David Lynch: The Final Project We’ll Never See

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Raise your hand if you got a good, hard sucker-punch to the gut this week when you heard that David Lynch, master of the deliciously bent, had died.

I know. Me too.

Mr. Lynch gave us so much. He tickled our collective creepy bone, took us on journeys into souls (The Elephant Man) and space (Dune), tossed us some neo-noir (Mulholland Drive) and pulled us behind the bushes to gossip about sex, booze and suicide (Desperate Housewives).

What didn’t this man do?

Oh, wait, I know.

This. (Soft sob.)

David Left Us So Much. Including This Unfinished Work

Most of the greats leave something unfinished.

That goes for music, novels, sketches that never became paintings, and yes, movie or TV features that will always be a “what if?”

In a weird sort of way, though, I’m comforted knowing David Lynch left behind an unrealized limited series. I don’t know — maybe my optimistic side (no, seriously, I have one…somewhere) holds onto hope that somebody very talented will snap it up and make something out of it. I like to cling like that.

But back to Lynch’s work that not only wasn’t finished, it never really got off the ground.

It was called “Unrecorded Night.”

First There Was a Concept…

The “Unrecorded Night” concept was originally called “Wisteria.”

(I have so many questions. A nod to Wisteria Lane and Desperate Housewives, who obviously adored Lynch and leaned hard into his ideas? The fact that Wisteria climbs, chokes and poisons? Who knows.)

Whatever the muse for the series may have been, the hoped-for series — still with its code name Wisteria — was first announced in 2020 at Production Weekly. It was to air on Netflix and would include 13 episodes.

Lynch would be producing the series along with Peter Deming, who was also a part of “Mulholland Drive” and “Lost Highway.” Tantalizingly (and frustratingly), no information on the plot was revealed at the time (and still hasn’t been). However, it is said that Deming and Lynch were both raring to go on their new brainchild.

But in 2021, Deming disclosed in an interview that due to COVID-19, the series had been put on hold.

…And then, a Tragic Illness

After 2021, not much more was said about the project, and the once-anticipated “Unrecorded Night” faded into the background all the way until 2024.

That was when Lynch’s producer Sabrina Sutherland disclosed that there was a “chance” Lynch could return to the project, but that other interests were taking priority for Lynch at the moment.

Then the boom came down: it was revealed that Lynch was suffering from emphysema.

It’s likely, though, that he had been ill for some time, as by the time the condition was announced, Lynch was just months from succumbing to it.

And Christ, was that ever hard to write just now. Just sayin’.

There Will Never Be an Unrecorded Night

Okay, I lied above. I don’t have any confidence at all that some quirky genius will emerge from the wings to take up this project and realize it in Lynch’s memory.

But in a way, that’s appropriate. I look at it this way: There will never be an “Unrecorded Night.” But then, there will never be another David Lynch.

Rest and rest well, and thank you, Mr. Lynch. For everything.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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