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I hope that I never see that face, ever, outside of a dream, he says.
The sequences familiar horror-movie grammar surely nothing is lurking behind the building, right?
Fischler was a young character actor in the making when he shotMulhollandas a TV pilot thatABC infamously passed on.
He credits much of that fortune to Lynch, whom hed long admired.
I grew up in front of the TV; I was a latchkey kid, Fischler tells Vulture.
I watched TV all through the 70s as a little kid, and then the 80s were my jam.
Then, whenTwin Peakscame on, I didnt realize television could be that different and weird.
I dont think anybody did.
He didnt audition actors.
You didnt get sides, you didnt get a script, you didnt get anything.
She would talk to you:Where are you from?
I was like, What, what?
You dont want me to audition?
She would show David these interviews, and then he would pick his cast.
So I got the offer to do it and the pages of the scene thats all I got.
It was like making a short film.
I had a little bit of a freak-out.
I was 27 and thinking,I have to do this monologue for David Lynch.
I mean, I was 13 whenBlue Velvetcame out, and it changed the way I thought of movies.
I met David for the first time on set at the diner we shot at.
They always say dont meet your idols.
Meet your idols if theyre David Lynch.
He was warm and kind and open.
I should have kept it, but I didnt.
So when I shot it, I did not really know anything about it except my scene.
I went in kind of blind.
Is the scene you shot for the pilot the exact same Winkies scene in the film?Exact same.
The rest are the reshoots and the stuff that he did when ABC passed, whichof coursethey did.
Can you even imagineMulholland Drivethe TV show?
Its even more unimaginable thanTwin Peaksthe TV show.One hundred percent!
BecauseTwin Peaksis at least kind of linear.
And its really a soap-opera mystery in a way.Exactly.
But I think it would have made people a little crazy.
And I say What do you think it means?
So I try not to give too many actual facts, but my memory is that were agents.
Most people dont get that right.
If my memory is correct, we were agents, which makes sense.
How are we part of Hollywood?
The movie has actors and directors and producers, and you need an agent in Hollywood.
But its so much better that its that one scene and thats it.
It happens, especially in TV.
But it didnt take terribly long for it to be put in turnaround and become a film.
We had to work for scale, but of course I said yes.
Theres that shot in the last 20 minutes where shes at the diner and sees me.
That was shot for the movie.
If I were to credit anybody for my ability to capture some stuff on-screen, its all him.
When we shot that original scene, I had done some stuff, but never anything substantial.
I had not found film acting, which is so different.
We rehearsed the scene, and I kind of sucked.
I did too much.
But, you know, he just had a bad dream.
I looked at him, and I could tell what he was saying to me.
He was like, Thats enough, right?
Youre telling your friend it was a bad night.
What I was doing was adding on and not just making it simple.
Then that was it he never gave me another direction again.
I was able to realize,Oh, Im enough.
Being simple is enough.
I can picture him saying all of that in my head.
Theres an actionable item within the note but there is also a specific cadence to that monologue.
He didnt guide you through any specifics there?No.
Really, I was scared to say these words out loud, so there were pauses, not intentionally.
A lot of the dread and the fear there are his shots, his music, his editing.
Thats all it is.
So no, he did not get specific about cadence or pauses.
Thats not who he was at all.
Or casting various outsiders, or someone whose presence is kind of an in-joke within the industry.
You could read your casting as a wink about Winkies, if you will.
Was that ever discussed?Not at all.
Yes, the Roadhouse was huge in the 80s.
I love that theory.
I believe David would have talked to me about it, but it never did come up.
I think its one of those unintentional weird moments.
Or David just kept it to himself.
I dont know if I talked about the Roadhouse in my casting interview.
But you know what?
What was the diner where you guys shot?It was a real diner.
People think its in Hollywood, but we were out, weirdly, in the Torrance area.
If my memory serves, it had closed down but was still the same inside.
And the whole thing was shot there, including the walk outside to the back?All of it.
I dont think I saw it until we did the first take.
What was that first take like for you?
Its a jump scare for the audience.It was kind of a jump scare for me.
It was like,Oh, shit.
In person, she looked remarkable.
It was scary and odd and creepy.
In that whole scene, even the walk, the dread just came to me.
I can feel it in my chest right now talking to you.
Im not that kind of actor.
You dont usually take it home with you.I dont even take it past cut.
Right now, talking to you about it, Im sweating a little bit and I can feel it.
That was an incredible thing to find on that walk.
We did more takes inside the diner.
David wasnt a guy who did 50 takes anyway, or not on my stuff with him.
You mention Bonnie, who plays the man behind Winkies, as this person is called.
But even thecluesLynch later wrote about the film say, Note the occurrences surrounding the man behind Winkies.
He uses a masculine noun, but theres an inherent androgyny.
In my mind, it really seemed like it was a man.
My character says, Theres a man, so it was just always a man to me.
But who knows why David cast Bonnie.
Its a great choice.
Mulholland Drivecomes out in 2001 and takes on a life of its own.
This scene in particular is often ranked on lists of the scariest horror moments of all time.
I hadnt seen the movie yet, and I was completely blown away by it.
It was not that when it first was released.
Silencio was talked about more.
But David was nominated for an Oscar, and who knew it was going to be this incredible thing?
In terms of me and that scene, I didnt really feel anything different.
But it started to change.
Over the last 10 years, with any director I meet on almost any job,Mulholland Drivecomes up.
Did it feel like a long walk to you?Yes.
David did tell me he wanted me to go slow.
But David never told me to go faster.
He loved how slow I went.
He wanted the audience to be uneasy.
Some people think of this scene as the movies thesis.
My friend who had never seen the movie before was like, Your character is an actor, right?
He came out here with the dream of success, and now the monster is failure.
I think theres a reason the scene stayed in the movie.
Then I got the call.
I would have dropped anything.
I would have quit another job to do it.
I was lucky it shot on a Saturday.
I was like, This is awesome.
I dont know what any of it means.
You had no further context about the show?
Did you ask questions?No.
I didnt want to know.
I think Showtime must have been a little like, Wait, what?
I think they were, yes.And yet I thought it was brilliant.
So, no, I did not ask any questions.
I think even Jennifer only knew her scenes.
It wasnt like the bigger stars got the full script.
Im sure Kyle MacLachlan did, but we all just knew what we were doing.
You talked about that great note David gave you at the diner.
Did you get anything memorable onTwin Peaks?Ive never told this story.
Everybody got quiet, and we kind of sat around.
Do you mean a literal meditative state?I do.
He sat there in his chair and he meditated.
How long did this go on?I think a couple of minutes.
It wasnt transcendental it wasnt that deep, but I think it was meditative.
I think its my first scene: Why do you let her do this stuff to you?
They were not these huge scenes, but that one had an element of dread.
In my mind, it pieced everything together.
Im not a big regret guy, but thats a bummer to me.
you might name a million directors who are so brilliant, but David represented more to people.
He was like, All right, you want to see something different?
My daughter is 15, and she wrote me from school, Papa, David Lynch died.
She was freaked out for me.
She was like, We have to decide what were watching first.
Ive never shown her his movies.
you could just start at the beginning.I think it would blow her mind.
