Happy summer!
~GERTIE

BTW, Californication returns in early 2011. Here is a sneak preview:

David Duchovny, Hollywood star, husband and father of two, is in the throes of a new relationship — and, to tell the truth, which he usually does, it has left him with mixed feelings. On the one hand, his new setup makes perfect sense, especially given his occasionally nomadic lifestyle. And, of course, we all have to move on and can’t live in the past. But he is something of a traditionalist and doesn’t enjoy leaving loved ones behind. Yes, like many, Duchovny is facing up to one of mankind’s great questions: just how do we feel about the Kindle?

“I travel quite a bit, and being able to throw this little thing in my backpack so I can take my entire library with me is unbeliev able,” reflects the 49-year-old actor, pondering his handheld vehicle for digital books. And yet paper is a good technology, I suggest. “I know,” he sighs, “I don’t like the idea of reading a book on a screen. But I tend to be a reference reader, flicking back and forth, so it really is useful.”

For all the success of the now-iconic The X Files, the more recent Californication and a clutch of films, Duchovny maintains a sincerely deep level of interest in literature, kindled during his youth. He began his doctorate in comparative literature at Yale in the early 1980s (one of his tutors was the eminent critic Harold Bloom), but his thesis — on magic and technology in contemporary American fiction — remains uncompleted. “My career started, so I couldn’t afford the time to finish it, but I do retain an academic interest in literature.”

There are few actors in Hollywood who profess an academic interest in anything, never mind literature, but Duchovny is cut from a distinctive cloth. Many actors display a ready wit and intelligence, but few have his candour, or the likeable nonchalance that imbues so many of his performances and makes his characters men you’d genuinely like to hang out with. He seems pitched somewhere between his two television characters — more relaxed than The X Files’ Mulder, more together than Californication’s troubled novelist, Hank Moody. He likes to shoot the breeze — he can’t cook, for example, although he does make a good sandwich. “And breakfast,” he adds with a pause. “Sandwiches can also be good for breakfast.”

In his professional life, after striking it big with the first of his two famous series, he eschewed big-budget bluster, concentrating primarily on independent film. His latest movie is one that few other actors could carry. Written and directed by a first-timer, Derrick Borte, The Joneses casts Duchovny and Demi Moore as the heads of a super-stylish household, parachuted into a swanky suburban neighbourhood to charm their friends and sell their lifestyle. Selling is exactly what they are doing: the family is false, assembled by a conglomerate to beguile an unwitting and seemingly affluent clientele into wanting what the Joneses have. It’s a smart piece, if a little contrived, and Duchovny’s first-class performance sees it through. “It’s smart and funny, and I wish that I’d written it,” he smiles.

Duchovny does, in fact, write, as well as act and direct, and admits to a hankering for the highbrow world of academia. “Actually, I have an interest in finishing my PhD, but I just know I never will. It’s like if I almost became a surgeon — that doesn’t mean I am going to operate on anybody right now.”

This little aside reverberates quite loudly through Duchovny’s life and career. Just as he’d like to finish his doctorate, but won’t, he’d like to write and direct, but accepts that he might not get the chance. He would also have liked to quit television after The X Files, but, in the end, he went back. Like many of us, he seems to want what he can’t have. Unlike many of us, however, he’s making his peace with the fact.

As a writer-director, for instance, his sole directorial effort on film to date (he has tackled a few X Files and Californication episodes) has come with the comic drama House of D, about an American artist in Paris, which he also wrote, and which featured his wife, the actress Tea Leoni. “I have things in mind for writing and directing, but the scripts I write seem to fall into this independent world,” he concedes, “which I started veering towards as I was finishing The X Files, about 10 years ago.” He pauses for a moment. “And it is a hard world right now, when you want to make the kind of movies I am writing. I think they could be popular, and could do business, but it’s hard to prove that at the script stage. At some point, I think somebody is going to take a chance and give me some money to make one.” If not, he could put one out as a novel, perhaps? “It’s funny you should say that. I have been working on this script this past winter, and I think it is quite dense. I don’t know if it is a movie or not. I hope it is, but I am also going to turn it into a novel, just in case.”

