Is Dylar in White Noise real and what does the drug do?

White Noise may not be the first book from American novelist Don DeLillo, but it’s likely the novel that introduced many of us to his work. It was published in 1985 and is highly celebrated in the realm of literature, often showing up on ‘best novels’ lists. While plenty of fans may not have envisioned a director doing a film adaptation justice, it’s hard to imagine a better fit for the task than Noah Baumbach.

The filmmaker previously helmed such comedy-drama efforts as The Squid And The Whale, Greenberg, While We’re Young, and Marriage Story, with those last two both starring Adam Driver.

Noah and Adam collaborate once again on White Noise, which premieres on Netflix on Friday, December 30th 2022. The actor plays Jack Gladney, a professor who teaches Hitler Studies in 1984.

As audiences dive in, they may be struck by the detail of a mysterious drug named Dylar in White Noise, so let’s address what it is and does with spoilers.

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR WHITE NOISE

(L to R) Don Cheadle as Murray and Adam Driver as Jack seated and staring at each other in White Noise — © 2022

Dylar in White Noise explained

Jack discovers that his wife Babette (played by Greta Gerwig) is taking a prescription drug named Dylar that she is eager to keep hidden from him. He’s unfamiliar with the drug and becomes obsessed with learning about the mysterious substance that his partner is taking.

He finds that it’s not listed, sending him down a rabbit hole that is interrupted by a chemical waste spillage that is labeled the Airborne Toxic Event. The Gladney family finds itself in a camp during the incident but after they return to their lives, it’s clear that Babette isn’t quite right and is feeling even more withdrawn from the family.

As Jack investigates, it’s revealed that Dylar is an experimental treatment to target anxiety and, in particular the fear of death. It’s a fictional drug that was made up by the novel’s author.

Jack himself is grappling with the fear of death following exposure to chemicals after the Airborne Toxic Event, so has even more interest in Dylar. However, he finds that their daughter Denise threw away the bottle. Babette was given the opportunity to participate in the secret Dylar trials after engaging in sexual relations with a man named Mr. Gray.

Jack eventually finds an ad for Dylar in the garbage and heads to confront Mr. Gray.

"Let’s enjoy these aimless days while we can."
Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, and Don Cheadle star in White Noise. In select theaters this November and on Netflix December 30.
— Netflix (@netflix) September 26, 2022

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‘I was reminded how much I loved it’

Dylar is an element stripped straight from the source material and Noah’s adaptation is actually very faithful to the novel, for the most part.

The director was recently interviewed by Entertainment Weekly and asked how he approached adapting a book that a number of its fans considered an unfilmable text:

“It wasn’t something that really entered my mind. It was something that I was responding to, and drawn to adapting, and drawn to make into a movie, so I was following that trail. I wasn’t thinking about whether something is filmable or not. I don’t even know what that means… I read it close to when it came out, and loved it then, and aspects of it have always remained with me.”

He continued: “… but like anything, you start to forget the specifics. I started rereading it, on a lark really, at the end of 2019, beginning of 2020, and I was reminded how much I loved it, but also loving it in a whole new way now.”