#iwtb

(*Note*: I wasn't, at this time, able to order the July 21st interviews by release time. Therefore, they are subject to interpretation.)

July 21, 2008: Q: Now, you guys hadn’t, uh, really seen much of each other for the past five years. What was going on with that? 

DD: Well, Gillian lives in London and I live in here. And, um. 

GA: We, we email each other from time to time. Or sometimes….

DD: [Cutting in with light tone] We had enough of each other, quite honestly. [GA laughs.] I mean, we spent almost every day together-- [GA makes wincing noise] --for eight and a half years. I’m not kidding, right? Really.

GA: That’s more time than I’ve spent with my brother or sister in their lifetime. So--

DD: Or--

GA: --that’s, that’s a lot.

DD: Or any-- [GA: Or parents, even!] --of your many husbands. 

[Both laugh.]

GA: [Laughing] Yeah! Shut up. [Comedically swacks him.]

Q: How--

GA: It’s true. 

July (21?) 2008: Q: Chemistry is hard! How did you guys come, how did you guys do it again?

DD: You know, it's just, it's... we're just lucky, I think, as actors to play well off one another. And it's kind of been that way from the beginning when, when I, when we were waiting to go in and read for the network. Uh, I forget, did I come up to you [addressing Gillian]? I mean, I just, we just started running lines with one another-- [GA: Mm hm.] --before we went in there, so--

GA: You were trying to pick me up.

DD: [Pauses, looks up] ...Was I?

GA: [Laughs.]

DD: Was I?

GA: [Laughing] I don't know.

DD: Do you think I was?

GA: [Hands up] No, no, no, I didn't say that! But, um....

DD: [Mock exaggeration] I, I never! [GA: Laughs.]

GA: No.

July 21 (published 22), 2008: Question: What do you think the secret is to your chemistry when you two plays these characters as actors?

Anderson: We've actually been having a fifteen year affair.

July 21?, 2008: [Cutaway after CC's remark: "Yeah, we had as much fun, uh, pretending what this movie wasn't than what this movie was."]

DD: We’re having a baby. 

Interviewer: [points to GA] Congratulations! 

GA: Thank you. 

Interviewer: Is it going to be an alien child? 

DD: Yes. 

GA: Uh, yes it is. 

DD: Half English.

July 22, 2008: GA: What was your first impression of me when we first met?

DD: [Sits back, thinks Gillian is pulling a prank on him.]

GA: [Laughs.]

DD: Let me see if that's truly written.

GA: [Laughing] It is! [Flashes card around] It is!

[Note: Both are referencing and reacting to Gillian’s press junket joke, i.e. that David tried to pick her up while they were reading for the pilot.]

DD: [Smiling] Okay. Uh. I, I can, uh, I can picture, you were-- I think, you know, I may be making it up, but I think you were sitting on the stairs of, outside of Peter Roth's office where we were going to go-- [GA: Mm hm.] --read together, for, for The X-Files. There were two guys and three girls, and we were all gonna, you know, mix and match. And I went up to you; and you were sitting there, and I wanted to run the lines with you; and, and we ran the lines. And, uh.... [Thunks card against his chair loudly.]  And uh.... [trying to contain his smirk across from Gillian's wide grin.] And, uh, it's fifteen years ago-- [faces her, smile threatening to break free at her gleeful amusement] --you know, so I don't remember exactly. You, you just said that I tried to pick you up, I don't remember that--

GA: [Laughs.]

DD: --and I, and I don't think that's true; but I think it's funny. [Grins back at her, eases back.]

GA: It is funny.

August 2008: Question: The X-Files first started production in 1993, when you, David, were 33 and you, Gillian, 25. Do you remember meeting each other for the first time?

Duchovny: Yeah. It was at the network reading for the pilot. There were two actors – me and another guy – and four or five girls. And just by chance I sat down next to Gillian and said, "Do you want to read through the lines?

Anderson: I remember it a little differently. The first time I met David was outside in the hallway at that reading, and he was quite charming and picking up all the girls passing by. (Both laugh)

THE TRUTH BENEATH THE JOKES

When stripped of their humor and banter, how did Gillian and David describe their friendship?

In similarly complicated (yet straightforward) terms--

December 15, 2007: “I think we're good,” he says without emotion. “We haven’t had a lot of contact over the last few years. Not out of any kind of enmity: we just drifted naturally into our own space. There were times that we were definitely tired of one another. It was eight or nine years of intense work and a lot of life changes.”

April 16, 2008: Shock: What’s that like with David now that you’re not with each other 16 hours a day on a series?

Anderson: It’s great, but it was great then, too. This is like a sibling relationship and I never had siblings. I had brothers and sisters that started when I was 13, so I was out of the house and didn’t have that experience. There was always this love/hate – hate is too big of a word – but there was always something. It was a natural relationship over a period of time. Now we’ve grown up and we’re older, we’re more appreciative of the relationship period and the unique experience we had together and have an opportunity to continue that and foster it. We’ve always loved each other and we’re always going to be a battle sometimes.

July 22 (interviewd on 21st?), 2008: Question: David, you famously sort of distanced yourself from the show in the last season, being fatigued, and then we hear that you're really the now who was big into getting this movie done. Can you talk about that? Is it a love/hate relationship?

Duchovny: I wouldn't characterize me as the one who really wanted to get it going, but I'm certainly someone who would always say yes whenever Chris and I would talk about it. The love/hate has nothing to do with the actual content, the actual people, the actual anything. The love/hate had to do with me wanting to get on with the rest of my life, the rest of my career and when you think about it, that I did eight years and Gillian did nine, that's a lifetime. There are no other dramas that keep the same characters that run that long. If you look at 'Law & Order' or 'ER', they're twenty years old or whatever they are, but they're completely recast. So it's just not something you see. You don't see actors not get fatigued and not get frustrated in a drama where we're working, cell phones or not, everyday for many, many hours playing the same characters. So it's just natural to burnout. There was always love for the show and love for the character. There was never any hate for that.

Anderson: But it's interesting that it's always something for the press to latch onto. It's always a surprise, in some way or it's a good headline, that someone wants to leave. It creates good drama and so it always becomes this thing where actually it's just a natural thing.

August 1, 2008: Q: Why did you do the film?

DD: It was always in the back of my mind. Especially leaving the show a year before it finished, I always said to Chris and Gillian I didn’t want to destroy the show, I just wanted to do it as a movie franchise. I wanted to do another X Files film, it didn’t matter about the money. It provides some resolution in my relationships with Chris and Gillian. […]

Q: When was the last time you saw Gillian Anderson prior to shooting the film?

DD: It had been a number of years but when you spend that much time with someone it doesn’t feel like you’ve been apart. She’s like my sister.

Q: After working so closely together for eight years you must have been sick of the sight of each other.

DD: Absolutely. Familiarity breeds contempt. It’s nothing to do with the other person. All that fades away and you’re just left with the appreciation and love for the people you’ve worked with for so long. We used to argue about nothing. We couldn’t stand the sight of each other.

And that’s not a negative, mind. It’s simply interesting to piece together the whole picture of 2007-2008.

CONCLUSION

Thanks for reading~