Mulholland Drive brûle et David Lynch est mort.

Je le connaissais de Dune — le roman de mon adolescence — et de Blue Velvet — hasard de DVD, mais c’est avec Fire Walk with Me en 2017 que je l’ai découvert pour de vrai. En sortant de la salle de cinéma, je me sentais bizarre — comme si on m’avait drogué. Puis j’ai vu The Art Life, Mulholland Drive et Elephant Man sur les quelques années où le cinéma était mon endroit préféré sur Terre (c’est une phrase que j’aimais dire ; je la pense toujours, mais je ne la dis plus).

J’ai regardé Twin Peaks avec mes parents, j’ai ri devant le John Ford de The Fabelmans.

L’été dernier, j’étais à San Francisco (quelques jours à L.A.). Après Tortilla Flat, j’ai lu Lynch on Lynch. **Florilège :

When I was little I used to draw and paint all the time. One thing I thank my mother for is that she refused to give me colouring books because it's like a restricting thing.

When you talk about things - unless you're a poet - a big thing becomes smaller.

It smelt good — there were pines there and I like the smell of pine.

The people had stories etched in their faces

You’ve got to keep your eye on the doughnut and not on the hole.

I like to build things, and I like to collect things. And when you collect things, you need a place to put them. I built a very elaborate little studio shed out of found wood.

Each day at 2.30 p.m. I'd have several cups of coffee and one chocolate shake — a silver goblet shake. I discovered that sugar makes me happy and inspires me, so I would get onto a sugar jag and create on the napkins. Try to get ideas. I got so wound up that I had to rush home and write. I’m heavily into sugar. I call it ‘granulated happiness’. It’s just a great help. You know, a friend.

Peggy Reavey remembers the occasion when, while they were still both art students at the Academy in Philadelphia, Lynch thought he could build a perpetual motion machine and went to the Franklin Institute to tell them so. ‘He'd just go straight to the top and tell people: “ I think I know how to build a perpetual motion machine. I'm an art student.” Einstein couldn't do it, of course. But he was utterly earnest. And this guy very nicely explained why his plan wouldn't work and we trooped out and had a cup of coffee.’

I like Bauhaus: that kind of pure, formal thing. I like grey rooms that have nothing in them except a couple of pieces of furniture that are just right for a person to sit there. And then, when the person sits there, you really see the contrast, and then the room looks very good and the person looks very interesting. Architecture is really the most fantastic thing. A house has got to have a roof of some sort, and windows to let some light in, but it’s amazing how few are successful as buildings. The ones that are, just stand out because you just can’t believe how beautiful it is to be inside them. But the little mini-malls and postmodern stuff — they’re killing your soul.

And then a weird thing started happening. I went to meet George Lucas who had offered me the third Star Wars to direct, but I’ve never even really liked science fiction. I like elements of it, but it needs to be combined with other genres.

I have a theory about Carlo Rambaldi: he always builds himself. And so, somehow, the Navigator looks to me a little bit like Carlo Rambaldi. And ET looks exactly like Carlo Rambaldi!

I’m in a recording studio, which is the greatest place, and I’m with musicians, who are the greatest people in the world - the greatest people. They sleep late, they’re like children, and they have this unbelievable thing that they don’t talk about. They just do it. It’s a thing that brings all different kinds of people together. And now, without saying anything, they’re really together, making this music. It’s a magical thing! You can do anything. You just have to say what you want. It’s the best !

A fifties/nineties combo was what Twin Peaks was all about. We weren’t making a period thing.

With some actors, when you look in their eyes, you just don’t see them thinking. Kyle [MacLachlan] can think on screen.

If you just do something to be different, it’ll always have a false beginning.

In a theatre, when the screen is big and the sound is right, a movie is very powerful, even if it stinks.