Hoping to revive the taste for surreal television, ABC hired Twin Peaks creator David Lynch to pilot a noirish program called Mulholland Drive . After insisting that the director cut down on cigarette-smoking characters and shots of dog poop, the risk-averse network ditched the series and filled its time slot with another Friends clone.
David Lynch kept smoking Marlboro cigarettes on set. 
mnli hypothesis: David Lynch kept smoking Marlboro cigarettes on set.  premise: Hoping to revive the taste for surreal television, ABC hired Twin Peaks creator David Lynch to pilot a noirish program called Mulholland Drive . After insisting that the director cut down on cigarette-smoking characters and shots of dog poop, the risk-averse network ditched the series and filled its time slot with another Friends clone.