Sunday » March 16 » 2008

Filming of The X-Files sequel wraps
Creator Chris Carter, star David Duchovny thank city after secret-
filled, three-month shoot

Glen Schaefer
The Province

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

CREDIT: Les Bazso - The Province
Star David Duchovny says he always wanted The X-Files to become a
feature-film franchise.

Goodbye, and thanks for all the aliens.

The cast and crew of the still-untitled X-Files feature film sequel
wrapped up work in Vancouver with a press conference yesterday, a
brief lifting of a curtain of secrecy that the production has
maintained through three months of filming.

"We've had lots of paparazzi," said writer-director Chris Carter. "In
Langley a couple of days ago a black SUV pulled up on the side of the
road and there was a long lens pointed at us."

The next day, pictures of stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson,
locked in a full-on kiss as FBI agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully,
appeared on Internet fansites alongside breathless speculation about
the characters' are-they-or-aren't-they romance.

"We staged that," Duchovny told reporters at the Sutton Place Hotel,
where media were informed Anderson would not attend due to illness.

"It's been a two-way street," says Carter of the prying eyes. "To
tell you the truth, I would like to make the movie secretly and put
it out there on July 25, have everybody get a gift they could open."

Duchovny finished work late the night before and was catching a plane
to Los Angeles yesterday. The rest of the crew were to finish by
week's end. The movie is a stand-alone story unconnected to the
series' ongoing conspiracy thread, but beyond that they're not saying
much.

"We're not doing an exercise in nostalgia to appeal to the fans of
the show," said co-writer and producer Frank Spotnitz. "We saw this
as an opportunity to introduce the characters to people who may have
been too young . . . It has a reason for being, even if there'd never
been a television show before."

Carter said their secrecy extended to the fluorescent-pink signs film
productions use to direct crew to locations. Their signs read "Done
One Productions."

The original series filmed for five years in Vancouver starting in
1993 and became a big hit for the Fox network, in turn boosting
Vancouver's filmmaking profile.

"It would please me to no end to think that we were helpful to
Vancouver, because this was the perfect city to film this particular
show in," Duchovny said. "When we came here, we barely knew what we
were doing, and as we got better, the crews grew with us."

The show moved production to Los Angeles after the fifth season and
continued there for four more years. A 1998 feature film also shot in
L.A.

But cast and crew kept their ties to Vancouver - Carter still has a
home in the city and Duchovny has filmed two movies here since The X-
Files headed south.

Co-writer Spotnitz said the new script was written specifically for
locations in Vancouver and Pemberton, where they filmed for three
weeks. As with the series, the B.C. locations stand in for places in
the U.S. The producers showed reporters a trailer for the new movie
with Anderson, Duchovny and shaggy co-star Billy Connolly searching a
snowy field with dogs and sticks for some unspecified monster.

The new story picks up with the main characters in real time, six
years after the events of the series. Duchovny, who left the series
the year before it wrapped, said he always wanted The X-Files to
become a feature franchise.

"This is a great, flawed, questing hero - there's always more stories
for that person to be involved in," said the actor, who now stars in
another TV series, the dysfunctional-sex comedy Californication.

He brought his children with actress wife Tea Leoni to stay in
Whistler during this latest working trip.

"I do consider Vancouver one of the three cities I've lived in in my
my life," Duchovny said. "It is a home away from home."

gschaefer@...

© The Province 2008

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MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.


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