a script based on a painting that he had done called Garden Back. And again, like, Fox studios were interested in that.

Like, he was immediately just like, everyone was like, this guy's fucking interesting. God, such a completely different era. Could you imagine reading a variety headline like, like right now about that? Or it's like Sony options script about painting. About painting from guy who made painting in Philadelphia art school. We're making movies based on 4chan posts now.

Yeah, that's true. Yeah, we're just getting a little bit fucked up. Um, AFI is obviously a little more avant-garde, but, uh, for a sense of like the direction, it could have gone a few years later. The director, Martin Brest comes through AFI and goes on to direct Beverly Hills cop, midnight run, scent of a woman and, uh, jiggly. So, uh, gilly. Gilly.

Gingley. The benef, the benef, the benef, the binafer flop. It's called giggly. Giggly. Giggly. Um, but so on the, on the topic of Eraser. head. Like, do we even, how do you talk about a razor head for people who haven't seen it? It's like, it's nightmare. I've seen it twice. The first time I was about five years old.

And the second time I was seven. Yeah. Again, because my dad, he was like going, he was like, getting like, I'm sure to see you on. Yeah, because he's all into art. My dad was never the kind of person. He's like, if it's art, like, you're never too young for art. It was like, his, kind of thing. So I remember going with him to the video store and I was like I want to get land before time or some shit. He's like, nah, man, we get to racerhead. Yeah, sucks. You're watching Salo tonight. And then I was like, fuck, all right. And I just remember too, Janie, like the same way you're talking about it.

My feeling was I was first so put off that it was in black and white. And then because you're like five, you're like, this is nah, this is bad. But the imagery... I know. I originally thought it was from like probably like the 50s or 40s when I first watched it. That was an ancient movie.

and it gave me such a reaction like it made, I just remember being really icked out by what I was seeing. Like I just remember feeling, like so viscerally, like what's happening. I couldn't make sense of any,

like the metaphor or anything, but I could just tell like from the fucking weird chicken on the, there's just so many things that just really got me as a kid. And then I watched it later on when I was like 17 because I was like, yeah, I mean, I seen a racer head when I was five and I know what the fuck going on and again

had a very similar experience but it just made a little bit more sense and I was like oh this is like this is dope because it's doing it's fucking something's working on me that I can't quite describe I rewatched it around I think I rewatched

cards on the table I've seen all of his movies like a million times so I don't didn't really need to do too much brushing up for this episode I after he died I went through another marathon of them. And Eraserhead really struck me as probably the one that makes the most sense directly.

I don't know if I'm crazy to say that, but like in terms of like, I know that he's very cagey about what his films mean and like the metaphors and stuff. But I feel like pretty definitively the metaphors in Eraserhead are, I mean, I could tell they came out of the brain of someone who's like in their like, late 20s, early 30s, like going into adulthood, getting into fatherhood, like, having a child, relationships, children, yeah, what it's like to work for a living, to just like suffer in America and to long for just like the release and touch of like something ethereal out there. And yeah, it also struck me just how funny it was. I, it

It's, if you watch it as a really, really, really black comedy where, similar to a movie I talk about a lot that came out a few years ago, Bo is Afraid, which I also love, if you just watch it as this, like, horrific black comedy where, like, everything in the world is out to get you and is trying to kill you, it's pretty hilarious and relatable also. It's like a satire of the brain of somebody with an anxiety disorder. Yeah, for sure, for sure.

Yeah, yeah. And like, I feel like there's a lot of, like, yeah, like you said, so he's in Philadelphia being freaked out by being in the city of Philadelphia coming from this white picket fence background. He, his girlfriend of the time is pregnant and gives birth to his first daughter. And there's like all of the freakiest things in the movie are kind of like expressions of about the weirdness of some very, basically universal human experience. Like babies are weird looking when they come out. Sperm is weird. There's this horrifying scene with him eating a meal with his girlfriend's family. And they keep asking him if he's had intercourse with their daughter. And the chicken they're eating is like moving and bleeding.

Like meeting the parents of someone you're dating is like a right of passage. People like go through and pretend it's normal. But the subtext is like, we're eating together because. this person is having sex or like trying to have sex with my family member and like yeah oh you made this girl yeah I've been coming in her yeah she's great

she's great I'm filling her up yeah man oh you're having fun with them oh your daughter yep yep yep yep like eating meat is definitely grotesque viewed through the eyes of basically anyone who is not a hungry mammal you know I also believe he became a vegetarian later in life like yeah

the seeds of that are there um for sure um As for the making of the movie, they make it over a period of five years shooting it on buildings on my FI ground. But they have to make it over the course of five years because the people in it are like not professional actors in many cases. And so they like have full time jobs. And so they're like working on borrowed time and have jobs. And they like run out of money. And then they're like, okay, we just got enough money to make the dinner scene or whatever.

also Jack Nance the guy who plays the main character is you know struggling with alcoholism at this time and say yeah he keeps having to like David Lynch keeps having to take him to the hospital or like to you know be like all right go go back and sleep off the booze for six hours but anyways he is just keeps the costs low anyway he could

recorded all the sound using discarded stock that he salvaged from the Warner Brothers dumpster. Him and a friend loaded... That's awesome. Yeah, just like broke into the dumpster. He said,

Al and I had taken the backseat out of the Volkswagen, and we got away with hundreds of rolls of used soundstock. You can reuse soundstock if you put it in a degalcer, and Al would do this. I didn't want to go near this thing

because it's a huge magnet, and you feed the stock into the degalcer, and you have to turn it a certain way and you're rearranging the molecules and then you bring it out a certain way and it's clean so that's how they they had a machine to like erase

what was in the dumpster at Warner Brothers for props for the umbellical cord prop lynch's collaborator Doreen Small simply called up vets and asked for

real umbilical cords um okay she was like We're just going to put these in jars in the background. But, yeah. I would have just got some, like, tripe or something. I know. But they were like, nope, it has to be real. It has to be real umbilical cord.

David wanted a dog with a litter of nursing puppies. So I called vets to find people who had dogs with new litters, then called them and asked if they'd loan us their dogs. To get umbilical cords, I lied to hospitals and told them the cords would just be in jars in the background in a movie scene. Those are real umbilical. chords in the film and we got five or six of them. Oh my God.

I didn't know. Just bootstrapping it lying to a hospital for medical waste for your pro. I'm going to go get some. Yeah. I'm going to get some for myself. He got some ideas for the textures in the movie by dissecting a cat. So the cat was, I'm assuming they got that from the vet.

But, so all of this is like the stuff they will tell you. and then anytime anyone's like, okay, but the mutant baby, where did that come? No one will speak on it. And he's like, I just like don't like telling people, I don't want to ruin the mystery. But like they do ruin the mystery on everything else is just that one.

So I'm always like, what the fuck did they do? I remember him saying something like, you're like, yeah, it's like, I think we found it or something. Like he's been, like, it is the, call some hospitals and ask if anyone has had any new mutants. babies lately. I've heard rumors, and I, again, I don't know how confirmed this is, but there's some people that think it's a lamb fetus.

Like a skinned. I don't really know how you get a lamb fetus. I'll leave that up to your imagination, but yeah, I think it was like some kind of land fetus that they had, like, done sort of like animatronic work, you know, it's like. Right. It's basically baby Yoda If you think about it It's Grogu

Yeah yeah yeah David Lynch's Grogu I like that grogoo Yeah But I'm in a film It does I mean I guess if like You already got somebody

Going around Able to collect loose umbilical cords Like I'm sure you can be like Hey man you got any like Lamp fetuses back there Yeah That's just the

Let me just take that Someone drops When you kill someone in Philadelphia Those are the coins That come out It's lamb fetus Yeah The eraser out

of a bus. Yeah. It fell off the back of a truck. Wait, the lamb fetus did it? Yeah. Yeah. Don't worry about it.

Stop asking questions. I got you a guy. I got a guy who can get me some lamb fetuses. But yeah, it was totally broke by the end of making the movie. Had to work. Make ends meet building sheds, picking up odd carpentry jobs,

which he was an Eagle Scout and that he does credit that a couple times with like sort of the DIY nature of his filmmaking and also his, ability to like make ends meet in between. And then so the movie is released and it comes along at the exact right moment because this is right in the heart of the midnight movie craze, which, you know, this is like movies like Night of the Living Dead. Pink flamingos. Rocky Horror Picture Show are all, you know, these massive cultural things that they'll show at midnight and they'll just be on. Like one of the things Lynch says is very important is not just like all the people who saw it at midnight screenings, but also that the word eraser head was on marquees for so long. And it just like helped enter the public's.

