David Lynch says he can ‘hardly walk across a room’ in worrying health update

The celebrated director revealed he had been diagnosed with emphysema in August

Director David Lynch has said that he now needs a supply of oxygen and can only walk short distances after being diagnosed with emphysema.

Speaking to Sight & Sound magazine in August, the 78-year-old director of Twin Peaks and Eraserhead, revealed that he had the condition due to smoking throughout his life and said that, if he directs again, it will have to be remotely as he cannot “go out” due to fears he will get Covid. However, he did defiantly say that he would “never retire”.

In a new interview with People magazine, Lynch said that he now needs supplemental oxygen for most activities, adding: “I can hardly walk across a room. It’s like you’re walking around with a plastic bag around your head.”

Lynch started smoking when he was just eight and, although he concedes that his condition was “a big price to pay”, he doesn’t have any regrets.

“It was important to me,” Lynch says. “I wish what every addict wishes for, that what we love is good for us. I never thought about it as glamorising it. It was a part of life. Some characters [in his films and TV shows] would be smokers, just like in real life.”

Lynch, though, did use the update on his health to send a warning to other smokers, hoping that his current situation can encourage others to quit.

“I really wanted to get this across: Think about it,” he said. “You can quit these things that are going to end up killing you. I owe it to them - and to myself - to say that.”

Emphysema, also known as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), is mainly caused by smoking, air pollution and exposure to dust and chemicals at work. The World Health Organisation has predicted it will become the third leading cause of death worldwide by 2030.

David Lynch (Getty Images for AFI)

In August, Lynch released a new album of music in collaboration with Texan singer and audio engineer Chrystabell, called Cellophane Memories.

The pair have previously created two albums together, and also collaborated on Twin Peaks: The Return, in which the actor and singer played the role of Agent Tammy Preston.

Lynch’s last screen project was the aforementioned Twin Peaks series, which arrived in 2017. It was so well received that the show’s network, Showtime, said it would be happy to make another season.

A project Lynch has struggled to get off the ground is an animation called Snootworld, which he began working on two decades ago with Caroline Thompson (The Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands).