Decoding The X-Files

Contrary to tabloid reports, and past feuding, they seem to be getting along these days. ""It's an arranged marriage,'' Anderson says. Many people mocked Duchovny's 1997 box-office bomb, ""Playing God,'' about a doctor who sews up criminals. She defends it. ""I thought it was very brave of him. There was a lot of horrible stuff said about David and the movie. Completely inappropriate.'' David, too, seems to have mellowed. The long hours and isolation get to him. ""It's very difficult, because you tend to blame the nearest person. In my case that's usually Gillian or Chris or whatever director we have. I probably re-created my own family dynamic. I had to get out of that.'' Duchovny makes more than Anderson: $110,000 per episode to her reported $100,000. But she's won more awards. And her trailer is bigger.

Trailer size matters but the larger issue now is whether ""The X-Files'' will make either of them a major movie star. Anderson has a part in Sharon Stone's ""The Mighty,'' due this fall. But Duchovny is waiting for this week's reviews and receipts to come in, hoping they boost his price and stature. He and Anderson got $4.5 million each for ""The X-Files'' but, unless it's a huge hit, he could never command that much on the open market. The lack of a rumored naked rear view of Duchovny in the movie could also affect his prospects as a leading man female fans line up for. What happened? ""David's butt actually made film in a hospital gown,'' Carter says. ""The gown flapped open, but the camera position was such that the shot was unusable.'' Isn't that what always happens with those UFOs?

But even fully clothed, Duchovny and Anderson look sexier together than most movie matchmaking ever does. Five years in front of the camera have given them a comfort level with Mulder and Scully and each other--another reason the movie is good because it was a TV show first. During the bomb-scene scare, Scully accuses Mulder of losing his composure:

""I saw your face, Mulder. There was a definite moment of panic.''

""You've never seen me panic. When I panic, I make this face,'' he replies, offering his usual affectless stare.

Just a brushstroke, but one that efficiently highlights a relationship that could be brother-sister, close friends or Nick and Nora Charles. The writers know their characters well enough to generate heat with the merest hint of intimacy. Such is the intensity of sexual tension that these star-crossed FBI agents can be in separate scenes for much of the show and still smolder via cell phone. The cell phone is an ingeniously modern metaphor for their disconnected dance: apart yet together, professional yet erotic as they whisper urgent messages of danger and concern into each other's ears. As it happens, Duchovny wooed Leoni by phone for three weeks before their first date. A few months later, they were married.