Chris Carter Wants You To Believe
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The X-Files was always about turning something mysterious and untraceable into something known — so what better time to capture the elusive podcast interview on camera? That’s right: Fail Better is now on video, and we’re kicking off this new chapter with the one and only Chris Carter, the creator of The X-Files. And he came prepared, alien embryo and all. There’s so much to discuss about the show, and I even reveal my newfound theory about Mulder’s motivations. We also trace Chris’s labyrinthine career path from surfer to sculptor to writer, and he opens up about the critical response to the reboot — and why no one truly understood the ending, despite him leaving clues in plain sight.
Fail Better is now on YouTube! Watch this episode here.
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Transcript
SPEAKERS
Chris Carter, David Duchovny
David Duchovny 00:05
I’m David Duchovny and this is “Fail Better” – a show where failure, not success, shapes who we are. ChrisCarter is a TV and film writer, producer and director. He’s also an avid surfer and master craftsmanand artist. But most importantly, in my life – he’s the creator of “The X Files”. We actually had just gotten lunch a few days ago with Julian Anderson as well. And of course, Chris had a story to tell meabout what happened after we parted so we picked up there.
Chris Carter 00:33
Let me tell you the funny story. You and I had lunch with Julian on Saturday, I dropped you off and then I went to our favorite smoothie place, Sun Life.
David Duchovny 00:50
Yeah.
Chris Carter 00:51
I walk in and who’s standing in line in front of me, but Anthony Kiedis.
David Duchovny 00:55
Okay.
Chris Carter 00:56
And you’ve seen him around the hood, probably.
David Duchovny 00:58
Yeah.
Chris Carter 00:58
Anyways, very recognizable. So I thought, “Yeah, what do I do here?” Do I say, “Hey, love the music” somewhat I’d usually say […].
David Duchovny 01:09
We want to say John Bartley, poet on the Prophet. John Bartley told me how to off it. That is the insidestof all jokes and screw you, we’re not going to tell you what it means. But go ahead, what did you say?
Chris Carter 01:22
John Bartley. Anyway, I decided I’m just gonna leave him alone. This guy probably gets hit on all the time. Anyway, so he orders and then I order – then we’re standing there waiting for our food, our drinks or whatever. He’s got some people he’s talking to, and a young woman walks in with a dog. And you know me, I’m a sucker for dogs.
David Duchovny 01:45
Right.
Chris Carter 01:45
So, I’ve been down “Hi. What’s your dog’s name?” “My dog’s name is Tinker Bell”. The next thing I know, Anthony Kiedis is knelt next to me, petting the dog too. So, here I am.
David Duchovny 02:00
This is what they call a meet cute in Holland.
Chris Carter 02:02
A meet cute. So, he pets the dog for a little bit, and he gets up and moves on. The young woman looks atme and she says, “Can I ask you a question?” “Are you Chris Carter?”.
David Duchovny 02:16
It’s a good one. Well, thanks for coming on.
Chris Carter 02:22
Thank you.
David Duchovny 02:25
It reminds me. I remember we used to do Kevin and Bean.
Chris Carter 02:27
Yeah.
David Duchovny 02:28
And you went on and they said you had the voice of God.
Chris Carter 02:30
Yeah.
David Duchovny 02:31
So, that’s why I thought we needed video today because your voice is too overwhelming.
Chris Carter 02:37
I’ve got a radio face.
David Duchovny 02:39
No, it’s not the radio face. But one of the things, you mentioned Jillian. One of the things that’s interesting to me when I’m doing this with people that I know, with people that are my friends, people that I’ve known for 20 & 30 years is that. Well, first of all, I get to kind of apologize about shit or just reminisce. But also, as I study objectively, I read materials on you and stuff like that. I get kind of a different perspective as friends don’t at least. In my generation, don’t spy on one another, don’t read about one another in that way and I enjoy that. Actually, I usually take a swim after I take a bath in Chris Carter […] and history. I swim and I see what comes up because I’m not counting laps, it’smeditative state and something came to me today that I want to get to later. I really want to talk about.It’s interesting, not personal – but something about the show, and something that I’ve said before. You know, aside from my entire career, being made possible by The X Files which is obvious history. But specifically, I’ve said this before, when I think about what I learned from you on the show was really […].You know, I was coming out of graduate school, I was reading and writing these highfalutin papers about deconstruction and had nothing to do with the love of the story that I might have gotten into reading in the first place. I think as kids, we get into the story – that’s what we want to hear. And I no longer was doing that, because if you think about being a general surgeon, and now I had to do just brain surgery.
Chris Carter 04:29
Yeah.
David Duchovny 04:29
I had to learn about the brain. By osmosis, over a period of a few years, watching you write, watching you shepherd the other writers in The X Files, I re-learned a love for plot and for the kind of smart machinery that keeps somebody guessing that goes to the highs and low. Without that, I think I’d bemaking nonsensical movies that don’t go anywhere. I started or even writing.
Chris Carter 05:00
Yeah.
David Duchovny 05:01
I was like, “Okay, it’s not about language. It’s about the plot at least in our business.
Chris Carter 05:06
It is. Movies are about plot. I mean, movies have no plot. Some can be good. Terrence Malick movies, I admire.
David Duchovny 05:17
Right.
Chris Carter 05:17
Anyway, but when I did the pilot for The X Files, I wrote a 17 page, single space outline. So, story was very important. I didn’t just wing it. When we started up the show, we hired writers; Morgan and Wong came on the show – Glen Morgan and James Wong, they had been working on Stephen Cannell shows, and they brought with them a bulletin board, and we put up three by five cards, and that became the kind of the way.
David Duchovny 05:49
What’s happening? The Mayo Clinic?
Chris Carter 05:54
It’s my kiln guy. I’m putting in a kiln today.
David Duchovny 05:58
We’ll get to your podcast.
Chris Carter 05:59
All right. Anyway, I’m putting an account today, and that’s my kiln guy calling.
David Duchovny 06:03
So wait, where were you? You were talking about? Oh, the story Morgan Wong.
Chris Carter 06:08
Oh, Morgan Wong. They brought these bulletin boards and three by five cards, and that became the way we plotted the episodes.
David Duchovny 06:17
Well look, here’s more of your cards.
