• Director David Lynch, 78, was diagnosed with emphysema in 2020
• Lynch has been smoking since he was 8, but he quit two years ago and wants to warn others to stop
• Lynch is an acclaimed director of films like Blue velvet And Mulholland Drive

Try searching on Google “David Lynch» and you’ll probably come across photo after photo of the Oscar-winning director with a cigarette in his hand.

For most of Lynch’s life, that’s exactly the image he wanted to portray. “A major part of my life has been smoking,” says Lynch, 78. “I loved the smell and taste of tobacco. I loved lighting cigarettes. For me, it was part of the profession of painter and filmmaker.

But, he admits, “what you sow is what you reap.” Four years ago, the Mulholland Drive The director was diagnosed with emphysema, a chronic lung disease that causes shortness of breath and is a type of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or COPD.

Today, he relies on supplemental oxygen for anything more strenuous than a walk across the room – and he wants to warn other smokers that the same thing could happen to them.

“At the back of every smoker’s mind is the fact that it’s healthy, so you’re literally playing with fire,” he says. “It can bite you. I took a chance and was bitten.

Lynch’s habit lasted almost literally his entire life. A Montana native whose father was a forestry researcher for the Department of Agriculture, Lynch grew up in rural Idaho and Washington and began smoking at age 8.

At the time Lynch was releasing his first independent film, The Nightmarish Eraser head by 1977, smoking was part of his brooding arthouse persona. And cigarettes were an indelible part of his screen work. From 1986 Blue velvet to his groundbreaking 90s TV series Twin Peaks and his Resumption 2017, smoking was closely linked to Lynchian characters and his dreamlike cinematography.

Over the years, Lynch tried to quit “many, many times, but when it got tough, I’d smoke the first cigarette and it was a one-way ticket to heaven,” he calls it. “Then you start smoking again.”

In 2020, Lynch was diagnosed with emphysema, but even this alarming news wasn’t enough to make him stop. It took him two more years before giving it up for good.

“I saw the writing on the wall. and he was like, ‘You’re going to die in a week if you don’t stop,'” says Lynch, who has four children, including a 12-year-old daughter, Lula (he is currently going through a divorce). by his fourth wife, Emily Stofle). “I could barely move without gasping for air. Quitting was my only choice.

He says his long-standing practice of transcendental meditation helped him stop (he meditates twice a day and started a foundation dedicated to practice) and keeps him optimistic. “I have a positive attitude focused on healing the body itself,” says Lynch. But, he admits, “it’s hard to live with emphysema. I can barely walk across a room. It’s like walking around with a plastic bag around your head.

The illness, which makes him more vulnerable to other respiratory illnesses, keeps him mostly confined to the house. “I never really liked going out before, so it’s a good excuse,” he jokes.

And it also kept him from doing one of his favorite things: “I love being on set,” he says. “I like being there, being able to whisper to people.” But he’s also willing to try directing remotely in the future.

Although the consequences of smoking are a “high price to pay,” Lynch says, “I don’t regret it. It was important to me. I wish what every addict wishes: that what we love is good for us.

And he insists he wouldn’t change anything about including cigarettes so frequently in his work. “I never thought it was glamorous,” he says. “It was part of life. Some characters are smokers, like in real life.

But he says he hopes his own experience will be a sort of moral story for other smokers. “I really wanted to get this across: think about it. You can give up these things that will ultimately kill you,” he says. “I owe it to them – and to myself – to say that. »