You'd think that getting slimed by rapidly evolving alien creatures would make a performer a bit apprehensive. Well, that's just not the case for David Duchovny. The actor who has made a name for himself investigating aliens for the past eight years on TV's THE X-FILES ends up in similar circumstances (albeit more comedic ones) in the recently released EVOLUTION, directed by Ivan Reitman (GHOSTBUSTERS).
"Last year on THE X-FILES they had fish hooks in my face," muses Duchovny. "I've been treated a lot worse. Sliming is like a walk in the park after you've been probed and fish hooked."
Certainly, the role of Agent Fox Mulder has had its share of levity over the course of the series' run, but in EVOLUTION Duchovny truly gets a chance to let loose, have fun and not worry about taking his new alien adversaries all too serious.
"This kind of movie is a lot harder to pull off than it looks," admits Duchovny. "I give a lot of credit to Ivan because it has to be real enough. The germ of the idea of a microbe landing and then evolving quickly is a smart funny science-fiction idea. But you have to have characters and situations that are believable enough that the audience is interested in the story. Then the other end is you have to have the comedy. I wanted to be funny, though. I took the movie because I wanted to do funny scenes and play a funny character that I could be goofy in which I haven't done before."
In EVOLUTION, Duchovny plays Dr. Ira Kane, a college professor and former government scientist who lucks upon a meteor landing only to discover it's an alien force moving up the evolutionary ladder at an alarming rate. Teamed with college colleague Harry Block (Orlando Jones) and an idiot fireman trainee Wayne (Seann William Scott), the trio fends off the interfering government and, of course, the pesky aliens themselves.
However, after spending so many years on the X-FILES thwarting government and alien threats, you would think that getting back into the game, so soon after leaving his day job, would be the last thing on Duchovny's mind.
"Ivan had called to meet me and he basically said 'I want you to do this movie,' and I said 'I want to do movies with you right now,'" says Duchovny who previously worked in the Reitman produced BEETHOVEN dog movie. "He handed me the script, I got in my car and they say show business is hard but that was pretty easy. Ivan just handed me a movie. So then I went home and read it and it had aliens in it. I was like, 'God damn, what are the odds.' So I sat down and thought about the kind of performance I wanted to give in this movie and it really couldn't be further from the X-FILES. Even though the idea of aliens is a superficial coincidence, to me in the end, that was the worst of the song and I was more interested in doing the performance of the song. Besides, I thought, 'Am I going to make them make me not do this movie because I don't want to do something with aliens?'"
Looks like Duchovny's got a thing for red-headed, alien bashers
© 2001 DreamWorks SKG
While EVOLUTION is the beginning of Duchovny's full-time focus on a big screen career, his small screen stint on THE X-FILES came to a close this May. Although he only appeared in half of the episodes this season, he notes that for him, his presence on the show is officially over.
"I'm done with the show," he notes saying he likely won't be returning next season for cameos. "I'm sure they would [want me to], but I'm done. I just can't justify creatively going back. I think that I've been really proud of the work I've done on the show. It's a great show. I've done eight years of it. I don't feel like I'm abandoning shop. If I had done one year, I would feel that. However I feel I fulfilled my contract with the show with the fans. I think the fans understand that eight years is a long time."
Regardless, Duchovny feels that the show has been left in good hands, particularly with Robert Patrick filling in full-time as Agent Doggett (a transition which has surprisingly been embraced with little resistance by the show's fans). He's also pleased with the way the season finale ended this year. After years of sexual tension between Mulder and Scully, the two consummated their attraction to each other with a passionate kiss revealing that in many ways this is the real "truth" that has been out there all along.
"That was the mystery scene," says Duchovny. "We didn't get that scene until two hours before we shot it. I was like, 'Let me see the scene' we had to act it. It was a big mystery, but it's a big mystery to me if I can't memorize it. Three hours before [we shot it], the guy handcuffed to a briefcase comes in, the handcuffs came off and they opened it. The scene originally ended with Scully kissing me on the forehead. We all sat down with [director] Kim Manners and [series creator] Chris Carter and said, 'We've been teasing and doing that bull for so long, let's have a real kiss at this point.' I said, 'I'm pretty sure I'm not coming back at this point so let's have a romantic kiss.'"
Still, the big dilemma writers will have to face next season is resolving the aftermath of the kiss without the benefit of Mulder being around and without making him look like a schlep.
"I care how they resolve Mulder kissing and running [away]," says Duchovny. "If you watch the show, you realize that emotional issues are not important to the show really, that what they think of resolution is resolving a storyline or a plotline. If you've ever had a dog, you know that the best way to train a dog is not to give it a treat every time it does something right, but to do it once every five times. I forget what they call it, but it's like irregular reinforcement. So the fans of X-FILES are a classic example of if you give people what they want all the time, they'll probably walk away. But if you give it to them one out of 10 times, they'll go, 'Oh, I gotta watch that show! It could happen this time.'"
Orlando Jones is the victim of a literal alien anal probe
© 2001 DreamWorks SKG
While the future of the X-FILES movie franchise remains a mystery, Duchovny has expressed an interest in returning to the character of Mulder for any feature films down the road.
"I love THE X-FILES and I love playing Mulder," says the actor. "I would be interested in seeing a script and doing it again. I assume that's why I wasn't killed at the end. I think that they want to retain the franchise-ability of the show. I loved the first movie, and I would expect that there would be another movie, but I would have to look at the script and see if it was a script that I wanted to do. I would hope that it would be in like two or three years when I really miss the show, I miss the character and it would be great to return to that. I've always said that I would love to play Mulder in a wheelchair eventually because I loved the character and I would love to take him through the decades."
Another character that Duchovny wouldn't mind playing again is his role of DEA Agent Denise/Dennis Bryson from the David Lynch co-created TV series TWIN PEAKS. This, of course, would require Duchovny to put on a dress again, but the actor is game.
"I was only in a few of the episodes when the show was kind of fading," says Duchovny. "David Lynch didn't have much to do with the show and he certainly wasn't on the set at that point. I was excited thinking I was going to get to work with David Lynch and disappointed when I didn't. I have really, really fond feelings for that character. Whenever anybody asked me, 'Do you think there will be another TWIN PEAKS movie?' I would really hope and wish and prey that my character would be in it. I only got to do three episodes, but it's a really great, funny, interesting character."
Ironically, now that actor's schedule has been freed up, Duchovny may have more time on his hands due to the pending actors strike. Still, if anything, Duchovny hopes that being freed from X-FILES will allow him to branch out and take some risks with his acting choices.
"I realized that I could go back and make great money and probably do the show for three or four more years," says Duchovny. "But you just feel it. Something inside of you goes, 'I need to be addressed here.' And I'm not addressing what I got into acting to do. No offense to the show, but I had done it. Whatever was in me that drove me to act in the first place was saying, 'Let's go off and be afraid. Let's go off and try something new. Let's leave the more comfortable job.' I believe you do your best work when you're scrambling."
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