And this is his quote, collective consciousness. One of my favorite things to talk about. But it is such an evocative title that like you're not going to forget when you do your eraser head. It is. and it doesn't have aside from like the one scene where they're making the pencil erasers it's I don't know

it's not terribly too much to do with the actual like plot or anything it's yeah and I fully support that I love when there's just like a there's like a song that's like a cool title that the lyrics have nothing to do with right totally thought it was just like that guy's hair is big and weird like an eraser on the top of his head

yeah just dang eraser head um but uh it came as Stanley Kruber has said Eraserhead is one of his favorite movies, speaking of 2001. But another person we should shout out here.

So Jack Fisk is one of his best friends since ninth grade, like since back in the Pickett Fence days, they go to high school together, travel to Europe together when they're just like trying to figure it out. They go to that Philly Art School together. So by 1973, which is four years before Eraserhead comes out, Jack Fisk becomes the art director on Badlands, the Terrence Malick movie, goes on to be one of the best art directors in the world. He's 80 now and still, you know, working,

but he works on Eraserhead, Straight Story, a Mulholland Drive, but he also is the art director for There Will Be Blood, Killers of the Flower Moon, Marty Supreme, the Revenant, on Killers of the Flower Moon, he builds an entire town. But he's this super talented guy that just happens to be best, friends with David Lynch and so they're like kind of feeding off of each other and um you know probably has a huge part in David Lynch's career and David Lynch has a huge part in his career. Right. I think when talking about David Lynch it's it's kind of you kind of got to bring up like

the the other cast of characters that um revolve around like Jack Fisk, uh, Angelo battle Lamenti. And then obviously all that, like Kyle McLaughlin, Laura Dern. Yeah. And you mentioned Jack Nance also, who comes back in Twin Peaks. He also has a bit part in Blue Velvet. It was a very funny line in Blue Velvet. Yeah, he's like one of Dennis Hopper's goons.

Also had a really, like, harrowingly tragic life. Yeah. Yeah. To get into all that. He relapsed on drinking and, like, ended up, like, the morning he died. Like, his friend was like, why? your eye bruised and he's like I got I got in a fight in a winchell's donut parking lot this morning and then he like goes home and apparently the whatever whoever he had gotten in a fight

with at the donut shop had like struck him in such a way that he had a brain bleed and so he died like tragically in his 50s yeah but that's that's the thing with a lot of these directed like i always like martin scorzzi uh always worked with uh felon the shoon maker uh is his like chief editor um on all of his movies. And I feel like you don't get a lot of, like, what, I mean, obviously, like, his movies would still be very special just on their own, but, like, there's so many, like, interesting people that... It's interesting to me because he's someone that always gets, like,

the absolute best out of everyone he works with. And every time, like, I see someone like Nicholas Cage and Wild at Heart or Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet, I always think, wow. I wish they worked with Lynch a lot more because he gets these, he pulls these idiosyncrasies out of people. And I think that that goes down to like production designers and like, people to make the music as well, all very talented people.

There are these anecdotes from his films where the most famous one is how they got, like the main villain in Twin Peaks is this character Bob. and like he the way that they came up with Bob is that a set dresser named Frank Silva was like on set and someone was like don't get locked in the set in Laura's room Frank and Lynch was like

oh I kind of like that idea for an image and like shot some B-roll of Silva being like being in Laura's room and then like later he was visible in a shot and they were like actually like this ruins the shot and David Lynch was like no that's actually cool like it's actually creepy and that's how the character it was just a set dresser who he liked the look of so it's like he just seems like very open to everything that's possibly happening around him so it's like yes he was lucky to be around these like very cool talented people but he's also just like amazing at like pulling things that are unexpectedly like showing you. up around him and like, you know, part of, like, making them part of the vision for the thing. I think that's what's so interesting about him is that, like, even, like, to Janey, your point,

like you consider him, like, not even like a filmmaker, but an artist, right? And a film just happens to be the medium because he doesn't even really subscribe to the same sort of filmmaking, quote, unquote, rules about anything. Because everything just feels like it's purely his own self-expression and how he ever, like, however he, however he needs to achieve it, he's going to pursue. do like doggedly. And I think that's really interesting too, because even like when the way he casts things, they're just, he's just so, I think it's pure, like, my, I was talking to my dad about

this because I'm like, hey, we're recording this episode about David Lynch. And I'm, my first memory is you sitting me down and watching Eraser Ed. And I'm like, why are you, like, why did you even think this was worth seeing? And he's like, I don't know if it was worth seeing for you, but it's, there's something about, that he really loves about David Lynch is that everything feels like a dream. to my dad. He's like, I love that it feels so different than I watch any other film that there's just the pacing, the way things are presented, the shots. It just takes you in this other frequency in terms of watching a film that it's like really hard to explain. So yeah, like hearing things like,

I don't know, dude, I like the vibe of this. It's because he's just purely thinking in terms of like the art. He's like, no, like this figure is going to help bring about the emotion I'm trying to sort have expressed through this film. And I think looking at it like that, I'm like I become even more like impressed with the way he does stuff because it just feels like I like this is just the fucking vision. I'm not even thinking in terms of like what a movie is or if this shit is weird. Like this is what I'm seeing and how I'm trying to present it.

And yeah. It's also interesting like mentioning like Kubrick again who was like notably one of the biggest like control freak. in all of cinema. Everything was so, so, like, egregiously meticulous with all of his films. And, I mean, Kubrick, I would argue, is one of the most evocative filmmakers ever. Like, I love Stanley Kubrick, but, like, it's interesting that, like, there's, like, two kind of schools of thought there. There's, like, the overt, extreme workman-like meticulousness of Stanley Coober.

Kubrick versus just like the complete abstract invert, like the abstract esotericism of David Lynch. And it's like both of them can kind of like hit your like soul in a certain way, but they come to it from very, very different perspectives. Yeah. Stanley Kubrick should have had more peanut M&Ms in his pocket is my feeling on it. Give himself little treats. We'll get to Woody Woodpecker.

Let's take a quick break. We'll come right back. We'll talk about him when he had to turn down Return of the Jedi. And the rest of his amazing career, we'll be right back. Hey, I'm Ruby Carr, the host of the podcast, Encore. Check out our brand new episodes featuring music from the show that everyone is reheating as we speak. Heated rivalry. Join me as I go behind the songs that brought Shane and Elia together.

I'll tell you the stories of Fice, My Moon, My Man, Wolf Parades, I'll Believe in Anything, and tattoos all the things she said, and how they all became a part of this global phenomenon. Stream encore on IHeart Radio, crave, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of Everyone Watches Women's Sports, a new podcast from Together and IHart Women's Sports. Because let's be real. Women's sports is giving us way too much to talk about these days. So Kelsey Finler, she became the first female solo rower to go from California to Hawaii.

My first thought is, like, what's up with the snacks? Like, what are we eating? The highlights, the rivalries, the breakout stars, the moments that take over your entire timeline. And the conversations that start during the game and somehow keep going all week. Every week, we're breaking down the biggest stories across women sports. Naomi Osaka showing out, she beat Sabalinka. Shoutouts to you, Naomi. You get the palm, Naomi.

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Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. You know us, or rather you know them. Tony and Candace, Nina and Lance, Spike, and yes, the chicken. We've played a lot of iconic characters over the years, but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia, A.O. our brand new podcast. Each week, we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning, breaking down the sketches, exploring the backstories of our most iconic characters,

revisiting the Portland locations you know and love, and opening up about our creative process. How did any of this get made? Why do we think that was a good idea? We're ready to talk about it. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guest stars, collaborators, and friends, including director Jonathan Chrysler, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin,

legendary musician Amy Mann and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song, a melody. I thought he was going to write. I thought you were all going to write a song. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia. Ayo rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My first guest is Paris Holtin, Shakira, Luke and Ierrin, Samira and Gracie. I'm so excited. on a bouncy bed. You have surprises? Many surprises. Welcome to Sweet 305 where the group chat comes to life. What a . It's like a way of a thing,

oh, my friend, oh, my her mother. Look, never have ever been to have to be a lot of nobody. Except with my kids, my children, my mom. Oof, yeah, the telenovela. Uff!

