Natasha Lyonne’s comments about artificial intelligence and a final conversation with the late David Lynch have kicked off a full week of discourse—and a meme.
Before his passing, filmmaker David Lynch allegedly had a final conversation with his neighbor, Natasha Lyonne. The fledgling director said in an interview with Vulture that the conversation was about artificial intelligence. According to Lyonne, Lynch didn’t warn or scold, he simply stated a fact. Holding up a pencil, he told her, “This is a pencil.” Just like anyone who has access to one can use a pencil, he said, everyone with a phone will soon use AI. He added, “It’s how you use the pencil” that is the most important.
In interviews surrounding her directorial debut, Uncanny Valley, Lyonne reflected on that moment. She took Lynch’s words as both encouragement and inevitability. While the world debates the ethics of generative tools, she’s focused on transparency. “It’s better to get your hands dirty than pretend it’s not happening,” she said in an interview with Vulture.
The “Before David Lynch died” meme is born
The solemn tone of Natasha Lyonne’s anecdote quickly became meme fodder as people began reimagining it in absurd or melodramatic contexts. Users on X have begun pairing the phrase “before David Lynch died” with silly one-liners or completely unrelated thoughts, mimicking the format of a profound pre-death revelation.
“Before David Lynch died he told me he resonates most with Hannah Horvath” wrote @funnsexywoman, referencing the iconic Girls protagonist played by Lena Dunham.
“I spoke to David Lynch shortly before he died. He gave me permission to commit many crimes,” wrote @MKupperman.
It wasn’t long before other directors also got pulled into the trend.
Why people are upset about Lyonne using AI
Although Uncanny Valley is not a “generative AI movie,” its use of AI for set extensions and production tools drew online backlash. Critics accused Lyonne of jumping on a trend that threatens artists’ jobs. The fact that she co-founded an AI film studio, Asteria Film Co., with boyfriend Bryn Mooser only added to the suspicion.
Many fans overlooked her emphasis on using an “ethical” model trained exclusively on copyright-cleared content. When the film was announced in April, accusations flew before most had read the details. Lyonne told Variety that it felt like she was cast as “some weird Darth Vader character.” Though she tried to explain that the project wasn’t replacing artists, many weren’t ready to hear it.
“I’ve never been inside of one of those [backlash storms] before,” Lyonne admitted. “It’s scary in there.” Still, she took a cue from collaborator Rian Johnson, who told her to ignore the noise and keep making things.
Despite her ambivalence, she recognized a growing disconnect in the industry: people were using AI while pretending they weren’t. “And you find out that there’s a lot of situations where they’re calling it machine learning or something,” she said in the interview with Vulture, “but really, it’s AI.” Rather than hide, she chose to confront the technology openly, with ethical boundaries and creative intent.
Hollywood’s uneasy AI future
Hollywood’s relationship with AI remains deeply fractured. While some see it as a tool to streamline filmmaking, others consider it a threat to originality and labor. The Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA held longstanding strikes that included AI-specific protections. Studios can’t use AI-written scripts or clone actors without consent, but loopholes remain, especially around generative visuals.
Lawsuits from creatives across multiple disciplines continue, targeting how these AI systems were trained. Many were built on copyrighted material scraped from the web without approval. That murky legal terrain has left producers anxious.
“The biggest fear in all of Hollywood is that you’re going to make a blockbuster, and guess what? You’re going to sit in litigation for the next 30 years,” one producer told Vulture.
Nevertheless, every major studio is moving forward with AI, often quietly. Smaller studios like Lyonne’s Asteria are pitching a more responsible alternative.
But Lyonne is focused on Lynch’s metaphor. Like a pencil, according to his reasoning, AI can be used to sketch beauty or scribble garbage. What matters isn’t the tool, but the intention behind it.
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