Chris Carter 06:19
I have more three by five cards, yeah. Exactly.
David Duchovny 06:22
But, your handwriting was perfect.
Chris Carter 06:24
That was a Glen Morgan thing. He actually had beautiful penmanship, and he would make these cards. And so that became also competitive. Who could make the most beautiful cards?
David Duchovny 06:38
Really?
Chris Carter 06:39
Yeah. Anyway, we’ve worked that ever since. And I think, Vince Gilligan still works that way on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. I think I’m not positive about.
David Duchovny 06:52
Well, I think it’s smart, because you’re gonna. I remember, we would work on some scripts and we would just take this card wjith this scene. Maybe go over here or this scene goes over here. Maybe it comes back, maybe it doesn’t.
Chris Carter 07:03
Yeah
David Duchovny 07:04
And that all makes sense. So, I wanted to thank you for that, which I can’t repay that, Chris because it’ really opened me up into another part of who I am. Also, giving me the opportunity to write and direct on the show, which you didn’t have to do. Now, it’s almost de rigueur, stars of the show.
Chris Carter 07:29
Now, the stars are also the producer.
David Duchovny 07:31
Yeah. But then, it wasn’t. It was probably seen as some kind of gift or whatever, which I never wanted it to be. I just wanted to earn it. Well, I said to you, if I’d like to write and direct one. And you said, “Write something good”.
Chris Carter 07:49
Yeah.
David Duchovny 07:49
You can direct it.
Chris Carter 07:50
And then maybe you can direct it.
David Duchovny 07:52
Yeah.
Chris Carter 07:53
No.
David Duchovny 07:54
Well, you didn’t put it like that […].
Chris Carter 07:58
I gave Jillian a shot too. You know, the great thing about The X Files was that you were surrounded by people who wanted it to be good from the beginning. You know, in my experience – always the case. Some people just show up for work. But certainly when we shot in Vancouver, it was that esprit de corps,was the reason I got up every day to do the show, do the job.
David Duchovny 08:28
Yeah.
Chris Carter 08:29
And when you were a kid, your writerly ambition, didn’t kick in till later, right?
David Duchovny 08:38
Well, it kicked in. I didn’t realize it until later in fourth grade.
Chris Carter 08:42
Cause you’re late bloomer.
David Duchovny 08:45
Late bloomer. Anyway, we had a little exercise in fourth grade, and it was more like advertising. The teacher said, “Come up with something about reading”, something that could just a sentence, and I came up with a sentence.
Chris Carter 09:06
Do you remember the sentence?
David Duchovny 09:07
Yes, I do.
Chris Carter 09:09
What was it?
David Duchovny 09:11
It was, “Don’t read in the dark. Let’s light up the room”.
Chris Carter 09:14
Oh, not bad.
David Duchovny 09:16
He praised me for it. So, you know, it was one of those things.
Chris Carter 09:21
Where you got the applause.
David Duchovny 09:22
Exactly, the hook.
Chris Carter 09:25
Yeah. He’s the problem, that guy put the hook in you. The other part of knowing people that come on like this is that I get to go over some difficult times.
David Duchovny 09:38
Yeah.
Chris Carter 09:39
And something kind of lost in the times that we’ve done a reboot of the show twice now – even the second movie. You know, going back to me leaving the show. The end of the seventh year, I did half theeighth year, you did ninth year without me until I came back for the end of the ninth year which was the end of the show. You know, we don’t have to hash it out. I realized later, that was a difficult thing to do, even though, you may have been as tired as I was, or as wanting to move on as much as I was. I consider myself a team player, so I’ve always felt like a bit of an abandonment, not by you, but of youvinthat sense. And I don’t know if we’re going for any resolution here, or anything like that. This is not like the VH1 version.
David Duchovny 10:46
By season seven, we were all tired. We’d made a big move from Vancouver to Los Angeles. We had done well over 100 episodes. There were legal, contractual things going on that were, fraught. You and I had a party, and we became (I don’t want to say mortal enemies).
Chris Carter 11:12
No.
David Duchovny 11:13
It was difficult a time, and it was resolved. You came to me, I remember you coming to my office. I remember, we were standing and you said, “I’m going to leave one of the parts of this agreement. I’m going to leave the show for a time”. That was actually something you had worked out legally with Fox, but you came to me and told me that. Actually, you just reminded me of something so that wasforgettable part of the show for me, because you and I were at odds.
Chris Carter 11:50
And I was in a lawsuit with Fox while working on the Fox live, I actually had my security sweep my trailer for bugs. We were afraid that we were getting bug.
David Duchovny 11:59
I ran during that time in Malibu. I was walking, and you pulled over with Teya, and got out of the car to say something to me – not something mean or provocative. But I remember, out of the blue, I hugged you. I just hugged you and it was almost like a reflex. I just did it. I think you surprised both of us.
Chris Carter 12:07
Yeah, I repressed it.
David Duchovny 12:32
Well, thank you. I got the resolution that I wanted. I didn’t even know. And one of the things that I was touched about what you did – and it’s really just a gesture, but it was a beautiful gesture to me was that you were. I was number one on the call sheet, and you retired the number one which was really nice.
Chris Carter 12:50
Yeah.
David Duchovny 12:52
So, moving on from that. Also, I have apologized for this, but last time we were shooting in Vancouver, we had a screaming match. It was probably the last time we got on site together.
Chris Carter 13:04
I don’t think we had a screaming match. I think I screamed at you. You were much more […].
David Duchovny 13:05
Well, what happened was, it was the last time we’ve ever shot together, which I don’t want it to be the last time (if only for that reason). I was trying to get an early flight back home as we always do – we’re going longer. I suggested that this one particular shot that I would turn back and deliver the line so that you wouldn’t have to turn around which was going to be another 45 hour, because you’re turning all the way around. And you rightly, as a director, got pissed off that I was trying to simplify your work and get out of there and we had an argument about it.
Chris Carter 13:58
After 11 season, I just had it with you.
David Duchovny 14:00
And it was so uncharacteristic of us.
Chris Carter 14:06
It was.
David Duchovny 14:07
Because you’re not a screamer and I’m not a screamer.
Chris Carter 14:11
It came out of nowhere for me. It was like one of those things where I just reacted, I didn’t know. There was no rehabilitation.