That's incredible, yeah, the telenovela. You're the only person I know that loves a Yellow Starburst. It's flammated. And no there's someone like you like to like to

this person This is Sweet 305 Listen to Sweet 305 with Lele Pons as part of my Culture Podcast Network

on the IHeartRadio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts And we're back We're back And so the next movie

That takes him from the maker of this like Midnight Cinema Arthouse classic Eraserhead

to more of the Hollywood mainstream as he makes the movie the elephant man. He directed it for producer Mel Brooks. Yes,

that Mel Brooks. The combination of the title and having Mel Brooks as a producer meant that they had to hide the fact that Mel Brooks produced it. Like they couldn't put his name on the poster. Like Mel Brooks presents the elephant man. Yeah.

Like you can just like picture. You're thinking it's going to be somebody with like an elephant trunk just like tripping over. The same thing happened with the fly. David Cronaubonabrohn. the fly he, Melbrook produced it but like they had to keep it a secret a secret because they're like

otherwise people are going to be like that's the elephant man the fly those sound like laugh riots right um but so he can David Lynch like successfully makes great

whatever he decides to to make like he so the elephant man is basically a pretty straightforward like what we think of now is like an Oscar Bate movie and it did it did have like eight nominations for Academy Awards but it's like you know the harrowing tale of somebody who like has a you know the the number one thing the academy loves is somebody who looks like shit um and uh you're sounding a little mean here though i love the elephant man no the elephant man's good i'm just saying that it's uh it does seem like it's like right

in that world of if ron howard directed the elephant man And it would be a very different movie. Ron Hart could have, and it would have sucked, but it probably would have also, like, gotten Academy Awards. You know what I mean? Like, it just in the log line only. Sure. Yeah.

I will say, I think, interestingly enough, the elephant man at the time of Lynch's passing was the only one I had not seen. And so I fixed that. And it's honestly, I don't know if it's in my top, like, tier, but it's, I, it's so good. It is such a, it really, so like, I, I kind of see it like this. Like, eraser head kind of lays out, like, the foundation of the most, like,

avant, like, spiritual, uh, esoteric vibes-based stuff. And while The Elephant Man does have a lot of, like, vibey, I hate that word, but it's, it has a lot of, like, esoteric, creepy, uh, black and white photography. it has a lot of interesting production design elements to it as well. I think what it lays out is more Lynch's connection with like the human spirit and like what it means to be like a person. And honestly, like as a trans person, the elephant man really means a lot to me because I think that the whole theme is like being wanting to be seen as human, like wanting to be seen

as just like, I'm a person, you're a person, and you're afraid of me. And that's something I've experienced as like a trans person a lot, is that like a lot of people, like, it's not necessarily that they, they hate you or it's, it's this like, ideological, like hate. It's that they're afraid of you, that, that you're different. You look different. And it's, it's that fear that, like, I don't know. Like, I don't know. Like, I, Ideology is one thing. Like, I think that ideologies can be learned and unlearned, but, like, knowing that someone has, like, a visceral fear of you

and you're just another person is just such a devastating thing. And I think that it's a really... I think it's really important to look at the elephant man because I think that it, like, kind of lays the foundation for the humanity that he would lace into, like, all of his films, like, whether it's Alvin in the straight story, or whether it's

Laura Palmer in Twin Peaks, or Laura Dern's character in Blue Velvet. Like, there's, like, this kind of, like, human goodness in everyone that he wants to, like, tap into. And I think that the elephant man is, like, that's what he's

doing there. I think it's a really beautiful film. Yeah, that's really well put. I think, I'm, I think what I was trying to express is that like, you know, when you hear, like I remember when I was a kid and I saw a abstract art, like a piece of abstract art. And I was like,

well, that would be easy to do. I could do that. And someone was like, no, that person could like draw you photo realistically. They just like choose not to and like choose to have this as like, that's what elephant man to me is like in some ways,

him proving to Hollywood at, at least. Oh, he can make, he can make your mainstream feeling movie and, like, do it in a way that is, like, beautiful and evocative. And it's just he, you know, it's, he's not just eraser head. He can make a movie that is going to be a crowd pleaser and, uh, you know, an Oscar pleaser, an academy pleaser, I guess. Yeah. This is, this is like a. Yeah.

The other thing, I just, you know, to your point, Janie, like the elephant man is just like the. grotesque other and like the fear of that. And my, again, I was talking to my dad about this, because we were also talking about, you know, Lynch doesn't have a lot of characters that aren't white.

Like, I mean, he does, but a lot of it is focused on that. And, and we were talking about like, my dad, he made a point.

He's like, he's that obviously, like a lot of his work, to your point is dealing with sort of, he draws from what he knows, which is like this darkness that, that emerges in American, white American culture.

So it's not, to say that like it's never a celebration of that at the expense of like marginalized people. He's always shining a light on the darkest spots of like the hegemonic culture. But my dad was always like, he's like, I could have really, it would have been cool to see the elephant man like almost. He's like, I viewed it as a black man as another like analog for that experience. Because I think it touches out to everybody of like that the mainstream with like, this person is an animal.

But when you look at the people who are calling the elephant. elephant man the animal they themselves are the ones actually behaving in the least human way possible and that sort of like mirror image I think is like really interesting but that was like yeah my dad was like he's like the elephant man could have been black that would have been wild and I was like well it's a metaphor

he's like but imagine and I was like I like yeah I like the idea of someone as like a hotel they're like the elephant man was black yeah yeah like he's like oh no no no we don't realize John Merrick no no that John Merrick was black He was black as Beethoven. But shout out to Melbrae.

Lynch assumed he wouldn't get the job for directing the elephant man. And because Brooks was like, hey, can I see Eraserhead? Could you like screen it for me? Because it's hard to get. And he watched it and came out and gave him a big hug and said, you're a madman. I love you. Which Eraserhead like works so well for so much like for being a thing,

a movie about a person who, allergic to every moment of their life and like get so mad at their horrific mutant baby that they stab it to death but it's just like man this guys those images get a load of that huh uh so elephant man ends up getting eight Oscar nominations including best director and now people are like well shit this is our next big director uh the offers that he uh is entertaining at this time include Halloween 2, fast times at Ridgemont High. Oh my God. He even met with Cameron Crow, which the most famous scene does involve a voyeuristic dream and

sexual compulsion. That is true. Imagine what that would have looked like. I know. The David Lynchian, Phoebe Kate's emerging from the pool. Yeah. The big one is he turns down an offer to direct return of the Jedi. The story of him meeting with George Lucas is pretty funny because,

George, like, invited him over. And it seems like from the jump, he was uninterested because he was saying, like, George, like, this is your baby. Like, this is your thing. Like, you should, you should want to do this. This is your mutant baby. I don't know if this is his perspective or George Lucas has came out and said this, but I kind of think this is true. I don't think George Lucas likes directing really very much. Like, like, he likes his weird little world, but I don't think he likes the actual.

process of directing and that's why he didn't he only directed what four of the Star Wars movies the prequels and the first one and David Lynch was he was like he brought me in and he showed me these things called wookies I mean he seems like

he got a physical he got a migraine when he tried to describe a wookie dude that's like how I feel I this is a diversion but I had like a co-worker showing me like how she's really into like Grogu and the Mandalorian and stuff. And I literally, I was like, oh my God.

I didn't know people were still this immersed in like Disney Slop Wars stuff. Like, oh my God. He was seeing a vision of like what was to come with like Star Wars and Disney and like and probably just couldn't take it. Yeah. I didn't think you saw both the ways too. Like also as an artist, he's like, dude, this is holy your vision. Like you don't want me.

You actually don't need me to do this. so wookies, bro? No, come on, man. Do you see the other shit I've been working on? So instead he did Dune, which is what,

you know, what George Lucas plundered for a lot of Star Wars imagery and a lot of the ideas in Star Wars. And, you know, it's, mileage may vary.

It's not one of his most well-received movies. And I think he thinks of it as a failure. It's the only one that does not have a, that he does not, have a director's cut of. And I think for that reason, he considers it a failure.

Because he does not get to see his full vision. That, and it's the only one that has so, like, the studios just molested that thing. And it's, yeah, they took it away from him. I mean, you can't fucking do, like, you can do that with, like, I don't know, like, you can do that now with any director with any property. But, like, back then, it's like, you, like, I don't know. got to let the artist cook. They weren't letting him cook.

So, yeah. Specifically him. And, like, he had such a specific vision. They took it away from him, edited it, like, down to the point that it was so confusing that the studio literally had to send, uh, Dune terminology cheat sheets to theaters. So the audience could, like, try and figure out what the fuck was happening. And it's like, it's in fine print, too. Yeah.

