X MARKS THE SPOT
Creator happy to be filming in B.C.
Chris Carter, the creator of the hit sci-fi show The X-Files returned to the B.C. coast this week to be the guest speaker at a Vancouver International Film Festival Industry panel being held on National Canadian Film Day Wednesday. The recently announced reboot of the series, consisting of six new episodes featuring most of the original cast and crew (including David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson reprising their roles as FBI agents Mulder and Scully), will be shot in Vancouver later this year. It will air on Fox in 2016. The Vancouver Sun chatted with Carter about the return of The X-Files to B.C. and how truly Canadian the series really is.
Q
As you know, you were a pioneer in making the Canadian film and TV scene explode. Do you get criticized for taking work away from Los Angeles?
A
I don’t get criticized. I’ve actually contributed to a lot of work in L.A., certainly with the last four years of The X-Files. Everybody has their sensitivities. For me, Vancouver has always been the perfect place to do The X-Files. It doubles as almost anywhere you want in America, which is where the FBI pursues its cases. It also gives you great atmosphere through much of the shooting season: You get long dark nights, you get often times a moodiness of light — even in the daytime — that gives the show its signature look.
Q
Was that part of the decision to shoot here? What was that process like back in the ‘90s when The X-Files were
being conceived?
A
I’ve actually been coming to Vancouver since 1986. My wife, who also was in the entertainment business, was making a Disney Sunday movie. It was a one-hour movie for ABC. I came up with her and I saw this place I’d never visited. And here is this place that is so beautiful and it’s got these amazing, beautiful forests that she was shooting in. When I wrote The X-Files pilot and it came time to produce it, we were looking around L.A. — the pilot has an important forest in it — and we couldn’t find a good forest. So it was a no-brainer to go to Vancouver.
Q
Was the decision to come back here for the reboot an easy one to make?
A
For me, it was an easy one to make. I think for the actors, they have family and obligations — it’s shooting abroad, really — so I think everyone is torn. … I know this to be true: everyone loves shooting in Vancouver.
Q
Let’s talk about the six new episodes. Mitch Pileggi, who plays Walter Skinner, confirmed on Twitter he’s returning. The Cigarette Smoking Man is saying he might be there, he might not be there. What can you confirm?
A
I’ll confirm they’re both coming back. I won’t say how they’re coming back. As people who know the show know, the Cigarette Smoking Man was incinerated in the series finale (two-parter The Truth, in 2002), so how he comes back is going to be handled — I’ll call it — “in a particular X-Files way.”
Q
Why the decision to make it six episodes? As a storyteller, is six episodes better than 24 or 25 to tell a certain story arc?
A
For me, it’s a dream come true. Television has changed. You see cable shows that are now eight and 13 episodes. That’s what I would call a very “human” approach to a business that can just overtax crews, writers, producers and directors by trying to do 22-25 episodes a year. When we were trying to do 22-25 episodes a year, I worked 11 and a half months a year intensively. And those two weeks off, if you weren’t thinking about what you were gonna do in the next 11 and a half months, you were already behind. It could not be a more intense and difficult workload.
Q
In a way, would you consider The X-Files to be somewhat Canadian in its identity?
A
Could you say it has a Canadian identity? Without a doubt. Canada put its stamp on The X-Files in no uncertain terms. I think it’s a misconception that people think, “Oh, he’s coming up there because of the exchange rate.” I fight hard for the budgets I get, and if I can stretch the dollar, it’s that much more I can put on screen — not for savings, but because I get to make a project as good as it possibly can be. More on the screen is what it’s all about.