Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
70 free David Lynch trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This David Lynch trivia quiz covers the whole of the great American surrealist's life and work, from a boyhood spent following his forester father through the woods of Montana and Idaho to the flowers left at a Bob's Big Boy statue in Burbank after his death in January 2025. The early questions deal with the painter who wanted to see his paintings move: the art schools, the Philadelphia house bought for $3,500, the first shorts, the AFI grant and the five-year struggle to finish Eraserhead. The heart of the quiz is the films and the show: Mel Brooks and The Elephant Man, the offer to direct Return of the Jedi, the Dune disaster and the pseudonym Lynch put on its extended cut, the song that sparked Blue Velvet, the coffee-shop idea that became Twin Peaks, the booing at Cannes when Wild at Heart won the Palme d'Or, the abandoned ABC pilot that turned into Mulholland Drive, and the cow Lynch used to promote Inland Empire. The last questions cover everything else he did: the comic strip, the albums, the Paris nightclub, the coffee brand, the daily weather reports, Transcendental Meditation and the foundation, the roles in Louie and The Fabelmans, and the tributes that followed his death. Every answer has been checked against the Wikipedia articles on Lynch and his films.
30 of 70 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which Montana city was David Lynch born in January 1946?
Missoula
He often described himself simply as 'Eagle Scout, Missoula, Montana'.
Q 02Lynch's father Donald worked as a research scientist for which federal agency?
The USDA
Lynch remembered being driven through the forests in his father's green Forest Service truck and then left alone in the woods.
Q 03Which rank did Lynch reach in the Boy Scouts, despite claiming he only joined so he could quit?
Eagle Scout
He was standing with other Scouts outside the White House for John F. Kennedy's inauguration, which fell on his 15th birthday.
Q 04Which Robert Henri book inspired the teenage Lynch to dedicate himself to 'the art life'?
The Art Spirit
The friend was Toby Keeler; his father Bushnell Keeler was the painter.
Q 05In which city did David Lynch attend the Academy of the Fine Arts and make his first short films?
Philadelphia
He called the city 'the biggest influence in my whole life' and later described Eraserhead as his 'Philadelphia Story'.
Q 06Which 1967 short, Lynch's first film, did he describe as '57 seconds of growth and fire, and three seconds of vomit'?
Six Men Getting Sick
It shared first prize at the academy's end-of-year show with a painting by Noel Mahaffey.
Q 07Which newly founded institution financed David Lynch's 1970 short The Grandmother?
The American Film Institute
It initially offered $5,000 of his requested $7,200 budget and later granted the rest.
Q 08To keep Eraserhead going, Lynch took a paper route delivering which newspaper?
The Wall Street Journal
He also borrowed from his father, and eventually lived full-time on the set.
Q 09Which actor played Henry, the quiet young man left to care for a deformed baby, in Eraserhead?
Jack Nance
Nance became a Lynch regular, later playing Pete Martell in Twin Peaks.
Q 10Which legendary director named Eraserhead one of his all-time favorite films?
Stanley Kubrick
The film was rejected by Cannes and New York but became one of the key midnight movies of the 1970s.
Q 11Which comedy director's company produced The Elephant Man after he saw Eraserhead and declared 'You're a madman!'?
Mel Brooks
Lynch picked the script purely on hearing its title, the first of four his producer offered him.
Q 12Which real Victorian Londoner does The Elephant Man portray, played by John Hurt?
Joseph Merrick
Anthony Hopkins played the surgeon who took him in; the film earned eight Oscar nominations.
Q 13Which blockbuster did Lynch decline to direct for Lucas, with 'next door to zero interest'?
Return of the Jedi
Lynch told Lucas he should direct it himself so it reflected his own vision.
Q 21Which composer scored Blue Velvet and most of Lynch's later work, including Twin Peaks?
Angelo Badalamenti
The two also recorded the long-shelved Thought Gang album together around 1993; it finally appeared in 2018.
Q 22With which writer-producer did Lynch create Twin Peaks after a failed Marilyn Monroe biopic?
Mark Frost
They had the idea of a corpse washing up on a lakeshore while talking in a coffee shop.
Q 23What was the working title of Twin Peaks before it took its final name?
Northwest Passage
ABC financed the pilot and commissioned a first season of seven episodes.
Q 14Which producer hired Lynch to adapt Dune and contractually bound him to two further projects?
Dino De Laurentiis
Lynch particularly enjoyed building the set for the oil planet Giedi Prime out of steel, bolts and porcelain.
Q 15Who made his film debut as Paul Atreides in Dune, beginning a lifelong collaboration with Lynch?
Kyle MacLachlan
The film cost $45 million and grossed $27.4 million domestically.
Q 16Which rock band composed the soundtrack for Lynch's Dune?
Toto
Brian Eno also contributed a track.
Q 17What screenwriter pseudonym did David Lynch invent for the longer TV cut of Dune, to express his sense of betrayal?
Judas Booth
The director credit went to the standard pseudonym Alan Smithee.
Q 18What does college student Jeffrey Beaumont find in a field at the start of Blue Velvet?
A severed ear
The film is set in Lumberton, North Carolina, and was shot in Wilmington.
Q 19Who played the gas-huffing psychopath Frank Booth in Blue Velvet?
Dennis Hopper
Frank is moved to tears by a lip-synced performance of Roy Orbison's 'In Dreams'.
Q 20Lynch said Blue Velvet was 'sparked' by which singer's 1963 recording of the title song?
Bobby Vinton
He said it made him think of lawns and the neighborhood.
Q 24Whose murder does FBI agent Dale Cooper investigate in Twin Peaks?
Laura Palmer
Sheryl Lee played the murdered high school student.
Q 25Which hard-of-hearing FBI chief did Lynch himself play in Twin Peaks?
Gordon Cole
He directed two of the first season's seven episodes and the series finale.
Q 26What did ABC insist Twin Peaks do in season two, which Lynch called one of his biggest professional regrets?
Reveal the killer's identity early
The show also moved from Thursday to Saturday night and was canceled after ratings dropped.
Q 27Frank Silva, who played the entity Bob in Twin Peaks, originally worked on the show in what job?
Set dresser
He was cast after being glimpsed on set; his reflection in a mirror is one of the show's most famous shots.
Q 28Twin Peaks was filmed largely around which small town in Washington state?
Snoqualmie
Japanese tourists later traveled there purely to see the locations after the show became a hit in Japan.
Q 29Wild at Heart was adapted from a novel by which writer, who later co-wrote Lost Highway?
Barry Gifford
Lynch's friend Monty Montgomery gave him the book hoping to direct it himself.
Q 30Which classic film does Wild at Heart repeatedly reference?
The Wizard of Oz
Lynch called the plot 'a road picture, a love story, a psychological drama and a violent comedy'.