Deep Thoughts by David Lynch

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I don't think I'll ever say what that sentence was.

Therapy
I went to a psychiatrist once. I was doing something that had become a pattern in my life, and I thought, Well, I should go talk to a psychiatrist. When I got into the room, I asked him, 'Do you think that this process could, in any way, damage my creativity?' And he said, 'Well, David, I have to be honest: It could.' And I shook his hand and left.

Casting
It doesn't matter how wonderful an actor is; when you're casting, you have to pick the person who marries to that part, who can do that part.

I don't ever give actors cold readings. I feel that's a torment for them, and I don't learn anything. Plus, then I would want to start rehearsing with them. It would take a long, long time to do that with every actor. So I like to just talk with them and look at them while they talk. I start running them through the script in my head as they're talking. Some of them go partway and then stop. Then one of them will go all the way through, and I'll know.

On Blue Velvet, I worked with a casting director, Johanna Ray. And we had all brought up Dennis Hopper. But everybody said, 'No, no; you can't work with Dennis. He's really in bad shape, and you'll have nothing but trouble.' So we continued looking for people. But one day, Dennis' agent called and said that Dennis was clean and sober and had already done another picture, and I could talk to that director to verify it. Then Dennis called and said, 'I have to play Frank, because I am Frank.' That thrilled me, and scared me.

Darkness
People have asked me why -- if meditation is so great and gives you so much bliss -- are my films so dark, and there's so much violence?

There are many, many dark things flowing around in this world right now, and most films reflect the world in which we live. They're stories. Stories are always going to have conflict. They're going to have highs and lows, and good and bad.

I fall in love with certain ideas. And I am where I am. Now, if I told you I was enlightened, and this is enlightened filmmaking, that would be another story. But I'm just a guy from Missoula, Montana, doing my thing, going down the road like everybody else.

We all reflect the world we live in. Even if you make a period film, it will reflect your times. You can see the way period films differ, depending on when they were made. It's a sensibility -- how they talk, certain themes -- and those things change as the world changes.

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