* Recurring use of the numbers: 1013 - Ten Thirteen is the name of Chris Carter's production company; his birthday is 13 October 1956. The number 1121 also appears often; it is creator Chris Carter's wife, Dori's, birthday.
* "I made this.", the words spoken over the Ten Thirteen company name, are spoken by Nathan Couturier, son of the supervising sound editor, Thierry Couturier.
* Scully's family has a thing for Moby Dick: Scully is called Starbuck by her father, her dog's name is Queequeg, and she calls her father Captain Ahab.
* The character Senator Richard Matheson is named after Richard Matheson, whose writing inspired "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" (1974), the show that inspired Chris Carter to create The X-Files.
* Brad Follmer, the character played by Cary Elwes, is named after creator Chris Carter's writing assistant, Brad Follmer.
* The series' science consultant, Anne Simon, a virologist at the University of Massachusetts, wrote a non-fiction book in 1999 titled "The Real Science Behind the X-Files: Microbes, Meteorites and Mutants".
* The line "The truth is out there", at the end of the opening credits, was ranked #9 in TV Guide's list of "TV's 20 Top Catchphrases" (21-27 August 2005 issue).
* The production of the show took place in Vancouver, Canada up until season 5. From season 6 the show moved to Los Angeles.
* David Duchovny and his character Fox Mulder have the same middle name: William.
* On an episode of The Simpsons titled "The Springfield Files" both Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny parodied their respective characters of Dana Scully and Fox Mulder.
* The recurring character Cigarette Smoking Man was never given a name until late in the series. He is referred to as Cancerman in some early episodes. The show's fans took to referring to him as simply CSM.
* The Lone Gunmen characters became so popular that they were briefly given their own short-lived series, "The Lone Gunmen" (2001).
* Nicholas Lea, who plays the traitorous agent Alex Krycek, does all his own stunt work.
* Props from Mulder's X-Files office are currently preserved and on display at the Hollywood Entertainment Museum in Los Angeles. According to the museum, the famous I Want to Believe UFO poster from the office continually had to be replaced as copies kept disappearing from the set. The poster on display at the museum is reportedly one of the last available copies of the original set-used posters.
* Ranked #2 in TV Guide's list of the "25 Top Cult Shows Ever!" (30 May 2004 issue).
* The character Fox Mulder was ranked #7 in TV Guide's list of the "25 Greatest Sci-Fi Legends" (1 August 2004 issue).
* During the last season of the show, the opening credits included a shot of a list of "FBI Contacts, Witnesses, and Contributors." The names on the list were actually the screen names of posters on the official "X-Files" message board and changed with each new episode that season. Other names on the list were anagrams of characters on the show.
* Mulder saw Edward D. Wood Jr.'s Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) 42 times. He also lives in apartment number 42. 42 is the answer to life, the universe, and everything from Douglas Adams's "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", another cult sci-fi story.
* Chris Carter lists All the President's Men (1976) as one of his inspirations for the series. There are numerous references to the film, including the shadowy informer Deep Throat, meetings in underground car lots, and hints at conspiracies which stretch all the way to the F.B.I.
* The famous echoing chord from the theme music was a fluke. Composer Mark Snow accidentally rested his elbow on his keyboard with the echo function on, and he liked the resulting sound so much, he wrote the theme around it.
* In the early years of the series, Mulder is a firm believer in extraterrestrials and Scully is skeptical. The opposite is true for the actors who portray them.
* William B. Davis, who plays the Cigarette Smoking Man, is a non-smoker. The cigarettes he uses in his scenes aren't tobacco, they're herbal.
* Dana Scully was named after the famous sports journalist Vin Scully. Mulder is the maiden name of Chris Carter's mother.
* The series does not show episode titles on-screen. While this was not unusual even in 1993 (though it is more commonplace in 2004 when virtually no American dramatic TV series display episode titles), what is unusual is that many fans learned episode titles as well as advance plot information via the Internet. "The X Files" (1993) was one of the first TV series to be so promoted.
* Was the very first TV series to be released on DVD.
* The name of the female lead in The X Files, Dana Scully, is also found in Anne Tyler's bestselling 1985 novel "The Accidental Tourist".
* Mitch Pileggi (Skinner) met his wife Arlene Warren on the set of "The X Files" (1993), while she was Gillian Anderson's (Scully) stand-in. Later in the series, she gets some screen time, as Skinner's secretary, Arlene.
* Robert Patrick, who plays Special Agent John Doggett, is the brother of Richard Patrick, the lead singer of Filter. Filter's music has appeared on the TV soundtrack, "Songs in the Key of X", and the The X Files (1998) movie soundtrack.
* In the episode "Hollywood AD", Scully tells Mulder that she thinks Téa Leoni has a crush on him, to which Mulder responds "How could Téa Leoni have a crush on me?" Téa Leoni is David Duchovny's wife in real-life.
* Gillian Anderson's contractual obligations to this series stated that she could not play an F.B.I. agent in any other production during the series run. As such, Anderson lost out the chance to portray Clarice Starling in Hannibal (2001).
* Fox Mulder's sister Samantha was abducted while she and Fox were watching an episode of "The Magician" (1973). When Patty Hearst (Patricia Hearst) was kidnapped by the SLA, she was watching "The Magician" with her boyfriend Steven Weed.
* The character Leyla Harrison was named after a writer of The X-Files Internet fan-fiction who died of cancer in February 2001. The fictional Leyla Harrison was a fan of Mulder's and Scully's, having spent her time in the F.B.I poring over their expense reports (in much the same way that Internet fans of the show examined the minute nuances of every episode), so the tribute was very appropriate.
* David Duchovny originally suggested Jennifer Beals, his former classmate at Yale, for the lead female role.
* Network executives originally wanted a "taller, leggier, blonder and breastier" actress for the role of Dana Scully, but series creator Chris Carter lobbied for a then-unknown Gillian Anderson.
* When Gillian Anderson got pregnant at the start of Season 2, some network executives wanted her role recast. Execuive Producer Chris Carter adamantly denied their request.
* Chris Carter has cited "Moonlighting" (1985) as an influence on this show, specifically the relationship between Mulder and Scully. Carter also has said cited that show as an example of how not to further the story, as the sexual tension between the two leads should never be resolved.
- SPOILER: David Duchovny (Fox Mulder), Gillian Anderson (Dana Scully) and William B. Davis (Cigarette Smoking Man) are the only actors to appear in both the first and last episodes of the series.
- SPOILER: Scully's abduction during the second season was originally planned as a way of explaining Gillian Anderson's absence due to pregnancy. Later, it became a vital plot point to the ongoing series mythology.
0 comments:
Post a Comment