The X-Files star whose athletic abilities almost ruined a shot

By Chris Snellgrove
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When you are a television director, it is always a pleasant surprise when you learn that one of your stars is naturally amazing about making their own stunts. This is something that The X-Files Director Rw Goodwin found the season 1 finale of his horrific show, “The Erlenmeyer Flask.” One scene included Fox Mulder jumped a fence and ran down the lane, and as David Duchovny performed this stunt, Goodwin discovered that the leading actor was too fast for the cameras to keep up with.

David Duchovny was too good for stunts

Goodwin is a former Director, and had a simple plan to shoot this scene… in particular, by having a cameraman riding a vehicle to keep up with the actor. In this case, though, David Duchovny was so fast in performing the stunt that the cameraman and his ride could not keep up. As Goodwin later described, “I had a golf cart initially and that passed that, you know, a bolt of lightning.”

If you are a more casual fan of The X-FilesYou may be surprised to hear that David Duchovny did this stunt himself. However, the actor often preferred to make his own stunts when possible, saying Rolled stone In 1995 “If you’re going to shoot him and I’m going to be doing it, at least see that it’s me.” He did this for the sake of his ego but for his supporters, saying, “If that’s the real actor” makes these stunts, “it’s usually more exciting than double shooting.”

Recording the commentary for “Erlenmeyer flask,” Rw Goodwin said David Duchovny could have been double, but only for the first part of this stunt. “I think we might have used Stuntmen in one big wide shot going over the fence but, on the whole, this was all David and the problem we had here was to keep up with it.” The Director personally solved this problem by upgrading his ride: “Eventually, I had to be on a regular lifting truck that could travel up to fifty miles per hour to keep up with it.”

Part of what David Duchovny helped perform this stunt was his height: at six feet tall, the actor’s long legs make it easy for him to run fast, but they also made him often tumbling over Costar Gillian Anderson. Speaking of references, the first X-Files movie referred to the height difference by having a Mulder joke at Scully he always insisted on driving because “I was never sure your little feet could reach the pedals.”

By the time that movie was filmed, The X-Files Cast and crew were very familiar with David Duchovny’s speed and how it would sometimes change rudely for running shoes to make stunts look more realistic. Fans also started noticing those running shoes and were particularly entertained by the fact that poor Gillian Anderson had to do all his runs in heels. Those shoes were something necessary, though, because the actor couldn’t stand on her box all the time, and high heels helped him look a little closer to Duchovny when they were talking next to each other.

The speed and general abilities of David Duchovny were well known after a few years, but they surprised everyone in filming the end of season 1. Very funny, this led to the Director to have to put the camera on a lifting truck just to keep up with the actor. Fortunately, the stunt worked brilliantly, and Duchovny soon made his own running scenes and other large stunts in Staple of the series.