Kyle MacLachlan has revealed that he believes his career was affected by working with David Lynch, as other directors seemed resistant to cast him.
READ MORE: David Lynch – 1946-2025: a true visionary who reinvented cinema
The veteran actor, who recently appeared in Fallout, came to prominence as the lead in Lynch’s series Twin Peaks, which ran for two seasons and a spin-off movie in the early ‘90s.
He would reprise the role in 2017’s Twin Peaks: The Return, Lynch’s last project before his death last January. Prior to that, he had also appeared in Lynch’s 1984 adaptation of Dune, and his 1986 thriller Blue Velvet.
Appearing on The Louis Theroux Podcast, he remarked about the duality of roles he was being offered in the aftermath of the show’s success. “I can be the weird outsider with David [Lynch], but I’m not the weird outsider in a regular movie, that didn’t make sense to me” he recalled. “I said, I’m not that person. So, I just was like, I’m kind of between two worlds.”
He continued: “In some ways I feel like there may have been a few directors who were not interested in working with me because the stamp of working with David was so strong. If it was between, Dune, not so much, but Blue Velvet for sure. And Twin Peaks for sure.
“The identity was very strongly identified with Lynch. Which at the time, I felt sort of ambivalent about, but now of course I’m absolutely thrilled that I was able to be part of that universe, it comes with age and maturity I guess.”
David Lynch passed away on January 16 last year, aged 78. Reflecting on their long friendship, MacLachlan said the filmmaker’s reputation for being dark and mysterious was a misconception. “He had a tremendous lightness around him and a joy,” he said.
“Particularly in the creative environment that I think somehow allowed him to visit, create, interact with the darker sides of things, things that a lot of people would turn away from.”
Away from Lynch, the actor discussed the film of his that he still can’t bring himself to watch – infamous box office flop Showgirls. When asked if he was a fan of the movie, set in the world of Vegas performers, he replied: “No, I wasn’t. When I saw the film, I didn’t know what to think. I said, “oh, this is awful”.
Host Theroux mentioned that, while the film was a bomb upon its release in 1995, it has been reappraised in recent years and is beloved by many. When asked if he could ever revisit it, he replied: “I can see it, but I’d be closing my eyes. It’s definitely a film that people enjoy for whatever reason, which is great. But I think the original intention, I had signed on for something else.”
Kyle MacLachlan recently joined other David Lynch collaborators to mark one year since his death.
The post Kyle MacLachlan says some directors didn’t want to work with him due to “stamp” left from David Lynch success appeared first on NME.
