Patricia Arquette recently worked with the late David Lynch’s daughter Jennifer Lynch, and she said she felt the spirit of the legendary filmmaker come through her during their interactions — specifically regarding one particular habit.
“I heard David in my head, ‘You gotta make her quit smoking, Arquette,’ and so I was telling her, ‘your dad wants me to tell you… like my ‘Medium’ self-came out,” Arquette told IndieWire at the Tribeca Film Festival, referencing the psychic character she played on the hit drama from 2005-2011.
Arquette teased to IndieWire that she recently worked with Jennifer Lynch on a project, though didn’t reveal which. Jennifer Lynch has become a prolific director in her own right, working frequently on television series such as “Matlock,” “Monsters,” and “American Horror Story.” Her father died in January from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, which resulted from his own lifelong smoking habit.
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Arquette teamed with David Lynch on the 1997 film “Lost Highway,” where she played a dual role in the twisted Los Angeles-set neo-noir.
“As an actress, David doesn’t give you a lot of information,” Arquette told IndieWire in January. “So I’d say, ‘David, am I playing two people? Is this one a ghost?’ And he’d say,’ ‘What do you think, Patrish?’ So, I had to make up my own logic. I decided we’re looking at women through the eyes of a misogynist, but one who is woke enough to know he shouldn’t think this way. It’s almost become a subconscious part of him.”
Arquette just wrapped production on Kenneth Branagh’s next project, “The Last Disturbance of Madeline Hynde,” also starring Jodie Comer and Michael Sheen. It’s billed as a “contemporary psychological thriller,” though the plot itself remains under wraps. Arquette said that watching Branagh work put her “to shame as a director.”
“That whole English way of making movies — they are on it, constantly moving. You are ready. He’s prepared… I was actually quite terrified,” Arquette said on the red carpet. “And there were a couple days there that I was ready to just freeze up and shut down.”
Arquette made her directorial debut with “Gonzo Girl,” which premiered at TIFF in 2023. The film though is currently in the process of re-editing to help it secure distribution. The new cut is premiering at Tribeca.
“I can have so much respect and awe of somebody [like Branagh] that I really kind of shoot myself in the foot with it, and [it] felt like one of those situations,” she added.