Yeah. I would argue the first half of the film is, is solid. It's not, it's far from his best work, but the production design is incredible. I like a lot of the ideas,

presence in it, and it's really when it gets to the siege, and I've read Dune, and like, it's, it completely falls apart. Once it gets to,

like, the second half, when they get to the siege, it's, it's, I wouldn't say it's, like, unwatchable, but it's,

I, I'd put it at best, It is a interesting curiosity with a lot of cool little flourishes here and there. But it's far from like a seminal David Lynch work. I love that. That's like the most skeathing you can get about Lynch's work, Janie. You're like, it's, he's my guy. I laid my heart on the table.

He's my guy. I'll comfortably call it his worst movie. I will say that. They came in like heading into the release of the movie, there were like there was a Star Wars ask merchandising push. They had action figures, kids coloring books. I want to get my hands on all of that.

That sounds awesome. Yeah. And it just, you know, it flopped. And thank God it did because he, his next movie,

he had already written Blue Velvet. And he, Dune was important because he met Kyle McLaughlin on Dune. And he, the producer on Dune

was Dino D'Larentus. who was like, yeah, I'll let you actually direct blue velvet and give you total artistic freedom. If you just like cut the budget way, way down, he met with a producer who was like, you could actually do this for $4 million. Like, lokey, don't tell anybody. And so he was like, yeah, sure. So they did it. He made it, got complete artistic freedom. and as mentioned, it became like a cultural phenomenon.

It seems to be informed by, like, it seems to be the dark side of the pre-Philadelphia part of his life, like the, you know, white picket fences and stuff like that. Mm-hmm. He says that the scene in which Dorothy wanders down the street naked and hurt in search of Jeffrey came from a formative incident from his youth in which a naked woman who had clearly been attacked came out onto the street. Um, and he, yeah, when he's playing with his friends. It's in that, have you seen that documentary where it's like, I think it's called like the art life where it's all lynch narrating it. Yeah. Like the way he describes that was is really harrowing. Cause he's like, like, you know, talks about how at the same time every night he could remember his dad calling for him and his brother to come in like from playing outside. And he said it was around that time. But he just could never shake like this image of this like naked, bloodied woman. And it's also interesting. too, like how much of that sort of like the Kyle McLaughlin character sort of represents Lynch in that point too because he just said how small his world was because he like had this sort of picturesque life. And then like these moments would happen that would like violently expand

it and make him more aware of like how large the world was and how little he knew about it. Yeah. Blue Velvet's one that really, um, I mentioned how I watched it when I was younger and I was like, okay, I like that more, but I'm still not like, still not hitting me. I've watched it maybe five, six times, I guess total. Every time I like it more and every time I get more out of it. And I really think that it's a movie that you do get more out of the older you are. Because it's, it's very much about like growing, like a young person who's just sees like a little bit of how evil and rotten the world is and the like the kind of like like not being able to like put that genie back in the bottle not being able to like unsee how the fucking sick this whole world is yeah yeah

can't put that ear back in the paper bag yeah the the monologue that uh laura durn gives about like the dream she has where there's like birds everywhere the robins yeah the robins like yeah yeah it's one of the most beautiful things to me. Like, I just, yeah, I think it's a really, and it's also very interesting, like, the kind of, like, dichotomy between, um, Kyle McLaughlin as, like,

a, uh, ostensibly, like, a good kid who's, like, going down into a bad world. And Dennis Hopper, who's one of the most evil, terrifying people ever, but has a lot of,

like, weird kind of, like, it's almost like he has, like, something, in him that wants to be good or that wants to like have a part of like innocence again. And I think that's, you, you see that in scenes where like they're singing and he starts like, like crying. But then he's like, no, fuck that, fuck this.

Yeah, yeah, right. Because he's like trying to like, you're like, no, like it's, it's a bad world. I'm going to be hard and tough. And it's like they're both kind of wanting to go. So, like, Kyle McLaughlin wants to get, like, Jeffrey, he wants to get more evil, in a sense. And because he doesn't really get involved with this to actually help anyone. He gets involved with this because it's cool. It's cool to look at.

Yeah. Like, it's voyeurism. Yeah. And it's like puncturing the myth. Like, it's, you know, this, this version of reality that, like, the suburbs puts in front of you. And then you have a sense is bullshit. and then you just have these little things that like punch through like a fucking severed year or yeah um it's did did either of you have the the like lynchian like blue velvet like we we had uh dogs in our

neighborhood that started getting like shot uh what when we when i was i was growing up like that like that always anytime i watch blue velvet i'm like reminded of this one neighborhood we lived in and like that they were just like it was kind of idyllic but then like these like dark fucking things would happen um that i don't know did you guys ever have like weird blue velvet things like that i don't know i mean i was an only child so when i wasn't like watching movies or like spending all my time on like my space or whatever um or watching internet porn i was uh fucking And I was just like walking through. I lived like right by a high school.

Um, and I would just like walk and honestly, wow, this is kind of weird. I would notice like all like the, the teenagers like going, going to school. Like it's like the early 2000.

I'm fucking, I'm all new metal and shit. And I would just like watch them like smoking weed from afar and shit. Yeah. I guess it was kind of very voyeuristic in a sense because like, I was just like watching these. people's lives on like a little 10 year old like yeah yeah as you saw a dead body yeah i mean it's interesting because like where i grew up in north hollywood it wasn't like you know sort of that

picture like that sort of yeah that suburb yeah version of it but it's you know the valleys like you know it is like a suburb but still very like urban you grow up in more mollhollen drive then at the edge yeah i mean like more like yeah we're like right at the foot of the like like we're like molland drive would be like you know straight up the hill that i could see but yeah i mean like i would say probably like that time i did see a dead like that's sort of like those moments where you're like what yeah like a dead a dead body right there at the park and having to be like wait that's right like there this is life like the people die and it's in proximity to you except most of the time you just don't know about it that's fucking crazy yeah um

anyway there's this s nl sketch where Dennis hopper like hosted SNL in 1987. And there's a whole sketch about Frank Booth hosting a game show called What's That Smell, where everyone just keeps putting the masks on? Really, like, clear crystallized for me how much of a mainstream thing that this movie was, that they were like doing SNL riffs on the scene where he keeps hitting the gas mask and saying, mommy, mommy, baby wants to fuck. Yeah, that's fucking crazy.

What was he hitting out of that mask? Okay. I do know the answer to this. Great. So I believe canonically, David Lynch, he originally wanted it to be helium. And that plays in with Frank Booth having sort of like an age regression thing. Right. You know, mommy, baby, daddy.

Like, he has a very clear age regression, which kind of ties in with the like loss of innocence theme and all that. But when Dennis Hopper was reading it, he thought he would like hit it and his voice would go high and squeaky. Right. He was like, David, this isn't going to work, man. This isn't going to work, man.

This should be like amyl nitrate or like ether or something. And David's like, what's that? The only way I was sucking helium out of balloons. Right, right, right. So, and I mean, it's weird. I kind of see both schools the thought. I see where Lynch is coming from

with it being like an age regression thing. If he hit that and started doing a fucking chipmunk voice. I know, right? Could you imagine? That would also imagine. Yeah, totally. And he does like change his voice when he hits it, but it's not to that degree. Amyl nitrate does also kind of lower your voice a little bit. It stretches your vocal cords.

But it's interesting because like, yeah, I see both schools of thought, but I kind of side with Dennis Hopper a little bit because he's like old school 60s, like, easy rider, drugs, all that. Like, he's done probably every drug under the sun. He was literally teaching David Lynch about drugs. And that I think that that would make more sense for, like, a hardened criminal to, like, have, you know, to be doing a real drug. But it's kind of both worlds.

Yeah. Yeah. It's not fully weird where it's a weird drug in a weird way. It's an actual drug doing it in a weird ass way. carrying around this tank and all that. It's like the effect is the same as that like it's a gateway for him to go deeper into his regression and like just sort of fully, you know, release, relinquish control to like that impulse. But it also, there is something baller about having like a mini tank and like a fucking respirator mask for your inhaled drugs. Yeah.

He just pulls it out of a real slick like, hold on. Yeah. That's how I felt when like people started like, uh, Whenever, like, dabs and, like, early vapes and stuff, like, came out, like, like, the first time I was, like, going to smoke weed with someone and they had, like, one of those, like, wall plug-in vaporizers. I was like, brother, what the hell's got? Like, literally, I was like, is a future? Yeah, am I hanging out with Frank Booth? Like, what's going on here?

