Nikolai Mather: Well, I can't thank you enough. Dan, thank you so much for talking about this. I really appreciate it. I guess my first question for you was, just tell me about yourself. What's your connection to Wilmington?
Dan Brawley: My parents moved here in the 60s. I was born in the 70s, and I went to Williston Junior High School. And after school, we would ride our skateboards downtown. And that was about the time that the film industry landed in Wilmington, it was not uncommon for us to wander onto a set downtown. Wilmington was a very different place. Back then. It was a little darker and seedier, and when the railroads left in the 60s, Wilmington had 25 years of decline. I think you can safely say it was probably the film industry [that] was really the turning point when Dino De Laurentiis discovered Wilmington and decided to build a studio here.
NM: What do you think drew David Lynch to Wilmington specifically?
DB: Well, David had been working with Dino. Dino produced Dune. Dino was really interested in supporting what, at the time, were risky projects. And I think, you know, there's a character in Blue Velvet who dances on top of the car. Really unusual looking character. That's exactly what she looked like every day she worked at the Dixie Grill. I'm sure David Lynch, you know, went to eat at the Dixie Grill and thought, well, here's a perfect character. Now, he obviously took her out of context, took her out of the Dixie Grill, put her on top of a car. I don't know if she's ever danced on top of a car before. But I think one of the gifts that he gave us was that he was able to pull things from our lives [and] put them in a new context, in a way that helped us understand just how weird everyday life is in the first place.
NM: Another thing I was thinking about, too is all of Lynch's work kind of dealt with this idea of, like, American life and how picturesque it can be, but also the seedier underbelly, which I think applies fantastically to Wilmington.
DB: Absolutely. I mean, you know… the Southern, someone's smiling and shaking your hand, but secretly they're plotting against you. Sort of on the surface, things seem picturesque and idyllic, but it's almost always a cover up for what's really happening. And I would imagine that his work will take on even greater significance in the next 20 years as we come to terms with the emergence of pretty overt fascism in this country, as everything becomes surface oriented, you know. We really made the bargain that David Lynch is critiquing over and over again in his work. We made the bargain that we wanted things to look perfect, knowing that they were really rotten on the inside.
NM: Yeah, fascism is nothing if not an aesthetic.
DB: Yeah, yeah, that's it. That's it. So I think people also forget how groundbreaking he was. Cinema is certainly, you know – you're like an orchestra conductor, because you're mastering all the art forms. You know, the written word, the performance, the audio. I mean, the audio in Blue Velvet is absolutely one of my favorite parts. I think a lot of younger filmmakers forget how audio is really such a critical part. We are all very forgiving of maybe a shaky camera or something being slightly out of focus, but no one is forgiving of audio that doesn't match up or doesn't work.
NM: I think my editors would agree with that. [laughs]
DB: [laughs] Yeah. I mean, they weren't making movies anywhere else in the United States, except for New York and L.A. And so the fact that a bunch of rednecks in North Carolina were making movies, you know, it's like, it's crazy. You know, Blue Velvet, in some ways, is a portrait of this city. There's something unusual about this city, and it's not just, you know, pretty, right? And we have beautiful beaches and all these historic homes, but there's something right underneath the surface, and I think that is captivating to artists, you know. And not in the easy way of pretty paintings, but in the sort of more difficult way of really examining human behavior, figuring out why is the world so messed up? I don't doubt that 20 years from now, Blue Velvet will continue to inspire people simply because David Lynch was such a master of the art form.
Read more:
- Remembering Oscar-nominated filmmaker David Lynch
- David Lynch, who directed off-kilter classics, dies at 78
- The musical universe of David Lynch