David Duchovny 14:18
Yeah. Well, we’ve talked about that. But I think, it might be interesting for people to know, the cliche may be true in this case is that we both do care. And it comes from that, you’re trying to do the best work that you can do. I’m trying to get home. I’m trying to do the best work I can do and get home, because that’s what you actually learn.
Chris Carter 14:43
Yeah.
David Duchovny 14:44
Over the time of being on a show like that. It’s how to balance that. How do I work this fucking hard? And continue to do good work. I gotta take my time when I can. But this brings me to your position. Oh, and this was another thing that we were at odds about when you started millennium, which was in the third year?
Chris Carter 15:07
Fourth.
David Duchovny 15:07
Fourth year of the show. So, this is what we’re talking about for your plate. I don’t think people will never work like this, like you did that year in television. So I’m thinking, if it’s the fourth year, we did The first X Files movie, when between the fourth and the fifth year.
Chris Carter 15:32
We were comparing it in the fourth year.
David Duchovny 15:35
So in the fourth year, you are executive producer in show running, because Morgan Wong took over a couple years.
Chris Carter 15:35
Yes.
David Duchovny 15:40
Show Running – a new show of 25 episodes, probably. X Files are 25 hours.
Chris Carter 15:53
Right.
David Duchovny 15:54
So you are the figurehead responsible, the executive producer, the creator of these shows for fifty hours.
Chris Carter 16:02
Yeah.
David Duchovny 16:03
Fifty hours in one year.
Chris Carter 16:06
Yeah.
David Duchovny 16:07
You’re producing ut of your body.
Chris Carter 16:10
Yeah. It was the hardest year of my life. I don’t know how I made it.
David Duchovny 16:14
No, there’s more. You were also preparing to shoot the feature film.
Chris Carter 16:19
Yeah, right.
Chris Carter 16:19
Yeah.
David Duchovny 16:19
Of your baby […].
David Duchovny 16:23
I don’t understand how you were able.
Chris Carter 16:28
What people don’t appreciate or can’t appreciate because they’ve changed the rules, is that we would often do sixteen hour days.
David Duchovny 16:39
Well, yeah, that’s us. I’m focusing right now.
Chris Carter 16:43
Yeah.
David Duchovny 16:44
It’s hard to even imagine. Let’s talk about success and failure, These are the fruits of success that you’re going to work yourself to death.
Chris Carter 16:55
Yeah.
David Duchovny 16:57
Beyond that, trying to make sure and I know this about you – you didn’t want to have a lemon […]. You see most procedurals. I have to say, “I’ll watch a procedural and I’ll go”, that’s good filler. It’s a good place holder. But no, The X Files and Millennium both wanted to have a movie worthy idea executed in forty sixth, seven minutes of television. And that you were taking that seriously as a commandment to yourself. So, I just wonder what your state of mind was in that year – then I would apologize again because I was pissed off, because I thought Chris is not with us.
Chris Carter 17:41
Right.
David Duchovny 17:42
Chris is splitting my time which is your prerogative. We all wanted to do other things. But I was like, “Hey, Daddy’s, got another girl – crossed down.
Chris Carter 17:53
Well I know, I didn’t want to do another thing, but Fox came to me and said, “This is your brand and run with it”.
David Duchovny 18:05
That’s how all came up?
Chris Carter 18:06
Yeah. It wasn’t an ultimatum, but this is what you should be doing.
David Duchovny 18:12
In a way, that’s the trap of success.
Chris Carter 18:14
It is and I’m really proud of Millennium.
David Duchovny 18:20
Yeah, that’s true.
Chris Carter 18:20
You know, I pulled the plug on Millennium too soon, because we can talk about failure for a show called “Harsh Realm” that I thought was going to be a hit – and I didn’t imagine myself doing three shows.
David Duchovny 18:34
Three shows and a movie franchise.
Chris Carter 18:38
As it works out, I pulled the plug on Millennium and Harsh Realm didn’t go. I want to tell you a story that came out of that. The writer, creator of blacklist; Jon Bokenkamp – very nice, talented guy from Nebraska where, I don’t know why they just the Nebraska, produces these creative geniuses. He called me at some point during the blacklist, because I talked to him before he started the show and wediscussed how it works, he had never done a TV series. He called me some years – maybe five or six (I don’t know how many years in). And said, “Look, you know, I have an opportunity to do something else. And I’m thinking about pulling the plug on the blacklist. I’ve done what I needed to do”. And I said, “Fromexperience, you shouldn’t do that if you’ve got something that works, and you like it and people are invested in it, keep going”. And in fact, he did.
David Duchovny 19:53
I mean, you’re kind of laying it at the doorstep of you didn’t see the future. You know, Harsh Realm you thought was going to be a hit. Millennium, you thought was kind of staying in its lane at that point three years.
Chris Carter 20:05
I mean, it had […].
David Duchovny 20:06
It did well enough, it was going to keep on.
Chris Carter 20:08
Yeah, they would have gone with it.
David Duchovny 20:11
But, was it not a desire to tell different kinds of stories? Did you see a different story in Harsh Realm that you were going to be able to tell different kinds of episodes to television?
Chris Carter 20:23
I got excited about Harsh Realm, because I got a chance to work with Dan Sackheim again who had produced The X Files pilot with me. There were a bunch of us that I was excited to work with, and I thought it was a really good concept – that’s a story in itself. So, I thought it was, and I still think it was a little bit ahead of its time. Anyway, I thought it was going to be a winner. Lo and behold, I made two mistakes at the same time.
David Duchovny 21:19
This is a character trait that I know in you – once you get a shape you like, you like to make that shape. With pottery, once you get in the groove in a show, I don’t think you’re there. Like me, I’m going, I want to try something new.
Chris Carter 21:41
Yeah.
David Duchovny 21:41
Because I’m not a detailed guy like you, and you are like, “I’m going to make the perfect bowl”. And it’s hard to do that. It looks like it might just be a bowl. Let’s just say, “Tell us what you did with pottery for a moment, and then I’ll take that leap”.