Yeah. People have speculated that Blue Velvet was such a hit because it's, like, the ultimate Reagan era movie where it's, like, got the, boomer nostalgia for 1950s Americana and Lynch was actually a Reagan fan kind of like his politics have like kind of been all over the place but um

I think his genuine affection for the world of you know the 50s Americana thing and then like showing the dark on it like it that that just like makes it realer that he like comes

from that um and like that it's like embedded in childhood and you know just how how natural and real that is to him you can like kind of feel it but it it does just like trying to explain why any of his shit is successful it's like it's just these images that come from out like the way he the first images he had for blue velvet were I see a severed ear with ants crawling all over it and then he said I've always wanted to hide in a woman's closet. Those are the first two things that came to them. And then, like, from that, the whole movie unfurls. Or, like, the red room from Twin Peaks. He was, like, trying to figure out how to end the show and, or end a season or an episode. And he touched a hot car door.

Yeah, he touched a hot car door. And, like, the red room just popped in his mind. And he's like, that's, yeah. Lost Highway, the first image is the idea of someone sending you a videotape of yourself. Probably his scariest movie, honestly. Yeah, that's fucking terrifying. Yeah. But it just feels like there are these images that bubble out of his unconscious mind that he just knows which ones are going to hit with people, you know?

Right. Yeah. Let's take another break and we'll come back and we'll talk twin Pete. and Mahal and Drive. I'm Ruby Carr, the host of the podcast, Encore. Check out our brand new episodes featuring music from the show that everyone is reheating as we speak. Heated rivalry.

Join me as I go behind the songs that brought Shane and Elia together. I'll tell you the stories of Fice, My Moon, My Man, wolf parades, I'll believe in anything, and tattoos all the things she said, and how they all became a part of this global phenomenon. stream encore on IHeart Radio, crave, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam?

I'm sports journalist Ari Chambers. Hey, what's up, y'all? It's your girl, Sam J. And we're the host of everyone watches women's sports, a new podcast from Together and Iheart women's sports. Because let's be real. Women's sports is giving us way too much to talk about these days. So Kelsey Finler,

she became the first female solo rower to go from California to Hawaii. My first thought is, like, what's up with the snacks? Like, what are we eating? The highlights, the rivalries, the breakout stars, the moments that take over your entire timeline. And the conversations that start during the game and somehow keep going all week.

Every week, we're breaking down the biggest stories across women's sports. Naomi Osaka showing out, she beat. Sabalinka. Shout out to you, Naomi. You get the palm, Naomi. You get the palm for that. Because we're not just interested in what happened.

We're interested in why everyone's talking about it. Because everyone watches women's sports. Listen to everyone watches women's sports. Sports on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, Portlandia fans. Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen here. You know us, or rather, you know them. Tony and Candice, Nina and Lance, Spike, and yes, the chicken.

We've played a lot of iconic characters over the years, but today we're showing up as ourselves to tell you about Podlandia, AEO, rewatch, our brand new podcast. Each week, we'll revisit an episode of Portlandia from the very beginning, breaking down the sketches, exploring the backstories of our most iconic characters, Revisiting the Portland locations you know and love and opening up about our creative process. How did any of this get made? Why do we think that was a good idea? We're ready to talk about it. And we'll also be joined by the people who helped bring it all to life. Guestores, collaborators and friends, including director Jonathan Chrysall, the mayor himself, Kyle McLaughlin,

legendary musician Amy Mann, and many more. Kyle is going for it here. You fully improvised, not just words, but a song, a melody. Well, I thought he was going to write. I thought you were all. going to write a song. I remember you thinking that. Listen to Podlandia. Ayo rewatch on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My first guest is Paris Hocon, Shakira, Luke and Yerrin, Samira, and Gracie.

I'm so excited. On the bouncy bed. You have surprises. Many surprises. Welcome to Sweet 305, where the group chat comes to life. What a fuck. It's like a way. like a way of saying like,

oh, my friend, oh, my best friend, oh, my brother, what are! Look, I never have I've evered to have to be able to have nobody, except with my my children, my mom. Uff!

That's incredible! Yeah, the telenovela! You're the only person I know that loves the Yellow Starburst. It's really, I'm a lady that's like you'd like to collaborate with this person. This is Sweet 305.

Listen to Sweet 305. with Lele Pons as part of my Coulthura Podcast Network on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. We're back. And so Twin Peaks is, I think, the

ultimate magic trick of what we've been talking about, of David Lynch being the maker of these very strange surreal works of art that go mainstream. And it starts with he meets the co-creator of the show Mark Frost.

They begin working on an adaptation of a Marilyn Monroe tell-all. The book alleges the Kennedy is we're behind her death. They pitch it to United Artists who reject it because Ethel Kennedy was on their board of directors. Wow. So shout out to nepotism because it gave us, indirectly gave us Twin Peaks. There is a lot about the Marilyn Monroe story in Twin Peaks. It's like a beautiful blonde character exploited by Powerful. men who died she dies tragically

that definitely informs the Lara Palmer story but it's conceived as a murder mystery with no solution by Lynch he's like we don't ever have to solve it and Frost is like we probably should eventually he's like no that's like your opinion man

so and Lynch is right and Lynch is absolutely right so ABC makes this out of desperation they have just been in dead last of the three networks for years. And they meet with network executives. The network executives say,

now we've got a few thoughts. You want to hear them? And Lynch just goes, no. No. And they put their notes back in their pocket. And that's it for the network notes on Twin Peaks. As mentioned, this highly collaborative improvisational process where, like,

he's like, I don't know, I like the look of our set. dresser, let's make him the main villain of the movie. And so he's like grabbing these amazing shots. And ABC is thinking about

taking a six figure loss by airing the pilot without commercials because they don't think that viewers have the patience for watching it for two straight hours. But like just think about they were thinking about just being like no ads because we

believe so much in this. We used to be a fucking country. The pilot is watched by 30, goes up against Cheers and is watched by 36 million people. Wow. Cheers is the number one show of the decade at the time

gets 20 million. That's also very bleak. Yeah, that Cheers was the number one show. Who the fuck talks about Cheers? Like, I loved them some cheer. It's like, Cheers and Cosby show are like the number one show.

at the time and they're like, how about Twin Peaks instead? And the pilot gets 36 million people to watch it. Yeah. Which, by comparison, today, like the top TV show last year was something called Tracker on CBS that average 16 million viewers per episode. So this is a time of monoculture and the monoculture all tuned into fucking Twin Peaks. and this is the show does like

slowly by slowly decline and then very suddenly declines when fucking Bob Iger is like you have to solve the you have to tell people who killed Laura Palmer and that basically kills the show

Bob Iger has said looking back on it now I'm not convinced I was right oh no way Robert I'm not convinced I was right is just such what a top-notch CEO

Brayette admit nothing keep moving forward with supreme confidence yeah I'm not convinced someone in a C-suite takes an L

public yeah exactly I'm not convinced I wasn't this is when David Lynch is on the cover of Time magazine like this this breaks him like people are like holy shit

this guy made the number one TV show and it's like very I mean it's a soap opera but it's also got very weird David Lynch shit in it yeah I'm really glad that was like when I was taking notes this morning. The context of Twin Peaks is something I like put in bold because I

think that like it's really really important. Twin Peaks stands on its own as a great piece of art. Again, bold statement, I would argue it's easily the best piece of televised media ever. But the context is really, really important because not just like what the studio medallel and all that, but, like, David Lynch's idea was that, like, he noticed how, like, on TV broadcasted to everyone's homes was violence and sex and dead bodies, and then two people would come in and be like, that's the killer, send them to jail, and then you go to sleep. And it's really, like, not dissimilar from the way that we consume fucking all content now,

Instagram Reels, TikTok, whatever, and shit, even a lot of movies and stuff too. He saw the medium as being pornographied, and he saw a promise in the medium that it could actually be something artful and beautiful. And he wanted to make this story about like a murder mystery like any other show. but instead of, you know, wrapping it up neatly so you can go to bed, he wanted you to get to know these people and know, like, why this murdered person, like, how it affected their lives. And, like, that's why in the first episode, there's a long fucking sequence of, like, they find Laura Palmer, and then it's just everyone in the town reacting,

that one iconic image of Maddie, like, oh, like crying, and James, like, slunching over. and like how all these people reacts and this whole little community and how like there it was meant to just be like this like labyrinthine thing where like as much as you try to learn the less you actually know because it's more about like the humanity of these people and he was like robbed of his promise that was like his baby that was like his thing that like it like i don't want to sound like too uh woo-woo about it but that was like his gift, like, to the medium and to, like, the people. And they rejected it and they robbed him of it in a very, like, classic, capitalistic, greedy, not understanding art fashion. And then after he leaves the show, he stays until they find out who killed Laura Palmer. You find out big surprise, no one cares about the show anymore.

or we have a bunch of weird stuff with like James and some bitch and the Civil War and it's it gets really crazy. Yeah. And it's like forcing an ending on somebody who's like has that holistic of a vision. You're fucking up the like it's going to feel false to the people who are watching it. Like obviously Bob Eager doesn't respect audiences enough to be like, well, they'll sense like a disturbance in the force of this fictional universe that was like conceived not to have an answer to it. but, you know, that is what's happening. We'll turn Josie into a doorknob and everyone will clap.

