Laura Dern reveals what David Lynch told her that changed everything

Laura Dern is grateful that visionary David Lynch took her under his wing during the start of her career.

Lynch cast Laura as an attractive girl-next-door in Blue Velvet, as a temptress in Wild at Heart, and an unearthly FBI secretary in Twin Peaks, and in his last and most disturbing film, Inland Empire.

During an interview with The Independent, published January 31st, the actress was joined by her Is This Thing On? costar Andra Day.

The duo began talking about being a visionary’s muse, with Day saying, "You know that you’re in the hands of somebody who really does care about you," adding that she’d even play "a live-action Kermit the Frog” if Lee Daniels asked her to.

"We found our person, right?" Dern said.

"And my person told me that I can do anything," she said of Lynch.

She reflected on the director’s last feature Inland Empire, where she played a troubled woman. The film danced betwen real and unreal and logic and abstraction.

The Lonely Planet star recalled with a smile, "He says, 'Now you’re going to do something – I don’t even know what it is yet, but you’re gonna show it to me, and then I’m gonna figure out what it is that I’ve been dreaming of.'"

"That kind of faith is incredible. I once said to my mom that David’s unconditional trust in me is something I’d only ever felt from her. It’s that kind of love where they just believe in you so much. [He] saw things in me I didn’t see in myself," she added. 

Laura Dern stars opposite Will Arnett in Bradley Cooper's divorce comedy/drama Is This Thing On?. The film is in cinemas now.