As an actor, Duchovny’s identity was — at least until Hank Moody arrived to ruffle his unflappable hair — inexorably tied to his X Files character, Special Agent Mulder, who, along with Gillian Anderson’s Scully, sleuthed the otherworldly on our television screens from 1993 until 2002. They’ve also popped up twice on the big screen, successfully with 1998’s The X Files ($189m at the worldwide box office), and less successfully in 2008’s The X Files: I Want to Believe (few felt the same; it took $68m).

“I think all great successes help and hinder, but they help most of all,” he says, reflecting on whether Mulder has cast a shadow on his subsequent career. “It happens that an actor comes into public consciousness only in one form. You can’t come out in three television series in one year and show people everything you can do. But I’m happy it was The X Files and not something I thought wasn’t good.” His pride in the franchise extends to the most recent movie, although he accepts that errors were made. “It was a $25m picture and couldn’t compete with the summer movies like The Dark Knight. It was a sombre mood piece, and that might have been a mistake. I hope we get to do another. Gillian and I would both be interested in seeing where it goes.”

Quite where that is remains to be seen, but there is no escaping the fact that The X Files transformed Duchovny’s life. Indeed, for all the material success it brought him, during one of the first conversations we had, in 2005, with the series three years behind him, he expressed a firm desire to avoid further television work. He popped up on Saturday Night Live, and in an episode of Sex and the City, but these were one-offs.

In 2007, however, he reappeared, in Californication. Despite some early criticism about its racy content (some critics dubbed it The Sex Files), the show proved an enormous hit; Duchovny scooped a Golden Globe for the very first season, and nominations for the two that followed. “When I said to you back then that I had no desire to go back to television, I didn’t see how TV was changing. Now, you can do a 12-episode series and it doesn’t dominate your life. I actually think that doing a series like this is the most free form of filmed entertainment you can make.” During his nine-year stint in The X Files, he starred in more than 150 episodes. “I just wasn’t smart enough back when we were speaking to see that the TV landscape was changing.”

In that previous conversation, we had spoken about infidelity. At the time, he had been happily married for eight years to Leoni — with whom he has two children, a daughter, Madelaine West, now 11, and a son, Kyd, 7 — and we had joked about man’s inability to keep his trousers on. “They’re discovering that levels of serotonin are much lower in men, and that’s the chemical that makes you happy, and also makes you want to bond,” he mused at the time. “So men not only want to have sex with lots of different women, to propagate, or whatever that old argument is, but they also have less of the feeling of being part of something. So it’s harder for a man to bond and feel connected.”

A few years later, in the summer of 2008, he released a statement that he was “voluntarily entering a facility for the treatment of sex addiction”. The news appeared somewhat ironic, given our earlier conversation and the libidinous nature of his character in Californication. Shortly after the announcement, he and Leoni separated, although they had reconciled by the autumn of last year, and the family went on an extended holiday on the West Coast. Despite his candour, I wonder, why did he go public?

“I would be glad to tell you off the record, but it is not something I really want to discuss in public,” he replies. It’s a delicate subject, and one that was inflamed further when a British tabloid claimed a week after the split that he had had an affair with a tennis instructor, Edit Pakay, while still married. Duchovny denied the report and announced legal action. The paper printed a retraction. He now views the whole business with an admirable mellowness. “The tabloid world is busy, and omnivorous, so I was not taken aback by that story,” he says. “I don’t take any of it personally. I am not saying I enjoy it, but these things exist because people buy them, so it is not for me to say they should not print this stuff.”

His refusal to blame the press is refreshing, and he even jokingly suggests that tabloid interest at least shows people still care. “It would be nice for them to get the facts right — but it is just gossip, so it’s not of world-shattering importance. It may be hurtful for me personally, but mostly what worries me is that my children are exposed to it. Luckily, they don’t read that British newspaper. But the time will come, with the glory of Google, that they’ll find something some day. ‘Dad, what the f*** is this?’ Hopefully, I’ll be able to explain. In the meantime, I’ll get on with enjoying my family, my work, my interests.”