He comes back for the last two episodes with Windham Earl and Annie, Heather Graham, love her. And it's a night and day difference from the previous, like, 18 or so episodes of just, like, junk food that, like, Lynch is back. and he's like course-correcting it by starting the other mystery when Kyle or when Agent Cooper goes into the Black Lodge to save Annie. It doesn't work. He smashes his head on the window and Evil Cooper is burst into the world. And that was kind of his way of like being like, okay, I'm going to try again to course correct this thing and people hated it. And then he gave it one last chance when he went to make Firewalk with me, which a lot of people were excited about because they're finally going to get the answers to all these questions. And once again, he's trying to show you, like, this is what I want.

Like, this is what this is about. And they booed him at the Con Film Festival, which I think was very upsetting to him. And Firewalk with me is looked upon very fondly now, but I think that getting booed for, like, making this incredibly, like, human thing. And another thing, I'm sorry, I'm going on for a while, but, like, Firewalk with me was notably, like, a very, like, harrowing thing, like, especially going from, like, the limits of TV

and what you can show on ABC to, like, having, like, full-on depictions of like incest and violence and murder and rape and all this awful, awful stuff seeing happen to this character that, that we've all come to love. It's just like a lot of people were very offended by it and they booed it for that reason. But Lynch recalls that in the months and years onward he would get letters from people who had survived abuse like that. like abuse from like their parents and like the worst kind of abuse that people can suffer and they would say this is the first time I ever felt seen this is like the first time I ever felt like um someone like cared about like my experience of yeah and um yeah I think that's really fucking beautiful and uh and and

then the return and all that I won't get into that now but like I think it's cool that like his promise did reach certain people. Yeah. And then he got to, yeah, come back, make the, like, ending of the show that he wanted to make and get, like, Showtime was trying to, like, cut the budget. And he was just like, okay, I quit on Twitter. And he was like, go ahead and do it without me. And then they came back and they were like, all right, whatever you want.

But, yeah, they wrote the entire, you know, however many episodes of the return. One of the funniest things about the return to me, which is a whole chestnut. I'll try to spare myself. But like, the return, if you end it on the second to last episode, you've more or less got a happy ending with a lot of questions answered. But it has one more episode. And if you play that one more episode, it does it all over again.

And I think that's such a cool trick. Like, it literally like opens everything up. It leaves you feeling gutted and empty. And it's like the very nature of it having that one episode. Like you could choose to end it. You can get the closure you want right there and walk away, but you don't want to. You want that one last episode.

And that's what twists everything. And that's so fucking cool to me. Yeah. I'd say the argument between, like, Lynchheads is like, is his greatest masterpiece, you know, Twin Peaks the Return or Mulholland Drive. And so after Twin Peaks, he goes on to make a bunch of movies. The last movie he makes before Mulholland Drive is The Straight Story, which I finally, that was the one that I hadn't seen until last night, watched it with my kids,

was initially like, how is this going to be a movie? He's just riding a lawnmower, but it is a blast. And it does have, like, everyone's like it's his weirdest movie because of, of how down the middle it is. It does have like, one of its best moments has a character from another David Lynch movie, kind of,

like the woman who comes in who's like, I can't stop hitting deer in my car. It's so weird. She's like, this is the seventh deer I've hit in the past six weeks. And it also just has like some of the darkest moments in a G rate. Like the main character reveals he was a World War II sniper who like, accidentally shot his best friend and never told anyone until this moment.

My kids were like, damn. Wow. But not really good. Also the scene when his lawnmower is like going down the hill and it's like going out of control and the camera gets all like shaky. Yeah. He keeps like zoomed in on his face. Yeah.

That felt like his one of his commercial. Like he had like a Nike commercial around the time. He directed a bunch of commercials that I remembered that I was like, Why do the images from this commercial stick so much in my head? Like the obsession, Calvin Klein, I think. Yeah, the fragrance. Also the Chris Isaac's Wicked Game video. Do you all remember that one?

Yeah, David Lynch. Is an firewalk with me. Yes. One of the detectives that goes missing. So, Mulholland Drive has been named the best film of the century in a BBC poll of film critics. And as far as I can tell, it's the only film on the list that co-stars Billy Ray Cyrus. I do just want to stop for a second to talk about Billy Ray Cyrus because he, the year

before Mahal and Drive, he starred in a movie called Radical Jack that I never watched, but always had the DVD. Adding that to my watch list right now. I was trying to make the nickname happen. It never quite worked out, but. You had a square root symbol on your T-shirt. far as I can tell that movie did not make the list of the BBC film critic poll. But Billy Ray Cyrus went on to blame David Lynch for bringing him to Hollywood with a dream and a cardigan.

He was, and like his marriage broke up. This is like his marriage broke up and Miley Cyrus had just like gone on YouTube and hit a bong. And he was like, Satan's tempting my family. And he said direct quote, were it not for David Lynch, Miley never would have been Hannah Montana. But I just laid out a timeline. Radical Jack was a year before. So he was trying to break it.

David Lynch just let him do what he was already trying to do. Also, Hannah Montana, like loosely the plot about a woman with like two identities. Yeah, kind of a Laura Palmer like, you know, the plot of Mahal and Drive, like two identities. Yes, yes. People recognize are the same person in a sort of surrealist lynchian way. Absolutely. So Mulholland Drive is a TV show initially.

It's a TV pilot. ABC's like, let's go. Let's do it again. Let's make the next Twin Peaks. The pilot, they make a 90-minute pilot. It is not picked up. Instead, the time slot goes to Wasteland, which is a show from the creator of Dawson's Creek.

It's like his follow-up to Dawson's Creek about like 20-somethings moving to New York and it's canceled after three episodes. Oh, a show about a bunch of 20-somethings living in New York? What an idea? What? So then they're like,

what about turning this into a feature film? And he's initially, Lynch is initially interested and then changes his mind once he learns that the sets had been, damaged and the props and costumes were all lost. Like they had just immediately thrown them out. I guess they were so certain that they were not going to do this series. They were like, yeah, man, we're all real excited as they're like throwing the costumes like into a dumpster.

One of the producers who put the deal together decided that Lynch was being a baby and convinced Disney to threaten to sue him if he backed out of making it into a feature film. So this is a quote from him. The same night, Tony said that to me. I sit down to meditate and like a string of pearls, one idea after another came along. And when I finished meditating, I knew exactly how to finish the film. Wow.

Like a string of per. He's just like plugged into the tap root at like such a deep level. It's just like, it's so crazy. Because he's just not thinking in, like in filmmaking terms. I think that's what's really interesting about him. He's like there's just this other level of creativity.

that he just sort of like filmmaking just happens to be the medium for that expression. Like that's why I think that process is so interesting. Like transcendental meditation and be like, yeah, I got past my rush. I don't have writers block. I just need to meditate deeper and go into my subconscious to figure out what it is. But yeah. So the way he solves the problem that like all the costumes and sets are broken is that like the twist in the third act is that the reality we were in up to that point was some kind of

dream and our protagonist is in an entirely different world, um, and though elements of her life like blurred into the earlier stuff we saw it. And it's like not that clear. It's not she doesn't like wake up and say, oh, it was all the dream, you know,

sure, but it's, you have to, yeah, read into it. I think that honestly saying that context is, is very interesting too because like the, the meddling,

uh, around Mulholland Drive is similar to like the meddling around, uh, Twin Peaks. Yeah. Kind of like in a meadow way, like enforces the story because Mahal and Drive is like very, Malam Drive and the Inland Empire and Lost Highway too, really, are about like the like evils of like Hollywood and like the promises of, I mean, it's similar with like all the other stuff,

like blue velvet's like the promise of like the 50s and the idyllisism of that. And then Mahon Drive is like that with Hollywood and with. dreams and like what people, like how you see this vision of your life. And one thing I've noticed like going through this, there's a few casual things you've mentioned, like Twin Peaks airing the same time as the Cosby Show. And one thing I found when like the straight story lost, Richard Farnsworth would have been the oldest best actor Oscar winner ever.