Chris Carter 21:58
This is a story about my serialized brain. I love working with my hands, and it’s funny when you go into television and there is a manufacturing quality to the actually making of something. But, when I was in high school, I had done a little pottery and art class so I started playing baseball in college. I wanted to take anything. I wanted to take any class where I didn’t have to study too hard, because I wanted to focus on sports and I wanted easy credits. So I took a pottery class, and it worked out that my pottery teacher saw some native talent, he had a studio. This guy lived and breathed ceramics. He had a studio and he asked me if I would come make pottery for him. I quit baseball.
Chris Carter 22:21
I quit. Mostly because I wanted to go surfing, and I started making pottery for this guy. I swear I would have done it for free, this is how much I liked it. I got good enough at it that I could be called a production potter, which means I would sit for hours at a time and make the same thing over and over or the same six things over and over – and I loved it. People say, “How did you do that?”. Once I sat for 14hours and made 300 pieces of pottery all the same. You weigh things, you weigh the clay out, and you make the same thing over and over. I loved it.
David Duchovny 22:21
You did? You quit?
David Duchovny 23:46
Well, that kind of jives, you love flying as well which as you said, “It’s redundancy”.
Chris Carter 23:54
It is redundancy.
David Duchovny 23:56
But there’s a freedom in that.
Chris Carter 23:58
Well, it’s about the process and you have to enter David Brooks, I brought Davd Brooks piece. It’s about the process. There’s something actually meditative, and I don’t know engaging about doing the same thing over serialized. What is television? It’s serialization of a concept.
David Duchovny 24:25
It’s so interesting to me because my brain is exactly the opposite from that.
Chris Carter 24:29
Yeah.
David Duchovny 24:30
I’m always looking for that new thing. I don’t have that kind of stick-to-itiveness that you have there. So, I’m not going to beat myself up for it, but it takes all kinds, I guess.
Chris Carter 24:46
Well you know, I worked at surfing magazine, as you know.
David Duchovny 24:50
We just talked about your […]?
Chris Carter 24:55
Right.
David Duchovny 24:56
Like fifty episodes of TV and a feature film. But, you were not a kid either when you hit as a writer.
Chris Carter 25:07
Right. You know, before The X Files, I had worked in Hollywood for seven years.
David Duchovny 25:13
So, what were you doing? Can we can we call those not failures, but like apprenticeships? Who are your mentors? Who did you learn that?
Chris Carter 25:21
I was learning how to do the job.
David Duchovny 25:22
Who you learning from?
Chris Carter 25:24
Oh, I had a wonderful next door neighbor; James Mangold, who just directed the the Dylan movie. I was in the animation building at Disney. I had been hired (I’m not sure I’m telling the story kind of backwards). I was working at surfing magazine. I met Dori, my wife to be – she was a screenwriter.
David Duchovny 25:49
So you hadn’t thought of it before that?
Chris Carter 25:53
Not really. You know, I was a movie fanatic. We can go back to the pottery again, and I’ll tell you about.
David Duchovny 26:02
Going to whatever you want.
Chris Carter 26:04
Going to film school. Anyway, I met her and we talked about movies. She said, “You know, sound like you’d like to make a movie someday”. I said, “I would, I have an idea”. She says, “Write it”, and I wrote thescript. Luckily, her cousin. Her sister, was actually a noted casting director – cast the first Star Wars; Dianne Crittenden. Anyway, everyone was in Hollywood. Her cousin was an agent, and I showed the script to her cousin. Her cousin showed it around. I took meetings. I was told that I should write a second script, I did. The next thing I knew, I’m telling you, I was a surfer in the morning. By the afternoon, I was a Hollywood screenwriter. That’s how crazy it was, right?
David Duchovny 27:03
What were those scripts that you came up with in that seven years before you hit it with The X Files?
Chris Carter 27:10
The first script I wrote was, you know I’m from Bellflower. I wrote a script about three kids in Bellflower in the early 1970s who are baseball players who have no idea that they can get out of the Vietnam draft and they’re going to war because they don’t know how to not go. They don’t know about bone spurs. The script is called “National Pastime”, so it’s near and dear to me. It’ll never get made.
David Duchovny 27:41
That was a pilot script or a movie script?
Chris Carter 27:43
No, that was a movie script. I mean, I didn’t know about television. I knew about television, but it’s funny. I say I went to film school when I was making pottery, and I would have the TV on for ten hours a day while I was making pottery. It was a film school of sorts with all those great 70s shows. So I kind of got inthe swing of things that way.
David Duchovny 28:16
But not consciously in a way.
Chris Carter 28:18
No, but I would listen on Sunday nights. There was a show called Dr. Demento. I think it was […] and I loved it. I loved The Dr. Demento show. It was those novelty songs and Steve Martin […]. But you know, just wonderful nuttiness, and it’s plugged into my goofy sense of humor.
David Duchovny 28:49
Well, I think you’re coming at things from not an ironic angle, but a parody angle. There’s part of that in you that is always there, which is interesting when you think about The X Files, because it’s not parody atall. It’s more like prophecy in your case. But in terms of writing, you’re talking about ingesting by osmosisin a way while you’re doing pottery these 70s shows. There was no other mentor at that point that took you under his or her wing and said, “Hey kid, I think you got talent, because you’re not a kid at that point either – you’re in your 30s, right?
Chris Carter 29:26
No, at that point, I was about twenty-six.
David Duchovny 29:31
Okay, so you were a kid.
Chris Carter 29:32
Yeah. Anyway, I had two moments. First of all, I was an art major when I entered college, and that lastedabout two years then I went down to the journalism department and said, “How do I make this my major?”. But, I had a really fortunate moment episode in my life. There was a teacher, a writing teacher named Mr. Lackman, and we used to do blue book essays. Remember blue book essays?
David Duchovny 30:13
Yeah.
Chris Carter 30:13
Anyway, I did a review (call it a review) of Billy Budd Melville. I wrote it and I remember calling Billy Buddself actualized. and was like a term then.
David Duchovny 30:27
Yeah.
Chris Carter 30:30
He got up and read it in front of the class. After he read it, he said, “I wish all my students could write likethis”. It was like one of those moments where it’s like, I was meant to do this. Then the second one waswhen I entered journalism school. I had a teacher named Dr. Stein. I did a piece of journalism on a guy named Gaylord Carter. Gaylord Carter was maybe one of the most famous theater organists, so he would play the organ to the silent movies. Anyway, I got to know him, and I did a story on him. It was perfect, hes my subject. I know him. I can share a last name. Anyway, I wrote the piece and I handed it in and I got like a “D” and he said to me.