Which brings us back to literature, books and, of course, the Kindle. What is currently top of his hard drive? “I have gotten into David Foster Wallace, mostly as an essayist. And Richard Powers I like very much. But I tend to read with attention deficit disorder. I read 10 or 15 books at a time, always wanting to read something else.”

Which comes as no great surprise. In fact, it might even be typical Duchovny, always wanting what’s just out of reach.

The Joneses is all about commercialism. You’ve made your share of commercials. Anything from the early-struggling-actor days?

They used to pay well. They could get you through the lean months. I did a couple of beer commercials. I did a vitamin commercial and a lottery commercial. When I started getting notoriety it was cheesy to appear in a commercial. Everyone was saying, “I have to get a commercial in Japan.” It was okay to appear on camera in Japan. But not in America. But that’s changing. Like with Luke Wilson and Catherine Zeta Jones. Seinfeld did the credit card one. It’s a sign of the changing times and I don’t think it’s an aberration. I think you’ll see more familiar people doing these.

So are you thinking about it? You do voice-overs for Pedigree dog food, but what what would you push onscreen if you had to push a product?

I’m not thinking about it. I’m not grabbing at the money. My kids are fine. We’re okay. It’s not something I think about. At one time there were voiceover artists, now there are celebrity voiceover artists. It’s unfortunate because these people need the money less than the voiceover artist. Commercials were traditionally a way for actors to support themselves to work on stage, movies or television.

You say in the film that whoever has the most toys when they die wins. Sounds good to me. Do you subscribe to that?

Not at all, I’m about three years behind the curve usually. I do have a Kindle, so maybe it’s only about six months behind the curve.

Do you have any tech obsessions?

No, I’m a luddite. I like my computer. But I don’t know how to use it as well as the 10-year-old daughter. I guess I like watches, but that’s kind of a 19th century obsession.

Really, how many watches?

I think I have two good ones.

That’s not an obsession. I probably have two watches somewhere.

I like sneakers. But they are given to me in the same way this film works. I think that satisfies an obsession because I was athletic as a kid. I was 12 or 13 when the Adidas Superstar came out and it was first time that you would pay more than $10 for a pair of sneakers. I remember wanting to pay $18 for a pair of sneakers and my dad was like “No way!”

Guessitmate your sneaker population.

There are a lot. I don’t know. 30 pairs.

Speaking of being athletic, there’s a scene in the movie on a golf course where you sink a hole in one. No trick photography?

Nope. Easily 40 feet. I was off the green. Into the hole. Second take.

How did you stay in character and not fall on your knees in joy when you hit that?

First of all it was freezing and windy. As [director] Derrick [Borte] set up the shot, I was like, “Are you kidding? I could be here all day trying to put that ball in the hole. It will be luck if it goes in.” I was surprised the first one was close. And when the second one went in, my impulse was to jump up and down. And I was like, “No my guy is a good golfer. He expects that.” So I put my head down again to hit another one.

Is that your greatest acting moment ever?

Derrick gave me a Quicktime movie of the shot and I sent it to everyone I knew.

Will you ever go back to The X-Files?

It’s ready-made nostalgia. It depends on whether [creator] Chris Carter wants to do it again. He certainly doesn’t have to. We always talk about it amongst ourselves. We talk a lot. Or I’ll text him and say “Do you have an idea?” Or I’ll say, “I have an idea for a show. I wish I had that one eight years ago. This would have been a good episode.” But generally I’ll be on an elevator with someone and the elevator will bump and they’ll say, “There’s an X-file.” And I’ll say, “Actually that’s not an X-file. That’s not a great story. The elevator just bumped.”

Super heroes are all the rage now. Which superhero would you want to play?

