An audio commentary of “1X23: The Erlenmeyer Flask” with Chris Carter, coming from The X-Cast: An X-Files Podcast recorded for the 30th anniversary of The X-Files! In a rare treat, The Creator talks about one of the most important episodes of the series and is, well, depending on what you compare it to, tight-lipped or talkative! Highlights below!
- opening sequence: shot in North Vancouver docks, used several times, have now been torn down [as I can sadly confirm]
- last episode of the season and he was really tired, wrote this in his room at the Sutton Place Hotel in Vancouver [still exists!], put Stone’s “JFK” on and became the background while writing (could have influenced the idea to kill Deep Throat, “sometimes you have to kill your darlings”)
- he sat a long while with the people that did the opening credits to fine-tune them
- many name references: Roy Lacerio: CC played softball with; Danny Valladeo: was pitcher in CC’s high school baseball team [ha! so it’s confirmed he’s supposed to be named Valladeo!]; Berube: named after a fan who wrote a letter to CC about what she liked and didn’t like about the show; Ardis: name of street in Bellflower where his oldest friend grew up in; William Secare, Fort Marlene: surely there’s a story there but he doesn’t remember
- they might have known that there was going to be s2 by this point, they were told they would have a short vacation
- episode inspired by conversations with virologist Anne Simon about DNA and nucleotides, became science advisor to the show [see analysis of her book on the science of TXF], Carpenter was her married name; and with Bob Hardy (?), South California doctor who was working on the Human Genome Project
- many takes to have monkey try to bite Scully
- all scripted, no ad libs, fast production, no room to improvise
- if you want to give someone a “tutorial” on what the mythology is about, you show them Pilot, Deep Throat, The Erlenmeyer Flask
- he can remember the name of the actor of Crew Cut Man, Lindsey Ginter!
- they managed to put so much in a single episode because they plotted out so intricately and elaborately
- originally 7 days of shooting, then 8, then additionally 5-8 days of 2nd unit working concurrently, sometimes 3rd unit
- detective scenes come from his love of “Sherlock Holmes”
- excellent directing from RW Goodwin, director of photography John Bartley set the dark visual tone of the show
- can remember every frame of “All The President’s Men” [I can believe that!]
- actually shot at a real Pandora Street in Vancouver
- he has Zeus Storage sign and alien fetus in his office
- Spielberg had called “Close Encounters” speculative fiction; CC gave in to the characterization “science fiction” eventually [I guess CC’s strong dislike of the term science fiction came from its pulpy connotation while he was growing up in the 60s-70s?]
- CC had in mind a high-tech facility, Alex Gansa suggested the look of a dark musty rusty warehouse
- from the get go TXF was not just going to be an alien show, although the mythology was going to be about that
- importance of science, developed a network of people they could call to get things right
- was the last episode of the season so he got to be on set for the whole shooting
- he wanted to direct an episode as soon as possible, but producing was very time consuming, so it ended up happening in s2
- Deep Throat, Syndicate and everything else derived from the idea of the character of CSM
- after shooting this, GA went on vacation and got married
- GA was not an experienced driver, had difficulty with shooting
- alien fetus design: props and art department took an idea and always made it better
- he didn’t have Red Museum episode in mind yet, but it was derived from Deep Throat’s line
- Deep Throat shooting scene: it was nearing dawn, cameras set up so that it would look night
- removing Scully’s boyfriend [Ethan] made Scully’s relationship with Mulder so much more tense