David Duchovny 31:31
Wait, same teacher?
Chris Carter 31:32
Same teacher. He said to me wisely. He said, you let your subject get away. You had him and you let himget away. There’s nothing you tell me about him that I don’t already know.
David Duchovny 31:47
I’m not sure I understand that.
Chris Carter 31:50
Well, he thought that I could have done a much deeper, more illuminating story than I did because I wasa novice, I was a rookie. I just didn’t construct a story very professionally. Two years later, I had a journalism teacher, I gave him something to read, and he says, “You’re gonna make it. This is good. You’re gonna make it as a journalist”.
David Duchovny 32:30
But in that moment of getting the D, what did you think?
Chris Carter 32:34
He was right.
David Duchovny 32:35
You just thought he’s right?
Chris Carter 32:36
No, he was right. And it was one of those moments fail better.
David Duchovny 32:40
Yeah.
Chris Carter 32:44
I’m a hard worker and hate to hear the word no. I wanted to be good at what I was doing.
David Duchovny 32:55
You know, I sent you that clip of Vonnegute Junior.
Chris Carter 33:00
Yeah, I love that.
David Duchovny 33:01
You know, the way he ends it, think of a teacher who made your life better.
Chris Carter 33:07
Yes.
David Duchovny 33:08
And say the name to the person next to you and the audience you hear. You hear how loud it.
Chris Carter 33:13
Right.
Chris Carter 33:14
And my mom was a teacher, my sister’s a teacher, my family are teachers. You know, it’s cliche to saythey’re so important. But as a parent, I realized as my kids were going through the education system, it’s really like lightning striking when you get. And it’s not just the guy who’s or the woman who’s like in your corner and saying […]. It’s also the guy that gives you the “D”.
Chris Carter 33:42
Yeah.
David Duchovny 33:42
And says you can do better.
Chris Carter 33:43
Yeah, I credit him for making me better.
David Duchovny 34:16
For the fans, there was the time when Chris wanted Julian to go out for a couple. I’m not sure if he meant it as a fictional television couple or real-life couple.
Chris Carter 34:30
No, you guys were at odds.
David Duchovny 34:33
That’s very early.
Chris Carter 34:35
Yes. I mean, sometimes on set and sign. That kind of thing rocks a crew. If there’s tension and you guys are the center of attention.
David Duchovny 34:46
Yeah.
Chris Carter 34:47
If there is tension in that relationship, everyone knows it and it affects.
David Duchovny 34:53
I think the impulse was good.
Chris Carter 34:56
Yeah.
David Duchovny 34:56
We should try and get along, if we can. But, idea has always struck me as so funny. The idea that we would go to couples therapy as fictional people, but we never did. The other one was one time youfigured out like an off screen line and it was too late to ask me, because I’d already done my ADR, and it was in squeeze.
Chris Carter 35:20
It was in squeeze. Your season one.
David Duchovny 35:24
Season one of Mulder finds Scully cross. There’s an insert of the cross so I’m not on camera and you, in your voice, recorded a “Damn it”. You can give it to me now. Let’s see how, “Damn it” very close you say so. And I don’t remember how did I figure it out because I said I saw it and I never said that.
Chris Carter 35:49
I don’t remember how you figured it out, but I remember your reaction which was not good.
David Duchovny 35:54
Yeah. I was really pissed off and I remember you being bemused (not amused). How could he be so pissed? And I think I just had this sense of authenticity.
Chris Carter 36:08
Yeah, sure. I understand.
David Duchovny 36:10
However I reacted. I mean, I’m sure it was more than was necessary but it is funny to think back on that, because now I would say, “Yeah, you just go say it”. You know, I’m somewhere else.
Chris Carter 36:23
I’m wrapped.
David Duchovny 36:25
Then the widows and orphans, of course.
Chris Carter 36:29
Yeah, right. I don’t want to talk about that.
David Duchovny 36:34
I’ll just say it quickly.
Chris Carter 36:35
Yeah.
David Duchovny 36:35
Because it’s charming.
Chris Carter 36:37
Yeah.
David Duchovny 36:37
It’s not, it’s not.
Chris Carter 36:38
I’m glad you find it charming. Now you find it charming.
David Duchovny 36:41
Well no, it was just this revelation.
Chris Carter 36:43
Yeah.
David Duchovny 36:44
Because the way I’ll tell the story, the way it goes for me is I’m reading your dialogue for twenty years on and off.
Chris Carter 36:54
Yeah.
David Duchovny 36:55
And there’s always ellipses. In my mind when I read a script like that, especially when it trails off at whatever in the middle of. I’m thinking, there’s a thought that’s not being expressed, and I’m thinking, “Well, what is the thought that’s not”, and I’m always trying to fill it in, like “What’s Mulder thought that’s not being expressed that he’s cut himself off?”. When we were doing the reboot, I called you with a question and I think I said, “What is Mulders?” clearly he’s cutting himself off what’s the thought. And yousaid, “Oh, that’s just no widows or orphans”. I was like, “What is that?”.
Chris Carter 37:36
Yeah, that’s crazy. So, people don’t speak in complete sentences.
David Duchovny 37:45
No, this things made sense.
Chris Carter 37:47
No, that’s why I put ellipses, dot and dashes.
David Duchovny 37:52
Yeah. Well, just to finish that story, for those who don’t know what a widow and orphanis and I’ve been around literature my whole life. I didn’t know what it was.
Chris Carter 38:01
Yeah.
David Duchovny 38:02
It’s when there’s in your chunks of dialogue. You wanted it to look symmetrical and you would make surethat each of your lines added up.
Chris Carter 38:13
For me was an exercise, because I always think if you can say it in four lines, you can exactly – instead offour and a half, it’s going to be better and it’s going to be add to the.
David Duchovny 38:27
I buy that. But, it was a shock when I realized, “Oh, my god, I’ve been trying to” but good, because I feel like good that I had to question that.
Chris Carter 38:36
Yeah.
