Kyle MacLachlan, Naomi Watts and others share heartfelt tributes to David Lynch: ‘He put me on the map’

With the passing of beloved director David Lynch, many of the actors he worked with – along with countless staunch admirers – have shared emotional tributes and testaments to his legacy.

With the passing of beloved director David Lynch, many of the actors he worked with – along with countless admirers – have shared tributes to his legacy. Lynch’s family announced that the filmmaker died earlier this week at the age of 78. Kyle MacLachlan, one of Lynch’s most perennial stars, shared one of the first tributes after the news broke on Thursday, writing on Instagram, “Forty-two years ago, for reasons beyond my comprehension, David Lynch plucked me out of obscurity to star in his first and last big budget movie. He clearly saw something in me that even I didn’t recognize. I owe my entire career, and life really, to his vision.” He was referring to Lynch’s lofty 1984 sci-fi opus “Dune,” the pair’s first collaboration, in which MacLachlan portrayed Paul Atreides (a role that has been reprised by Timothée Chalamet in the more recent Denis Villeneuve movies). Lynch and Maclachlan went on to work together on two of the filmmaker’s most iconic projects, 1986’s “Blue Velvet” and the series “Twin Peaks,” which comprises three seasons and a feature-length prequel film. MacLachlan wrote of Lynch, “I always found him to be the most authentically alive person I’d ever met. David was in tune with the universe and his own imagination on a level that seemed to be the best version of human.” In a nod to Lynch’s famously enigmatic approach to storytelling, MacLachlan added, “He was not interested in answers because he understood that questions are the drive that make us who we are.”