I’m not a big comic guy. Who’s not taken? Is anyone left? I knew a guy in graduate school who wrote about a cool character called Balloon Man. He floated above the city and he could see crime. But he couldn’t get down. He’d have to deflate himself in order to get down and by the time he did he had no power. I thought, “That’s the super hero I’m playing.” Because he’s totally ineffectual. To me that’s the truth. Balloon Man. He has no powers. To me The Incredibles was the apex of superhero [stories]. It deconstructs it and constructs it at the same time.

Duchovny unleashed his dry wit as he told Parade.com‘s Jeanne Wolf about his own take on materialism and how he’s coming to terms with tabloid scrutiny.

Trying not to get it all.
“I know what I want, but I’ve learned I can’t have everything when I want it. I would get upset with our kids when they were little and say to Tea [wife Tea Leoni], ‘I didn’t grow up with access to a lot of stuff, and now our kids want everything.’ And Tea said, ‘It’s a good thing to want. You actually want to encourage the wanting, just not necessarily the idea of getting it all.’”

His Tiger Woods moment…no, not that one.
“I’m a sh–ty golfer. On the golf course, Tea always wins. She’s a great golfer. For this movie, I just had to look good in a close-up. But there was one shot that was maybe my proudest moment as an actor. It was a freezing cold windy morning and they wanted me to try and hit a 40-yard chip shot from the edge of the green into the hole. I nailed it on the first take. People were like, ‘Do it again.’ And I’m like, ‘It will never happen.’”

His almost superhero moment.
“I was in Vancouver shooting X-Files and one night I went outside to walk my dog. I see a guy in a bathrobe, and as I got closer and I could tell he was apparently choking. So I grabbed him and did my best Heimlich maneuver, like I’m really yanking on his diaphragm. Finally, he calmed down and I waited with him until an ambulance came. About a year later, I was in a restaurant and he came up to me and goes, ‘Remember me. You gave me the Heimlich, but I was just having an anxiety attack.’ I’m thinking, ‘Thank God I didn’t kill him.’ Anyway, he bought me a drink.”

Coming up on Californication.
“We left Hank last year going to jail at the end of a season. We went about as far down as we could going for laughs since it’s a comedy not a drama. So after hitting the low point, I think this year’s gonna be about rising up for Hank, which is not to say there still won’t be plenty of laughs. I love it because I think people are finally getting used to the fact that I can be funny.”

As for being smart.
“Growing up, I wasn’t really the brain, I was more of an athlete. I wasn’t dumb, but my friend was the brain. I think we called him ‘Head,’ actually. Sports came much more easily. I wanted to be a professional basketball, baseball, or tennis player. The problem was that I didn’t focus and, anyway, I wasn’t good enough. But I never thought of myself as the brain at all. In fact, my brother told me that I was — well, he used that politically incorrect word that means mentally challenged.”

Why he’s willing to endure tabloid scrutiny.
“I think that the worst part of the whole celebrity thing is that there is too much attention paid to actors. There are other people that deserve attention that don’t get it. As for me, I’m not real happy about what they’re writing in the National Enquirer. But I’ll take a few hits if it means having freedom of press. I always have recourse in lawsuits, I can sue them if I want. But I think it’s much more important that anybody can print whatever they want. The fact that my feelings get hurt doesn’t factor into the equation.”

His advice to the young David.
“I’d probably say, ‘You’ve got to love acting because the odds are you won’t succeed. Don’t chase money and fame, chase the work because you love to do it. Then I’d say, ‘Get out of my way, you young handsome bastard. I’m not done yet.’”

“It’s about a hypothetical family put there to inspire conspicuous consumption,” he said. “They’re planted in the community to sell their lifestyle. They’re not really a family. Their bodies and homes are full of product placement — sneakers, jewelry, electronics, clothing, cosmetics.

“It’s basically an idea that I had,” he said. “These are like moles. Stealth moles. Like a cell. It’s a satire. We’re not talking science-fiction here. It’s a comedy.”
And at the end? It falls apart?

“Well, by then it satisfies a few different experiences.”

A disembodied voice came on saying David only had a minute more to chat with me.

He talked about his wife, Tea Leoni. “We had a tough year and a half. We split up for a bit. We’ve been together 13 years. But we’re back. And living in New York. In New York, you don’t exist in a car. Your whole life isn’t planned. You can walk the streets. People smile or nod. You can see life. People don’t bother you.

