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The World Needs This Documentary About 'Twin Peaks' Log Lady Catherine Coulson

Hurry up and crowdfund it, people.
Photo by ABC Photo Archives/ABC via Getty Images.

Finally, a new documentary project aims to answer Special Agent Dale Cooper's immortal question: "Who's the lady with the log?" Last week, director Richard Green launched a new Kickstarter campaign to raise money for the first authorized documentary about Catherine Coulson, the actress most famous for playing Margaret Lanterman, a.k.a. the Log Lady, in David Lynch's Twin Peaks.

The Log Lady was one of the most enduring pieces of Lynch's original Twin Peaks—save for Cooper's love of coffee and that scream that will haunt your dreams forever. In the decades since the show's original run went off the air, Coulson's character has popped up everywhere from The Simpsons to Psych to a Sesame Street parody, and has been the go-to Halloween costume for people who need to throw together a costume using stuff they can find in their backyard and closet.

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Although best known for that role—which she reprised in the 1992 Twin Peaks prequel film Fire Walk with Me, and Showtime's recent revival, Twin Peaks: The Return—Coulson collaborated with Lynch for decades on a variety of projects, both in front of and behind the camera before her death in 2015. Now Green, a close friend of the late actress, is trying to raise $250,000 to make a documentary about her life and career, appropriately titled I Knew Catherine, the Log Lady.

"I knew Catherine from the Eraserhead days," Green says in the Kickstarter video about Coulson's work as the assistant director on Lynch's first feature-length film. "When I heard that Catherine died four days after shooting her last Log Lady scenes, a character who was also dying, I knew we had to tell the story. And when David spoke to me so intimately about Catherine, I knew we had a story to tell."

When she wasn't working with Lynch, Coulson's varied career included gigs as first assistant camera on movies like The Wrath of Khan and starring in numerous productions for the prestigious Oregon Shakespeare Company, Variety reports. She died just days after filming her final scenes for Twin Peaks: The Return.

Green has already raised more than $30,000 to finance the documentary, but he's still working toward the Kickstarter's $250,000 goal. The quarter million-dollar budget will go toward offering a personal look at Coulson's life and career, and feature extensive interviews with those who knew and worked with her, including Lynch himself. It will also cover licensing fees to use Coulson's scenes from Twin Peaks in the film since there can't really be a Log Lady documentary without footage of the Log Lady herself.

Kickstarter donations will also earn you a whole lot of tree-related perks, including your own tree planted in the "Log Lady Grove" and a $250 custom, Magic 8 Ball-style log of your very own, though no promises that it will whisper secrets of the forest into your ear or whatever.

Ultimately, though, all perks aside, Coulson's Twin Peaks performance was instantly iconic, and her scenes from The Return brought a rare, emotional power to an otherwise cold and distant season. The world could really use a documentary celebrating her life. You can head over to the Kickstarter page and help I Knew Catherine hit its goal before the campaign ends on June 16.

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