David Duchovny 38:36
I didn’t need to know the answer. The answer doesn’t help me, but also it goes with my kind of philosophy that self imposed limitations, which you’re giving yourself, has to look a certain way are actually ways to get a deeper meaning and freedom. You’re forcing yourself like you were with your potter. You’re forcing yourself into some kind of a shape.
Chris Carter 39:00
Yeah. I’ll read the Quentin Tarantino script, somebody I admire and it’s the opposite. It’s just flowing and.
David Duchovny 39:13
Different strokes.
Chris Carter 39:13
Yeah, it’s different strokes.
David Duchovny 39:16
I wanted to get to this idea that I had when I was swimming this morning.
Chris Carter 39:22
Okay.
David Duchovny 39:23
And I’ve never thought this before and I’ve been living with this character for a long time. This is what Icame out of the pool and I had to go write it down, dripping wet because I knew I would lose it.
Chris Carter 39:36
With your Sharpie?
David Duchovny 39:42
Let me preface this by saying – as I gave thanks to you for kind of giving me a structural education in storytelling, I was coming to storytelling in a completely psychological sense. Freud being first literary critic, not the first one but Freud’s a literary. t’s Oedipus, complex, electric. All his syndromes and perceptions about the human brain come from literature. So, as I was taught, psychology is literary criticism. So, that’s how I approached acting was like, “How do I psychologically fill this thing?” and I think we complemented each other well in that way because you had almost a, it’s wrong for me to say pre-psychological, but a mythic sensibility more than a psychological sensibility. Is that fair to say?
Chris Carter 40:46
Here’s for me, the chemistry. I was writing a two smart characters, and you were both smart people – and you’re one of the smartest people I know. So it was a dream come true.
David Duchovny 41:07
Okay, you didn’t answer the question. That’s what.
Chris Carter 41:10
Maybe I didn’t understand the question.
David Duchovny 41:12
No, it’s a compliment. I’m just dodging the compliment. That’s my problem.
Chris Carter 41:17
But, cute too.
David Duchovny 41:18
Oh, that was the other fail. Chris wanted me to get this part, right? So, I had to test for it though, I had toconvince the suits that I was the guy. There was a line in the pilot, in the description where you describedMulder as like more MTV DJ than like FBI. So I was like, “Oh, he’s a bit irreverent, whatever”. So, I came tothe test wearing a pig tie. Some reason, I had a tie with these pigs on it and I just remember your face when you took us, because you’re testing for a role. The executives are not imaginative. You should come in and look as much like that role as you can and no FBI agent is going to be wearing a pig tie.
Chris Carter 42:06
Did you ever see what Jillian gave me? She gave me the sheets from those casting, the Randy stone casting sessions where I had made my notes next to the actors. You know what I thought about?
David Duchovny 42:19
By the company pig tie? Fuck him.
Chris Carter 42:21
Yes. I said it was written simply “Yes”, so I knew you were Mulder and you and I actually, I don’t know if you remember this, but we left the casting session. I actually talked to you outside and I said, “You’re good. I want to take you to the network”, and I said the stupidest thing. I said, “I want you to start thinking like an FBI”.
David Duchovny 42:46
I remember that?
Chris Carter 42:49
Because maybe it was the pig tie.
David Duchovny 42:53
I’ll show him.
Chris Carter 42:54
Yeah, right.
David Duchovny 42:55
That’s the last thing. How does she get a hold of those sheets?
Chris Carter 42:56
I don’t know how but next to her name it says, “Test”.
David Duchovny 43:07
Right. She go and test for it?
Chris Carter 43:08
Yes. But we’re jumping around here, which is maybe how it goes. But before I forget, you’ve got to tell that story about the Triathlon.
David Duchovny 43:21
Oh.
Chris Carter 43:21
It’s in your notes?
David Duchovny 43:23
It’s in my list of stupid questions. I have these questions and I have these stupid questions which is my new form. Stupid question, there’s a lot more stupid questions than there are questions that I think.
Chris Carter 43:35
I told you and I’d be sure to give it a stupid answer.
David Duchovny 43:37
Stupid answers. So, here’s what I came away with psychologically and it’s a little embarrassing to think that I’ve just thought of this 30 years after I started playing the part. I’m reassessing it. Mulder is traumatized by his sister’s disappearance. And trauma is word we use now, but we wouldn’t. We might not have said that back then. We could say something like PTSD now. He failed to protect her, that’s his trauma.
Chris Carter 44:11
Yeah.
David Duchovny 44:11
He’s failed, but now he’s returning to the scene week after week and putting another young woman in jeopardy and almost failing to protect her as if he’s trying to heal himself by protecting Scully in a way he couldn’t protect his sister. Yet he’s also re-injuring himself by putting her in danger and sometimes even having to be saved by Scully, saved by this sister proxy and I never thought of it that way.
Chris Carter 44:44
I never thought of it that way either.
David Duchovny 44:45
Do you think of that?
Chris Carter 44:50
Yeah, I guess you could make a guess for that. I don’t know.
David Duchovny 44:52
I don’t want to end on that. What I wanted to say was in terms of failure, I remember this is another point of gratitude. What the other kind of impetus for this podcast? It came out of my experience, my initial experience putting out house of D, where this critic gave me an F (house of D gets an F). Then I woke up the next morning and I was and I was like, “Oh, cool”. You know, I’m alive, but it hurt. Reception of it hurt. And I remember talking to you, are you?
Chris Carter 45:30
Yeah.
David Duchovny 45:31
What did you say?
Chris Carter 45:33
I said, “No one’s thinking that, but you”.
David Duchovny 45:35
You said that? But you also said, “I want to hear your big boy voice” because it was like a gut punch.
Chris Carter 45:43
Yeah.
David Duchovny 45:43
I think I was walking around for like a month, kind of talking like this. I was like, “I just couldn’t, I wasn’t breathing”. I was like, “I was in a shell. I was in a protective, non-deep breathing shell”.
Chris Carter 45:56
That’s a Bill Carter instruction. Well, he wouldn’t have said that exactly, but it was like buck up.
David Duchovny 46:09
Yeah. I mean, I’m not saying that to to imply that you are callous or 50s dad.
Chris Carter 46:16
Yeah.
David Duchovny 46:17
But, it was helpful to me.
