Gillian Anderson: Scully has 'taken longer to wake up' than expected
Suiting up as FBI investigator Dana Scully again has taken a bit of time for Anderson, who describes the process of reawakening the character for the reboot as wading through a thick substance.
Gillian Anderson, who played science-minded FBI investigator Dana Scully for nine years on TV show "The X-Files," says she's wading through a thick substance.
No, it's not some kind of alien goo or the trail left by a giant snail boy. It's the process of inhabiting the role of Scully all over again for the show's much-anticipated reboot -- hitting the airwaves in January -- after many years away from the character.
"It feels like it's been a long time since I've played her," Anderson told TVLine in an interview that posted on Wednesday. "I can't remember what year the movie was, but it felt like [Scully] was further away from me than I'd thought she would be. But I've also worked really hard at putting her entirely to sleep, so that was successful; she's just taken longer to wake up."
The movie she's referring to was "The X-Files: I Want To Believe," and it was released in July 2008, which means filming probably wrapped the prior year. That would make about eight years since Anderson had to play Fox Mulder's co-investigator of all things bizarre. A long time indeed for a character to sleep.
Since that time, among other projects, Anderson had a three-year run starring in the BBC crime thriller The Fall, co-wrote a sci-fil thriller novel called "A Vision of Fire" and became a regular character on NBC's "Hannibal" this season.
"This is a lot of flashbacks, a lot of deja vu, a lot of remembering dynamics -- and it's...a thicker substance to wade through than I'd thought," Anderson told TVLine about getting back into the swing of things.
"The X-Files," which ran from 1993-2002 on the Fox Network, will air again for a six-episode revival on January 24, 2016. In addition to Anderson, the mini reboot will also feature original cast members David Duchovny as Fox Mulder, Mitch Pileggi as Walter Skinner and William B. Davis as the enigmatic (and thought-to-be-dead) "Smoking" Man. Series creator Chris Carter is also back on-board.
When asked by TVLine to describe the new series in three words, Anderson had this to say:
"Slow. Intense. And it's setting groundwork, so it's got a particular role to play. It does exactly what it needs to do. What's a single word for fulfilling that requirement? Functional? Appropriate? Functional works. Slow, intense and functional."
