From: fakeaddress@mindspring.com   
      
   There's a DD article in the April 2005 issue #6 of the sorry little   
   shriveled-up shell of a magazine that passes for the US version of   
   DREAMWATCH.  I have no idea if the UK version contains anything   
   similar, since all the stores around here stopped carrying it when   
   the US version started being published.  :(  The only illustrations   
   are ancient XF publicity pics.  The bits in [brackets] are mine;   
   any errors outside the brackets (such as dubious lawsuit descriptions   
   and missing children) are theirs.  I left out a column on "Everything   
   You Need to Know About" TXF column and added quotation marks around   
   episode titles.   
      
   It's clear from the final paragraph that this "interview" consists of   
   quotes from the exact same unknown group press event that has generated   
   the recent flood of other "next winter" articles (eg. EMPIRE).   
   The paragraph devoted to DD's musings on the XF DVDs (and the fact   
   that he talks about XF at such length but *not at all* about HOD)   
   makes me think it may have been some kind of contractually-obligated   
   FOX event to promote the DVDs ...?   
      
      
   ===> pages 48-50   
   TIME TUNNEL   
      
   Celebrating Yesterday's Fantastic Entertainment   
      
   The X-Files   
      
   DAVID DUCHOVNY is inextricably bound up with the success of 1990s   
   television hit THE X-FILES, but when it started the show's longevity   
   was far from guaranteed ...   
      
   Words: Ian Spelling   
      
   Dramatic X-cellence   
      
   You may think that THE X-FILES was a big-hitting genre series, but it   
   was no LOST.  Back when it started, no one really cared all that much   
   about THE X-FILES.  The ratings were OK at best, the buzz was minimal   
   and if the show were to debut today under those same circumstances   
   it'd be cancelled in a matter of weeks.  However, Fox held steady   
   with its new supernatural series, let it breathe, and allowed   
   creator/executive producer Chris Carter to work out the kinks   
   in his undeniably engrossing premise.   
      
   Meanwhile, David Duchovny -- who played FBI Special Agent Fox 'Spooky'   
   Mulder to Gillian Anderson's FBI Special Agent Dana Scully -- did his   
   thing under the radar, all the while cranking out such classic first   
   year episodes as THE X-FILES' pilot, "Ice", "Beyond the Sea" and   
   "The Erlenmeyer Flask", the last of which most people regard as   
   the first bona fide conspiracy hour.   
      
   "Back then I was just trying to survive, just trying to educate myself   
   as an actor, as a working actor, and just trying to get through that   
   first year, which was a marathon," recalls Duchovny today, several   
   years after the end of the show.  "It was something I'd never   
   experienced before.  I was still trying to figure out what kind of a   
   performer I could be and trying to get better as an actor.  I didn't   
   really think about the show outside of what my role within the show was.   
   I kind of left it to Chris and the writers to figure out what THE X-FILES   
   was at first, and I just did my job.  I really had the blinders on for   
   the first 25 episodes because we were working 14-, 15-, 16-hour days and   
   I was just trying to get confident as an actor and get into the role."   
      
      
   Conspiracy Goes Mainstream   
      
   Not too much later, lots of eyes were on THE X-FILES.  The ratings rose   
   -- though the show never actually attained Nielsen blockbuster status --   
   and, perhaps more importantly, the mainstream embraced its cultiness.   
   All that coincided with Duchovny, Anderson and Carter finding their   
   respective strides and the show itself gaining traction with such   
   memorable second-season episodes as "The Host", "Duane Barry",   
   "Humbug" and "Anasazi".   
      
   "I think we all got better," Duchovny asserts.  "I think the stories   
   got better, the acting got better and the directing got better ... At   
   some point we just reached this critical mass where it was just a great   
   show and this unstoppable force, where you put a great show on TV and   
   people will find it.  Luckily, we had that little while to get great.   
   We didn't get cancelled before we figured out what we were and what   
   we were doing.  Once we did that, there was nothing like it."   
      
   Over the years on most long-running television shows, the actors   
   eventually assume guardianship of their characters.  Whereas a writer   
   and/or writer-producer invents a character, sometimes in his or her own   
   image, the actor then fills in the fine details.  And several seasons in,   
   they tend to dictate -- sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly -- the   
   ongoing character development.  "I was always interesting [interested?]   
   in writing, but early on I didn't so much take guardianship of the   
   character," says Duchovny, who first received "story by" credits   
   on the second season episodes "Colony" and "Anasazi".   
      
   "Although on a day-to-day basis there were discussions of what to do,   
   of what was correct for the character, it was never really contentious.   
   We were all pretty much on the same page that way.  But when I started   
   to write for the show, then I really became interested in trying to   
   take Mulder into areas that might be interesting for me as an actor   
   to play and for me as a storyteller to tell."   
      
      
   Deepening the Mythology   
      
   "By the time I was really writing for the show, it was the sixth   
   and seventh season," he adds, referring to "The Unnatural",   
   "Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" and "Hollywood A.D.", all of which   
   he scripted.  "In the early ones my interest was in the mythology and   
   kind of deepening the context in which the show was finding itself,   
   so it became like this prism through which you saw all of American   
   history or whatever.  It was really too ambitious.  I liked opening   
   it up, but when it came time to actually write an individual episode   
   I felt that by then, by the sixth and seventh years, what we'd lost   
   was the idea that the essential character of Mulder was that he was   
   a loser ... He was never publicly right, even though the audience   
   knew he was right.  He never solved a case.  He was never promoted.   
   He was a laughingstock.  I think the difficulty with the show becoming   
   what it did was I became a star, the show became a star, and it was   
   hard to see the guy as a loser anymore.  He was dressing better.   
   He had a better haircut and all that stuff that comes with money   
   and notoriety.  The fact was I felt his loser aspect had been lost.   
   So the couple of times I really tried to make a show I wanted to get   
   back to the fact that he's a loser, and what comes out of that is his   
   pathos, humanity and humor.  To me that was always the best part of   
   the character.  I'd rather listen to a loser than a winner any day   
   tell a story ... That's what I wanted to get back to."   
      
   As season seven played out, Duchovny made it clear he wanted to move on.   
   He still loved THE X-FILES and was appreciative of all it had done for   
   him and his career, but he was exhausted -- remember, they'd also squeezed   
   in an X-FILES movie.  He was also engaged in a lawsuit against Fox in   
   which he sought a larger share of the show's profits, and he was eager   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)