Chris Carter 46:21
Yeah.
David Duchovny 46:24
And I think we relate. We can relate to that kind of turtling up. And there’s a lot of shame involved in that, especially if you’re coming off of a massive success. And you know, we can look at certain things that you’ve done if you want to consider them failures, you want to consider them something else. If you want to talk about those things for a minute, but it could be instructive to people to hear your process oftelling yourself that in a way.
Chris Carter 47:05
Okay, so I have two things that I’m going to talk about the after, but I also want to talk about the coming back with season ten or eleven on The X Files. I thought, “Why do I want to come back? What story do I have to tell?”. I don’t want to just come back and do a victory lap. I have something to say andI did a four-part arc through two seasons to say all the things that I wanted to say. The first story is a prelude to my point that I wanted to make. The first story was called “By the New York Times Critic James Poniewozik”. I think his name. He called it a dud.
David Duchovny 48:01
It’s a brilliant critical term. Very instructive.
Chris Carter 48:04
Exactly. Then, it was the review was done as a conversation with another critic name. I think his name is Hale Mike. Anyway, he said, “Oh, I watched his pilot for Amazon and it was terrible. Another good critic word. You know, it’s loose. It was a painful review in New York Times, painful review to read and particularly because the episode that he was referring to as a dud was the episode that led us to the ending of the following season. And the big point, I was delivering it was all a plan. It was all veiled and complicated, and get to the end and no one got the ending. I’ve already talked to you about this, that I laid it out there, but no one got the ending. It’s a big it’s a huge ending, but Scully reveals that she’s pregnant. And I had a lot of haters for that. Scully didn’t have agency. Scully, […] women are only good as mothers. Anyway, I had a big idea. I put it right there, front and center for people to make the connection that literally no one made. It. And you know what it is? because I told you, you were the only one I told.
David Duchovny 50:04
I haven’t told to so. He’s taken an alien embryo out, so there’s now an alien embryo on the table. I knew it would come to this. I was hoping it wouldn’t, but I knew it would. Thank you for bringing him back. I haven’t seen him in a while. You look good, looking good. It’s kind of a lightning round, I guess, but that’s gross. I just call them stupid questions. You don’t have to answer them. What is the difference between believing and wanting to believe?
Chris Carter 50:41
Believing is a certainty. Wanting to believe is a doubters line that a person who wants to believe show me the reason to believe is what the line means.
David Duchovny 51:00
It also says to me that we have a need to believe.
Chris Carter 51:03
Absolutely.
David Duchovny 51:04
We have a desire, that’s a human desire. What’s the difference between surfing and writing, writing and directing, writing and show running, showrunning and art, pottery and ceramics?
Chris Carter 51:14
It’s all interconnected. Okay?
David Duchovny 51:19
You said something recently me said, “Love is the only thing that matters”.
Chris Carter 51:22
It is.
David Duchovny 51:26
How is men in their hair coming along?
Chris Carter 51:28
You want to tell why you asked that question? I once told David long long ago (30 years ago) that my first novel was going to be called “Men in their hair”.
David Duchovny 51:42
Yeah. You have been prophetic in seeing where society was headed to. What do you attribute that to your twin muses of science and fiction? Science fiction.
Chris Carter 52:02
Science fiction. Yeah, kind of that.
David Duchovny 52:04
I think you’re a pattern. You’re a guy that looks for patterns.
Chris Carter 52:08
Yeah. You see, doing The X Files was a perfect opportunity for me to talk about the world and my point of view in the world or I should say my competing points of view, which are science and faith.
David Duchovny 52:29
Why do you walk home along the train tracks?
Chris Carter 52:37
My wife told David a story we were sitting at lunch I think, and she told him that I always have adventures, which is true. I kind of put myself out there. I had been walking home. I was supposed to take an Uber and I decided, “No, I’ll walk a little bit”. And then I thought, “I’ll take the bus”. “No, I’ll keep walking a little bit”. Oh, “I’ll walk up by the train tracks”, and I go walk on the train tracks and I’m walkin in the middle of the train tracks, on the railroad ties, and I’m thinking, “Probably not a great idea to walk on”, but I’ll walk on the side of the tracks, on the ties, and I’m walking along – lost in my thoughts and without a sound, this train goes by me at whatever 65 miles an hour, I don’t know it. I mean, it was less than a yard away from me, and it was terrifying, but one of the most exhilarating moments of my life.
Chris Carter 53:40
I’ll take it.
David Duchovny 53:40
I think you got a bit of Huck Finn in you. That’s what I think. I think you’re out there throwing rocks.
David Duchovny 53:45
For adventures and I think that’s curiosity.
Chris Carter 53:49
Yeah, that’s what producing is, you get the kids to paint the fence.
David Duchovny 54:00
But Huck didn’t pay him. You had to pay him. How do you explain that we had the exact same time at the Malibu Triathlon?
Chris Carter 54:09
David and I did a triathlon.
David Duchovny 54:11
Not together.
Chris Carter 54:12
No, we didn’t. Yeah, right. You went out.
David Duchovny 54:14
We’re in different. I was in the celebrity.
Chris Carter 54:16
You were just celebrity wing whatever wave, and I was in the age group wave, so we did it. We don’t know our times because they’re not published. He calls me up the next day. You call me up the next day and say you’re not going to believe this, but we have the exact same times down to the second.
David Duchovny 54:41
To the 100th of the second.
Chris Carter 54:42
To the hundredths of a second.
David Duchovny 54:43
Yeah, and we never saw each other during the race. We fell into pace with one another.
Chris Carter 54:49
Yeah.
David Duchovny 54:49
How do you explain that, Mr. Carter?
Chris Carter 54:51
Kismet.
David Duchovny 54:53
But, do you remember what you said?
Chris Carter 54:56
Oh, yeah, you said, “So, we tied?”. And I said, “No, I won. I’m older”.
David Duchovny 55:00
Yeah. Well, fuck that. Wait, what was that? Okay. When I was a kid, I was obsessed with Dinosaurs, the Titanic Leopold and Loeb, Mel Stottlemyre baseball, Walt Frazier basketball, Charles Manson. I was obsessed with dinosaurs, tragedies, and sports.
Chris Carter 55:21
Yeah.
