Not long after last fall's notorious election, I had the urge to discuss David Lynch and Twin Peaks in a political context. It took a while to get out there (thanks to Ben Durant for his diligence in streamlining a lengthy conversation, which I know wasn't easy), but here is the segment I recorded with Ben on the subject several months ago. The focus is less contemporary politics (despite the inspiration) or the sort of hot-take thinkpiece approach that will no doubt be ubiquitous soon, and more a broader look at how the show operates through various perspectives. Particular attention is paid to David Lynch's own ambiguous place in the political spectrum as he and his work evolve.
Topics include how small town communitarianism fares under "conservative" regimes, feminist perspectives on Twin Peaks, Jonathan Rosenbaum's review of Twin Peaks (contrasting Lynch with Luis Bunuel), Lynch's affection for Reagan in the eighties, attitudes toward class in The Elephant Man, the avant-garde in a left and right context, the National Review cover story celebrating Lynch's work as moral and all-American in 1990, and some interviews Lynch has participated in over the years. (And thanks to John Thorne for digging up that copy of Lynch's National Review cover, which I couldn't find anywhere online.)
This episode also contains a fantastic, really fun interview with Takanori Higuchi, star of the Japanese Georgia Coffee commercials that David Lynch directed in the early nineties.
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