And he lost it to Kevin Spacey for American Beauty. and it seems like... American Beauty, by the way, was a movie that David Lynch was in talks to direct at a certain point. I could see that. I could see that 100%. And that would have made it a good movie.

But like, it's one of the most evil movies ever. And this is like something that I find very interesting is that like he's had this like proximity to evil. His whole career. And in Lost Highway too, like he cast Robert Blake because Robert Blake gave him a bad vibe. Robert Blake murdered his wife. Yeah.

Like, right by my house. In a restaurant, Vitello's. Yeah, it's like, it literally like it's, I were to believe in like spiritual stuff like that, which I kind of do a little bit maybe. I feel like he's someone who's just like tapped into something else. Yeah. Exactly.

And I think that like Mahal and Drive is like the pinnacle of that, like showing like how. there's all these evil, powerful forces that's just like coming in, going out, like just like the cowboy or the people who are controlling the movie. Like this is no longer your film. All of that is like it's about these things that you cannot control.

As an artist, as a woman, as a human being, as an American, there is a demon behind Winkies and it's fucking real and it will get you. And I it's it kicks ass Molland Drive is one quick thing like the reason Like my quick like elevator pitch reason for why I always say it's my favorite movie

Is because it's everything it's everything you want in a movie It is hilarious it is terrifying It is sexy it has action drama you laugh you cry And to me that's motherfucking cinema baby Yeah, it is a motherfuckerin' cinema baby I just yeah I don't have enough night things to say about it. Yeah.

I've never laughed more at a hit gone wrong. It's something made me bad. It's so funny. Hey, I need help, bro. You got to come here and call the ambulance. You gotta come here and help me. It's literally like the Cnacious D bit where he's like, come over here so I can stab you. It's so awesome.

Speaking of proximity to evil and lost highway. So David Lynch very rarely talks about his movies. two exceptions are he made a list of 10 clues to unlocking this thriller for the French market from a Holland Drive. And a lot of people are like, this is fucked up that they like made him do this and then like took it out of contact. He thought it would only be in France and then the internet happened. And the clues are like notice appearances of the red lampshade. And like these these things that are corny and like, but at the same time, I do think every director should at least have the option to put out a list of like 10 cryptic clues to like throw out there to like

because this doesn't ruin the movie at all to me. I think it's like cool to hear him be like, hey, here's a here's what I was thinking about when I was making this. Like, you know, it's, well, one, it's also very possible it could be some sort of red herring maybe. Also, I think it ties in with his, um, something else I wanted to mention his, uh, early pioneering of like digital media and like like the mohalan drive like predates david lynch dot com by like a year and that was when he started doing a lot of like kind of fun and sometimes like interactive stuff on that website and there's a lot of cool videos still up there the famous one of him with the panties in his mouth icon absolutely but uh yeah he basically invented patreon yeah seriously yeah the mohalan drive

uh clues it's like an argy you know it's like interactive And I think that that's like another like interesting use of the medium as like like making like ARGs and like interactive media. It's cool. But one of the other exception where he like usually is like the movie is the talking. Why would I talk about my movie? Yeah. But he did explain that the plot for Lost Highway was inspired by seeing O.J. Simpson golfing during his murder trial. He was like, whoa.

Wow. It's fucking weird. How do you get to that mind? mindset. Because Lost Highway is also about someone who has like a completely bifurcated reality. Yeah, exactly. It's a psychopath that like kills his wife and then imagines like, what if I was just some young hot shot in the 50s? Right, right, right. Yeah. And also, so the fucking soundtrack on that shit, nine inch nails and Romstein, crazy. Crazy stuff. Like we said, music, don't worry. You're also in cinema. so you're part of this um but yeah i don't know in terms of like david lynch the person like he's he's uh

supposedly like very pleasant or was very pleasant very kind um very cooperative and there's like all just like so many fun little anecdotes like he smoked everywhere he went but would keep a a fire extinguisher with him to like his to make sure that nothing happened and like uh to to get people to not fuck with him when he was smoking indoors in a non-smoking area. That's awesome. A real snack ho. In addition to the M&M peanuts, his only request on the set of the fablemans

was Cheetos. And when asked why by Empire Magazine, he said, any chance I can, I get them. But I know that they're not exactly health food. So when I do leave the house and I get a chance to, but I don't get them that often, honestly. If I do get them, I want a big back. Because once you start, you need to have a lot before you could slow down and actually stop.

Otherwise, with a small bag, then you'd be prowling for days to find more. It's incredible flavor. That was his pitch for a Pringles commercial. Once you start the bag, you can't. About once you pop, you can't stop. That's me as a Coke dealer. Right. You'll be picking through the carpet for days when this bag is done.

you'll be licking the bag folks um but he's he's like said some of my favorite thing like just hearing him describe tuna with soy sauce or like sandwiches or coffee he's like so he just like really enjoys things um right you know uh he said that he started drinking coffee when he was three and started smoking at age eight oh pierre he said he pictured him as like a nine year old Eagle Scout trying to get a cup of coffee. And he lived in his 80s, I mean,

come on. Yeah. He was, so my mom's a film critic and she, you know, had interviewed David Lynch like a number, like many,

many times. And she was always like he's, my mom would always say like she's, he was one of her favorite people to interview because he always remembered my mom because they have the same birthday. He's like older by one year. And so he would always be like,

it's my birthday twin. And like they, they were like very friendly. And so I also, it's crazy, right? So yesterday I texted my mom. I was like,

hey, we're doing an episode about David Lynch. And like, I'm curious like what, like what your thoughts are just based on you being a film critic or whatever. And the craziest part was she was on her way to her like colleague who had just written a book about David Lynch like yesterday. She's like,

it's crazy because I'm going to a book signing from. my colleague who wrote a book about, it's called The Dreamers Path. It was about David Lynch wanting to act. But this person was a film critic who also like interviewed David Lynch a bunch. And I was just like, wow, what fucking timing? But I was just like, what was it for you? And she was just like, the answer is that he wanted to express himself, the different side of himself. He knew his image as a director, which came with some connotations, was rather limited, like a rather limited side of himself. But she said the reason why I like his work is that he always tried to stir up some dark, mysterious, unconscious side of us where unless you were

urged, you don't go and made us think, do we do that? Do we have the hidden darkness like that? And challenge you to delve into yourself. Wow. And so it's just interesting. He's sort of like ambiently around everywhere, but it's like my mom who doesn't usually like sort of lynchian type films, even for her, like it's one of those things where she's like, it's just this like fucking wake up call. Like it's drawing to the point that you you have to confront these things, but you're grateful that it's done in this beautiful cinematic way, like in a medium that, like, really gets you to fucking see it without

being too, too vague, you know? Yeah. Um, did she mention the Woody Webpacker stuffies at any point in her explanation? She did not. She did not. I do just want to, well, we'll close with this anecdote. Yes. He bought five Woody Woodpecker stuffies from a gas station in 1981, named them, referring to them as his boys. So he said, I screech on the brakes. I do a U-turn, go back, and I buy them, and I save their lives. I named them Chucko, Buster, Pete, Bob, and Dan, and they were my boys, and they were in my office.

They were my dear friends for a while, but certain traits started coming out, and they became not so nice. that he looks straight ahead and adds with grim finality they are not in my life anymore um David Lynch

yeah I mean when you reached out to me about this like there was a handful of people like I said like Lynch was just like the obvious choice he's he's my guy but also like you said like icons and it's like I mean

I don't know like I feel like there's directors don't always get a lot of shine unless it's like skill for maybe sports say he's done. Yeah. Oh really? Yeah.

But I think he's probably the most iconic direct. Like he's yeah. Like they're because there's something so evocative that is like when someone says lynchian, I mean, they say that about other directors. Yeah. But when somebody says Lynchian,

you know exactly what they're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. And plus yeah. And speaking of like you need a trademark. Look, bro. God damn. That hair. Straight up. Straight up.

Amazing head of hair. Always took a good picture. It has so many funny little, like the one of them, like, pointing at the camera and, like, this, yeah, the hair, the cigarettes, all of it. He had a hair with a cigarette, always. Yeah. The Cleveland Show. I mean. Yeah, he was a character in 22 of the 88 episodes of the Cleveland show.

