Gillian Anderson has a lot on her plate
She’s got a smorgasbord, from ‘Hannibal’ to ‘X-Files’
If there is ever such a thing as too much Gillian Anderson, this might be the year for it.
“People are going to get so sick of me,” says Anderson, 46, who has four series lined up. Now appearing opposite Mads Mikkelsen in the third season of NBC’s macabre Hannibal (Thursdays, 10 p.m.), the Emmy winner also will star next year in Fox’s reboot of sci-fi smash The X-Files, Season 3 of BBC’s The Fall, airing on Netflix, and BBC’s War and Peace miniseries, premiering on A&E, Lifetime and History.
“It’s a great time. I’m fortunate to have the range of stuff available to me,” she says. “It’s nice to be able to work out how to fit as much of it in as possible, and still have a life and be an active mother” to her three children.
It’s safe to say the younger ones won’t be watching mommy’s current TV outing anytime soon. On Hannibal, Anderson plays the icy Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier, a former psychiatrist to Hannibal Lecter (Mikkelsen) who jetted off to Europe with the on-the-lam serial killer at the end of Season 2.
When the high-concept ( but low-rated) thriller returned last week, the duo was posing as a married couple under new identities. And just as Hannibal added yet another victim to his cannibalistic menu right before Bedelia’s eyes, a series of flashbacks revealed she also may be capable of murder.
“She’s on a very complex and disturbing journey,” Anderson says. Now that Bedelia is complicit in his thirst for blood, “there is a fear for her and for us that Hannibal could potentially turn on her, and that she is as much a vic- tim as anybody else. You can see she’s in over her head, but there’s also this certain amount of delight and enjoyment she’s getting in being so close to something that is so dangerous and titillating for her.”
As an X-Files fan, Hannibal creator Bryan Fuller sought out Anderson because of her “amazing pedigree in genre television” and felt fortunate to nab her for a supporting role for the drama’s first two seasons. He offered her a role as a series regular, expanding Bedelia’s story line this season.
“She was so game, and I’ve absolutely adored working with her,” Fuller says. “One of the things I like about Bedelia and Gillian’s portrayal is that you believe she is every bit as smart as Hannibal Lecter, and you need a very intelligent actor to be able to pull that relationship off.”
Of course, Anderson knows about complex partnerships, having played the skeptical FBI agent Dana Scully to David Duchovny’s more credulous Fox Mulder for nine seasons on The X-Files. The supernatural crime show, which ended in 2002 and inspired two film sequels, will be revived as a six-episode “event series” next year — an idea that initially didn’t excite Anderson.
“It wasn’t of interest to me,” she says. “But the more that David and (creator Chris Carter) talked to me about how much fun it would be, (that) there hadn’t been closure before, and it was unlikely there would ever be another feature, they won me over.”
It’s the latest example of reboot fever sweeping across the small screen. But to Anderson, the logic behind X-Files’ return is no mystery.
“It was such a huge thing in people’s lives way back when. It was the beginning of appointment television, and people dedicated every single Friday (or Sunday) night to watching it, and they became very fond of the characters. I understand the excitement around it in this case.”