“My mother lives here. It’s funny. Twenty years I’ve been in the business and, as I’m walking along, someone will say ‘Hi,’ and I’m polite so I give him a ‘Hi’ back, and my mother will say, ‘Where do you know him from?’

“Right now I’m in LA because I’m taping my show. But I love New York. My kids go to an Episcopal private school.”

The disembodied voice came on again with a crisp: “You have to go now, David.”

To which he then said to me: “Y’know, I always wanted to be a Knick. And I don’t think it’s too late.”

Source: The New York Post

As he discusses his character’s adolescent-like approach to life, Duchovny can’t help but reflect on his own final push toward maturity.

“I still feel like I haven’t grown up,” he says. “But I can judge from my work that I’m a lot more of a man than I was five years ago. Maybe I’m late. Maybe I’m on time. I’m happy it happened. It’s something you have to do. I paid attention. I didn’t coast. I asked some hard questions. I took some hard answers. I learned humility.”

Looking fit in slim-cut jeans and a nondescript pullover, Duchovny speaks quietly and calmly. “In this country, oddly, we have images of men as arrogant and aggressive,” he continues. “Humility is considered an unmasculine quality. What I found in the last five years is that humility is a beautiful thing.”

During Duchovny’s “maturing” period, he and his wife, actress Tea Leoni, separated. But they are back together, and he says, “things are terrific at home.”

He drops Leoni’s name into the conversation every few minutes. For instance, “Tea and I have a production company, and we’re developing projects.” Or, “Tea and I parent together, although if the kids had one phone call to make, they’d call their mom, probably.”

An ‘odd paradox’

Duchovny and Leoni met when they were both auditioning to be on The Tonight Show. Leoni, “a real extrovert,” Duchovny says, got the gig and the guy. They have two children, Madelaine West, 10, and Kyd Miller, 7.

The family now lives in New York, but Duchovny will return to Los Angeles to shoot Season 4 of his Showtime series, Californication, to air in the fall.

“Last season we left my character, Hank, going to jail,” he says. “We went about as far down as we could, so I think this year we’ll be rising up.”

Duchovny is fascinated with Hank and his problems. “He’s an odd paradox. He was with this woman he does love, and when they were together he was committed and monogamous. Since they split up, he’s kind of drifting passively. … Most people misread the show. They see it as a guy who’s always after women when, in fact, it’s the women who go after him, and he just doesn’t say no.

“I hope we can go six seasons. I think it’ll get canceled before I get tired of it.”

Duchovny calls The X Files “a cultural touchstone” and his official introduction to Hollywood.

“Sure, I’d worked before that. I’d played a transvestite on Twin Peaks. But in terms of mass appeal, it was The X Files, and the overwhelming feeling of The X Files is dark and brooding that attached itself to me.”

In The Joneses, Duchovny actually smiles on occasion. As Steve Jones, he charmingly tries to persuade everyone he meets to buy all the latest products he, his wife and two teenage kids are showing off. The “family” is actually a team of sales agents selling a very expensive lifestyle.

Wanting vs. getting

“My character (a former used-car salesman) is just smart enough to get this job but not smart enough to know he shouldn’t take it,” Duchovny says. “It’s a tough character to play. He’s both a winner and a loser.”

Duchovny understands the lure of wanting something you can’t quite afford. “I’ve seen things and thought, ‘Oh yeah, that’s a nice-looking island,’ ” he says. “Marlon Brando had that (Tahitian) island. I’ve had the fantasy to own a rock off the coast of Manhattan.”

The message of The Joneses, Duchovny points out, “is that keeping up with the Joneses is a fool’s errand. Money can’t buy you love. It’s all the things we say that we know, and yet the way we live puts the lie to it.”

Duchovny says he considers the film one of the high points of his 22-year career, along with The X Files and Californication.

“And I loved directing House of D (with Robin Williams),” he says, “no matter that the box office was not so good.”