David Duchovny 55:21
Is that similar to you? What were you obsessed with when you were a kid?
Chris Carter 55:25
Sports for sure. I was baseball.
David Duchovny 55:30
Yeah.
Chris Carter 55:32
Fanatic doesn’t go far enough. Thus, the name Scully after Vince. Sandy Koufax was the lifetime pitcher Iwas. But dinosaurs, I had dinosaurs as a kid. But I have to say, I think tropical fish was where I planted my feet.
David Duchovny 55:51
Did you have fern?
Chris Carter 55:52
I couldn’t believe I used to go to tiki’s tropical fish on Alondra Boulevard. It was like getting new fish. It was like going to the Caribbean.
David Duchovny 56:09
Also, knowing how you grew up, it was kind of a luxury item for you as well, right?
Chris Carter 56:14
Yes.
David Duchovny 56:14
It wasn’t like your family had a bunch of money to put into tropical fish.
Chris Carter 56:17
No, it was.
David Duchovny 56:20
You had to do your research.
Chris Carter 56:21
It was a kind of extravagant obsession. I want to plug this, because this person, Sweet Laurel. I have a little building in Santa Monica, and it’s got a bakery in it. This woman, not only does amazing work, she does it with all of her heart. Sweet Laurel, all her stuff is in stores far and wide. She does cake mixes.
David Duchovny 56:56
This is a nice way to end too because, most people will be coming on this to plug a movie or a book and you’re plugging somebody else’s work.
Chris Carter 57:08
Oh, I do need to make one plug here. This is maybe the most important plug.
David Duchovny 57:12
Laurel is the mix and muffins favored by alien babies everywhere.
Chris Carter 57:22
I just got the go ahead yesterday to do a director’s cut, I want to believe the second movie. I can’t tell you how excited I’m about this, because when we made […].
David Duchovny 57:35
For that movie, right?
Chris Carter 57:36
Oh, big time. I made it too scary, basically. I was told so by the Brass at Fox, and they wanted a PG-13 movie. So, we cut it back to be a PG-3 movie. We thought, “Okay, we’ve satisfied their demands”. The critics, the people who rate the movies said, “No, it’s not a PG-13. Yet you’ve got to cut it back even farther”. I can tell you that you can do more on network television. They’re more permissive than they are. The sensors are for the movies certainly.
David Duchovny 58:20
As well now.
Chris Carter 58:20
Yeah. Now,I have a chance to go back and make the scary movie that I always intended.
David Duchovny 58:26
Fantastic.
Chris Carter 58:27
Yeah. It’s not just doing a director’s cut. It’s really kind of bringing to life something that for me, was on the page and never got to the screen.
David Duchovny 58:38
That’s awesome. I did not know that,. It made me think, you know, early on I said John Bartley poet on a process, which is something we used to sing to the give it away by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. It just reminded me the kind of what you’re saying you can and can’t do in terms of your movie. I’ve heard you saying, “I think it’s true that the reason that The X Files was so scary in the beginning was because we couldn’t afford to show the scary things”. It had to be dark. Well, that dark keep us from New Zealand.
Chris Carter 59:12
Yeah, that is a great story.
David Duchovny 59:14
And again, it’s instructive which we sometimes go for on this show which is again in limitations. You don’tneed if you have a small budget, you have to figure your way around the scare. And that explained or that drove. The X Files when it first aired, was so dark compared to any other show on television and I’mtalking about literally.
Chris Carter 59:41
Yeah.
David Duchovny 59:42
That became its trademark, that became the art of it.
Chris Carter 59:46
Yeah.
David Duchovny 59:46
That’s an example where you’re given a weak hand, a failing hand – and you turn it into a winner.
Chris Carter 59:54
Well, I hope you invite me back because we could talk about The X Files for another 45 minutes.
David Duchovny 1:00:00
I’m done. I just want to eat these muffins. Are they muffins?
Chris Carter 1:00:05
They are all muffins.
David Duchovny 1:00:06
Thank you, Chris and yeah, we do come back.
Chris Carter 1:00:11
Yeah.
David Duchovny 1:00:11
In fact, maybe we’ll get Jillian in here. We’ll do a round.
Chris Carter 1:00:15
Integrate a little bit.
David Duchovny 1:00:16
And we’ll all talk about what we don’t remember.
David Duchovny 1:00:16
It’s been about a week since Chris Carter and I sat down, and I haven’t jotted down any post thoughts. I think my brain was emptied, but having had about a week, I’ve been thinking about it. I didn’t know that was the first time he ever did a podcast. Shocking in this podcast infested world, but he’s never been a guy to call public attention to himself, he’s never had that hunger. I’m sure, like anyone, he has a desire to be recognized or appreciated, but never that sense and wanting to be out in front. And it made me think about the evolution of our friendship and our relationship, because it is one of the major relationships of my life. As you know, when I quit the show, I was itching to do other things creatively. I wanted to leave home in a way, and I think I hurt him by doing that – and I regret that. I don’t regret leaving as much as I regret hurting people that I lef. What I’m proud of for both of us think, is that we have matured into peers and we are friends and equals now.
David Duchovny 1:02:27
Thanks so much for listening to “Fail Better”. If you haven’t yet, now is a great time to subscribe to Lemonada premium. You’ll get bonus content, like my thoughts on conversations with guests including Alec Baldwin and Rob Lowe. Just hit the subscribe button on Apple podcasts or for all other podcast apps, head to lemonadapremium.com to subscribe. That’s lemonada premium dot com. Fail Better is production of Lemonada Media in coordination with King Baby. It is produced by Kegan Zema, Ari Bracci and Dani Matias. Our engineer is Brian Castillo. Our SVP of weekly is Steve Nelson. Our VP of newcontent is Rachel Neel. Special thanks to Carl Ackerman, Tom Kupinski and Brad Davidson. The show isexecutive produced by Stephanie Wittles Wachs, Jessica Cordova Kramer and me, David Duchovny. Themusic is also by me and my band, the lovely Colin Lee, Pat McCusker, Mitch Stewart, Davis Rowan and Sebastian Modak. You can find us online at lemonada media, and you can find me at David Duchovny. Follow Fail Better, wherever you get your podcasts or listen ad free on Amazon music with your Prime membership.
