David Lynch
David Keith Lynch (born January 20, 1946) is an American filmmaker, painter, visual artist, musician, actor[1] and philanthropist. Lynch has received critical acclaim for his films, which are often distinguished by their surrealist, dreamlike qualities. He has received numerous accolades, including the Golden Lion in 2006 and an Honorary Academy Award in 2019.[2] In 2007, a panel of critics convened by The Guardian announced that "after all the discussion, no one could fault the conclusion that David Lynch is the most important film-maker of the current era."[3]
This article is about the American director. For other people named David Lynch, see David Lynch (disambiguation).
David Lynch
Judas Booth
- Filmmaker
- painter
- visual artist
- musician
- actor
1967–present
-
Peggy Lentz(m. 1968; div. 1974)
-
Mary Fisk(m. 1977; div. 1987)
-
Emily Stofle(m. 2009; sep. 2023)
- Isabella Rossellini
(1986–1991)
4, including Jennifer
Lynch studied painting before he began making short films in the late 1960s. His first feature-length film was Eraserhead (1977), which saw success as a midnight movie. He received nominations for the Academy Award for Best Director for The Elephant Man (1980), Blue Velvet (1986), and Mulholland Drive (2001).[4] His film Wild at Heart (1990) earned the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or. Other notable films include Dune (1984), Lost Highway (1997), and Inland Empire (2006). Lynch and Mark Frost created the ABC series Twin Peaks (1990–1991), and Lynch co-wrote and directed its film prequel, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992) and the limited series Twin Peaks: The Return (2017).[5] He also portrayed Gordon Cole in the Twin Peaks projects.
Lynch's other artistic endeavors include his work as a musician, encompassing the studio albums BlueBOB (2001), Crazy Clown Time (2011), and The Big Dream (2013) as well as painting[6] and photography.[7] He has written the books Images (1994), Catching the Big Fish (2006), and Room to Dream (2018).[8] He has also directed several music videos for artists such as Chris Isaak, X Japan, Moby, Interpol, Nine Inch Nails, and Donovan, and commercials for Calvin Klein, Dior, L'Oreal, Yves Saint Laurent, Gucci, and the New York City Department of Sanitation. A practitioner of Transcendental Meditation (TM), he founded the David Lynch Foundation, which seeks to fund the teaching of TM in schools and has since widened its scope to other at-risk populations, including the homeless, veterans, and refugees in 2005.[9][10]
Career[edit]
1967–1976: Short films and Eraserhead[edit]
Back in the United States, Lynch returned to Virginia, but since his parents had moved to Walnut Creek, California, he stayed with his friend Toby Keeler for a while. He decided to move to Philadelphia and enroll at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, after advice from Fisk, who was already enrolled there. He preferred this college to his previous school in Boston, saying, "In Philadelphia there were great and serious painters, and everybody was inspiring one another and it was a beautiful time there."[11]: 36–37 It was here that he began a relationship with a fellow student, Peggy Reavey, whom he married in 1967. The following year, Peggy gave birth to their daughter Jennifer. Peggy later said, "[Lynch] definitely was a reluctant father, but a very loving one. Hey, I was pregnant when we got married. We were both reluctant."[11]: 31 As a family, they moved to Philadelphia's Fairmount neighborhood, where they bought a 12-room house for the relatively low price of $3,500 (equivalent to $32,000 in 2023) due to the area's high crime and poverty rates. Lynch later said:
Reception[edit]
In 2007, a panel of critics convened by The Guardian announced that "after all the discussion, no one could fault the conclusion that David Lynch is the most important film-maker of the current era",[3] and AllMovie called him "the Renaissance man of modern American filmmaking".[118] His work led to him being labeled "the first populist surrealist" by film critic Pauline Kael.[11]: xi
Personal life[edit]
Relationships[edit]
Lynch has had several long-term relationships. In January 1968, he married Peggy Reavey,[30] with whom he had one child, Jennifer Lynch, born in 1968, who is a film director.[120] They filed for divorce in 1974.[121] In June 1977, Lynch married Mary Fisk, and the couple had one child, Austin Jack Lynch, born in 1982.[122] They separated in 1985 and divorced in 1987.[121] Lynch later developed a relationship with actress Isabella Rosselini, with whom he lived between 1986 and 1991. In 1992, he and his editor Mary Sweeney had a son, Riley Sweeney Lynch.[123] Sweeney also worked as Lynch's producer and co-wrote and produced The Straight Story. The two married in May 2006, but filed for divorce that June.[124] In 2009, Lynch married actress Emily Stofle,[125] who appeared in his 2006 film Inland Empire as well as the 2017 revival of Twin Peaks. The couple have one child, Lula Boginia Lynch, born in 2012.[125] They filed for divorce in 2023.
Political and public views[edit]
Lynch has said that he is "not a political person" and that he knows little about politics.[85]: 103 Describing his political philosophy in 2006, he said, "at that time [the 1990s], I thought of myself as a libertarian. I believed in next to zero government. And I still would lean toward no government and not so many rules, except for traffic lights and things like this. I really believe in traffic regulations."[126] He continued: "I'm a Democrat now. And I've always been a Democrat, really. But I don't like the Democrats a lot, either, because I'm a smoker, and I think a lot of the Democrats have come up with these rules for non-smoking."[126] He has said he voted for Ronald Reagan in the 1984 U.S. presidential election; in the 2000 U.S. presidential election he endorsed the Natural Law Party, which advocated Transcendental Meditation.[127][85] He said he would vote for Democratic incumbent Barack Obama in the 2012 U.S. presidential election.[128]
In 2009, Lynch signed a petition in support of director Roman Polanski after Polanski's arrest on his 1977 sexual abuse charges. Polanski had been detained while traveling to a film festival. The petition argued the arrest would undermine the tradition of film festivals as a place for works to be shown "freely and safely", and that arresting filmmakers traveling to neutral countries could open the door "for actions of which no-one can know the effects."[129][130]
In the 2016 U.S. presidential election, he endorsed Bernie Sanders,[131] whom he described as "for the people",[132] He voted for Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primaries,[133] and for Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson in the general election.[134] In a June 2018 interview with The Guardian, he said that Donald Trump could go down as "one of the greatest presidents in history because he has disrupted the [country] so much. No one is able to counter this guy in an intelligent way." He added: "Our so-called leaders can't take the country forward, can't get anything done. Like children, they are. Trump has shown all this."[133] The interviewer clarified that "while Trump may not be doing a good job himself, Lynch thinks, he is opening up a space where other outsiders might."[133] At a rally later that month, Trump read out sections of the interview, claiming Lynch was a supporter.[135] Lynch later clarified on Facebook that his words were taken out of context, saying that Trump would "not have a chance to go down in history as a great president" if he continued on the course of "causing suffering and division" and advising him to "treat all the people as you would like to be treated".[136]
In one of his daily weather report videos, Lynch expressed support for Black Lives Matter protests.[137] In another such video, Lynch condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and addressed Russian president Vladimir Putin directly, telling him there was "no room for this kind of absurdity anymore" and that Putin would reap what he had sown, lifetime after lifetime.[138]
Studio albums
Collaborative albums