Gus, the Bartender. Played a bartender. It's so funny. There's actually a really, I was, like, watching clips of it. And there was a funny one where he's like, this is my work. workout tape and it cuts like a tape and it's like a first person camera like following a woman. He's like, come back here. You don't want to know what happens if I get you. And she's like running. That's his workout tape. That's very funny. That's so funny. Yeah. I mean his his like you like you were saying,

you know, kind of invented Patreon and like did the the weather reports. He like, can you believe it? Just all around. Cooking quinoa. I icon. Like, yeah, yeah, and that's what I want to say is like,

he's someone that like, even people who, like, don't like his movies or haven't watched his movies, they are familiar with him as a person, at least. And I think a lot of people, like, get pleasure out of just, like,

his, like, folksy mannerisms and, like, um, yeah, it's just someone that, like, I feel like, is just a very, likeable,

universally pretty beloved person. person even if like some people don't get up because even the people that don't get it you know you can't deny charm you can't deny aura yes incredible aura and also just like great to have somebody who is like makes fucked up challenging like undeniable movies and is like not like everyone's like he's really nice like kind and like pleasant to be around yeah so uh janey Danger, such a pleasure having you on for those episodes. Thanks so much. This is awesome. Where can people find you, follow you all that good stuff?

Yeah, I got banned from Instagram, so you got to find my new one. It's God's Perfect Victim on Instagram. That's my new Instagram. I don't know what happened, but yeah, Janie Danger is the music. And I don't know if I've said this too publicly yet. So semi-world premiere for the Daily Ziteguise listeners. My new album is called Christiangers. acting. It comes out on 9-11.

Save the day. Oh, yeah. Amazing. Perfect timing. Miles, where can people find you? Everywhere at Miles of Gray. Check out the other shows, 420 Day Fiance and Ain't a Fuddy. And bless that beautiful head of hair, David Lynch's. All right.

I'll be right back with the Nope. Nope. All right. That was our episode. That was David Lynch. Thank you to Janie Danger for suggesting Lynch as an icon and for being a great guest. As always, thank you to Miles Gray for being a great co-host. As always, thank you to J.M. McNabb for the research on this one.

I also re-listen to some blank check episodes from their David Lynch run for research. So thanks, as always, to Griffin and David and Ben. And as always, thanks to Brian the editor for making us sound small. March making the conversation more coherent. This is the no, no, no, no, no, no, no, book dump. Just some stray observations. First of all, obviously, David Lynch

would have probably been iconic in any era. I mean, that's hard to say, but he's a genius. I do think that his iconography filled a need we specifically had for something to replace calling things Kafka-esque. We needed a new way to sound smart while saying something is weird or fucked up because not enough people were reading Kafka

or even pretending to read Kafka. And David Lynch came along and gave us a bunch of movies that allowed us to call things Lynchian or just to say something straight out of a David Lynch movie. Man, this wedding is straight out of a David Lynch movie. I wonder what kind of wedding that would be. A bad one. Or magically delinch-ish.

If you're the Lucky Charms lepricon. Am I turning into like an NPR comedian who does bad puns? Like I couldn't stop myself from doing magically delinchef just there. I thought of it and I had to say it and I apologize. But just generally, yeah. David Lynch allowed us to replace Kafka S with a touchstone that didn't force us to read, which is boring. Let us watch the movies, dog.

As mentioned, Kubrick was a big eraser head fan. So was H.R. Geiger, the designer of the Xenomorph from the alien films. Geiger had this really interesting one side of relationship with Lynch where people would ask him what he thought of Lynch and he'd be glowing. But people would be like, and what does he think of you? And he said, quote, people have asked Lynch about me, but he isn't really enthusiastic about my work. I've been told that he thinks we stole his eraser head baby for the alien chestburster,

but that's not true. I don't know if that's how he talks. But just to be that openly. in awe of an artist that they, they are on the record about you being like, not a fan and, and accusing you of stealing your crowning achievement from them. And you're still like,

I don't know, guy does amazing work, lucky to be alive while he's working, you know? That's impressive, an impressive level of awe. I did just want to talk about, David Lynch and Jack Nance, the fact that they randomly met and both became all-time great artists at their given craft in filmmaking is pretty incredible.

You know, they met. It's kind of like Lennon and McCartney, but, you know, what are the chances that two geniuses with such complimentary skills would be buddies? and with Lennon and McCartney, it's like they met making music, whereas Lynch and Nance met and were friends for years before either of them ever thought about a career in movies. And then both became massively successful in filmmaking and, like, worked together. You know, it's impossible to say, like, what the causal effect is there, like which direction the causal arrow flows.

But yeah, I guess it's clear that it's not just the great man version of history, right? We talk about that a lot in these icon episodes that like people get where they are by being influenced by and working with and, you know, having amazing friends, you know. But without the other one, would both of them be successful if they never met? Would neither of them be successful? Who drove who? Nance was making Terrence Malick movies while David Lynch was still dreaming of mutant babies. So who knows?

Another counterfactual that I think is worth thinking about is what would the world look like without the midnight movie movement? We wouldn't have Night of the Living Dead. We wouldn't have David Lynch, you know? a Night of the Living Dead Lunch an entire movie genre. David Lynch is arguably the best American filmmaker of the past 40 years, and they come out at a time when the predominant culture is kind of going conservative. Like if I had to conjure icons who represent the 80s, it would be like Michael J. Fox or Michael Douglas or like one of these greed is good white guys,

or obviously Ronald Reagan. but because of this underground movement that wasn't written about on the front page of newspapers but this movement starts of showing movies after the squares have gone to bed these artists are able to basically smuggle good shit out into the collective consciousness um so yeah I don't know never underestimate the benefits of doing something uh just because it's fucking cool and you think you're a cool person who thinks other cool people would like it. Blue Velvet, I did just want to shout out, being just such probably my favorite depiction of what it feels like to grow up in a suburb where you can tell very dark shit is happening

just below the surface. I talked about the dog sniper. That same neighborhood lived next door to a house where a doctor took his own life. We had a guy who would come out of his house and his underwear screaming at us on our bus stop because it was in front of his house. But all very idyllic on the surface. Also, while I was researching this, my son and I were out hiking and noticed that a patch of dirt had smoke coming out of it that was like the dirt was wet and hot to the touch. and I brought a park ranger over to see it and the park ranger was like,

damn, that's weird. I don't know what you want me to do about this. It felt very lynchian until that moment. If they had been like, forget you ever saw this, it would have felt magically delinch if, but yeah, I guess, you know, maybe it's like a dull. But he makes things less spooky.

Maybe if I lived in that same neighborhood that I grew up in, it would just be like, yeah, people have problems, but they'll work it out. Frank Booth was inspired by just some guy that he saw when he was young at a Bob's big boy. Didn't huff Amel Nitrate out of an oxygen mask. But David Lynch said that with seeing him came a feeling. and that's where Frank Booth came from. Imagine casting a vibe so menacing that the character of Frank Booth

comes off you like a stench without you saying a word, without a single mommy, mommy, mommy baby wants to fuck. But yeah, all of the dark childhood images made me wonder how much of the stuff, first of all,

how much of the stuff my kids see in L.A. are going to be printed onto the back of their brains forever. But also just how much of this, stuff would look different in the sober light of day to an adult. Like in my 20s, I once got falling down drunk and tripped over a fire hydrant, and literally falling down drunk, was too drunk to put my hands down, knocked myself unconscious and just kind of lay there face down with blood pulling out. And my friend who was there was like compared it to Joe Pesci and Goodfellie.

fellas. And I've thought of that moment and this episode actually made me think that like if a kid was walking by, they would have thought they saw somebody die. Which is all to say, I'm doing my part to create future artists. Future David Lynch's future Stephen King's. I thought about Stephen King a couple times during this research. One, because Dune and Blue Velvet were made by Dino De Laurentis, who is the character from, The Stephen King episode, who Stephen King drove 15 hours straight on a motorcycle and on cocaine to pitch maximum overdrive to. But, yeah, they also, David Lynch and Stephen King also seem to hold similar beliefs about their process involving like pooling images from deep beneath the conscious world. King describes it as the myth pool where we all go down to drink. but yeah, I don't know.

What else can you say about David Lynch? Total genius. The phrase tap root kept coming up for me just seemed to be able to pull from the deepest depths of our shared unconscious and the tap just never seemed to run dry. It was a privilege to share the planet with him, you know? What do you want me to say here?

Guy was cool, cool as hell. Next week, more fun homework for people. who are so inclined. Hopefully you watch some Lynch movies prior to this episode or it gets you to watch some. Next week, we're staying in the world of ingenious filmmakers with a character who seems to only be getting more iconic coming up on 30 years after he ambled lazily into the world. We're talking the dude with Vince Mancini. So go watch the Big Lobowski if you want to and half time and we will talk to y'all then. Bye! The Daily Zykeyes is executive produced by Catherine Law.

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