How Did Gillian Anderson Get Such A Huge Career In Britain?

I think it's due to Simon Pegg. Any other theories?

• Talent

• She's actually quite good and should not be judged based solely on The X-Files. Her performance in "The House of Mirth" speaks for itself.

• Why is she always with fug men?

• She won an Emmy for her work on The X-Files. Same reason Kim Cattrall is so big in Britain; they recognize these actresses are more than just the one role they're known for on TV. Actors in the UK aren't as pigeon-holed as they are in the US, especially women over 40.

  Dame%20Judi%20Dench

• Isn't Kim Catrall a natural born Briton...or the child of British citizens who moved to Canada? I believe Gillian lives in England or is married to a Brit. Plus, she's one of very few actors who can competently pull off a British accent.

• Kim Catrall is from Liverpool. When Catrall did Who Do You Think You Are and spent time back in England, she was totally different from her American persona (very quietly spoken). Gillian Anderson is similar. She's almost a totally different person when interviewing in the UK or working in the UK. She speaks in a slightly toffee-nosed, tranatlantic/English accent (she said she acquired her accent when living in London as a kid). She has a British husband, and seems to have totally shunned Hollywood. (I used to think she was a lesbian - always pictured with Ellen Degeneres). I loved Anderson in Bleak House.

• Anderson grew up in Britain so her Brit accent is a natural one. She moved to Michigan from the UK when she was 11.

• [quote]She's actually quite good and should not be judged based solely on The X-Files. I don't get that comment. She was brilliant in The X-Files. But yes, she's fantastic in House of Mirth. Deserved an Oscar nomination. Also great in The Mighty.

• She's hard;y had a 'huge career' she's had a few roles in costume dramas and done a bot of stage work. Outside a certain group of the arty middle class I doubt most people know who she is. It's not as of she's one of the big TV regulars.

• She's a terrible actress. This thread is filled with lesbians acting like idiotic gay guys. Come on, ladies, you should be smarter than this.

• She did star in Bleak House, r9, which was a big hit for the BBC.

• No, R9, she's pretty famous in the UK. She has magazine covers and is a generally well known celebrity. That's in spite of not courting celebrity at all - she seems to hate giving interviews if she can avoid it - but her name is used to promote things.

• Bleak House was a thoroughly first-rate production and she was perfectly brilliant in it. It's no wonder it goes right over the heads of the typical DL mental-midgets.

• Gillian can be accepted as an actress over in the UK than over hear. Over here, the public will still attach her with the "Dana Scully" thing from the X-Files.

• [quote]I think it's due to Simon Pegg. What's Simon Pegg got to do with Gillian's British work?

• R7, just wanted to elaborate on your post. Gillian was born in the US, her family moved to the UK when she was 2 until she was 11, then she moved back to the US. It's not like she was a Brit who emigrated. While I'm sure she can do a flawless English accent (especially since she's a good actress and has been living there for 6 years or so) I don't believe that it's her natural accent anymore. I come from Central America and moved to the States when I was 8 but spoke mainly English 'til I was 10. I don't have a trace of a Spanish accent, and when I try to speak Spanish I have a gringo accent.

• [quote]Isn't Kim Catrall a natural born Briton...or the child of British citizens who moved to Canada? Yes, she grew-up in BC. She has dual brit/can citizenship.

  and%20she%20lives%20in%20nyc

• R9, A bit of stage work? In 2010, Gillian Anderson was nominated for a Laurence Olivier award for Best Actress for her role in "A Doll's House." That is *the* most prestigious theatre award in the UK. It is similar to a TONY. Rachel Weisz won. In film, "Johnny English Reborn" was just a huge hit in the UK. It's definitely not a middlebrow film. Next, she has supporting roles in a few European films, one with Clive Owen and the other with Michael Caine. Gillian was smart to move to the UK after The X-Files ended. It seemed like career suicide at first, but she would never have been given the opportunity to navigate between theatre, television and film in Hollywood. Re: British television She just starred in two highly-watched miniseries in 2010 & 2011 and received a BAFTA nomination for playing the Duchess of Windsor in "Any Human Heart."

• THE DAILY MAIL 22nd November, 2011 [bold]GREAT Expectations: Gillian Anderson leads an all-star cast in the BBC's festive adaptation of Charles Dickens classic[/bold] By Daily Mail Reporter As Agent Scully in The X Files, investigating paranormal activity was part of her day job. So it's ironic that Gillian Anderson looks like the walking dead in her latest role as the tormented Miss Havisham in the BBC's festive adaptation of Great Expectations. The American actress cuts a ghostly figure as the jilted bride in the Charles Dickens classic. She is sure to satisfy those hankering after a bit of Christmas costume drama. The 43-year-old is no stranger to period drama or Dickens for that matter. She won acclaim for her role as Lady Dedlock in the BBC's 2005 adaptation of Bleak House. Ray Winstone, 54, also stars in the three-part drama due to be aired over Christmas, as the dastardly Abel Magwitch. David Suchet, 65, plays Miss Havisham's lawyer, Mr Jaggers. The series also stars the rather dishy Douglas Booth, 19, as an adult Pip. Booth played Boy George in BBC2's Worried About the Boy last year. A young pip is played by Oscar Kennedy, while a young Estella is taken on by 15-year-old Izzy Meikle-Small. British actress Vanessa Kirby takes on the role later on. Both Mr Kennedy, 12, and Miss Meikle-Small are no strangers to playing child leads after he played a young Nigel Slater in last year's autobiographical drama Toast and she a young Kathy in 2010 film Never Let Me Go, alongside Carey Mulligan. The adaptation is part of the BBC's 2012 bicentenary celebrations of Charles Dickens and promises to present 'the heart and grit of Charles Dickens at his very best.'

  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2064629/GREAT-Expectations-Gillian-Anderson-leads-star-cast-BBCs-festive-adaptation-Charles-Dickens-classic.html#ixzz1eooq0msi

• She's lovely.

• R20, I couldn't have said it better myself. Her work on the early seasons of X Files (when the show was well written) is fantastic. She was equally wonderful in House of Mirth and Bleak House. She deserves all of her success.

• Can't wait to see this. She was captivating in BH.

• I don't blame her for shunning Hollywood.

• I met her ex-husband who, together with their children, lives in Vancouver. Even though they are divorced, he had nothing but nice things to say about her. Apparently, she never really cared for The X-Files but it gave her the financial security to work in theater and not to have to worry about whether Hollywood or American television want her.

• Did she shun Hollywood or did she just make terrible decisions? I really wonder if she would have turned down so many big movies if she'd know how successful they were going to be? I can get why she would have no interest in doing in Men In Black or Hannibal, but The Matrix was fantastic.

• [italic]What's Simon Pegg got to do with Gillian's British work?[/italic] He put her in everything he did because he was obsessed with her. In fact, she was an inside joke on "Spaced". Gillian was just on the BAFTA Awards, where she was nominated. The Brits like a bunch of American celebrities such as Joan Rivers, who has a huge career over there, and Matt LeBlanc, and anyone who appeared on Celebrity Big Brother.

• So. "Te X Files" gave her the means by which to do quality work? Good for her!

• A friend of mine met her years ago on the set of X-Files. Said she is teeny tiny in person and incredibly beautiful and exceedingly nice.

• She's currently filming The Curse of the Buxom Strumpet with Ian McKellan. Doesn't get more British than that.

• R25, where did you read about Gillian Anderson being offered "The Matrix" and "Men In Black"? I've never heard that. Her name was thrown around as Jodie Foster's replacement in "Hannibal", but I think that was just casting speculation and not an offer. Gillian admitted that she turned down the lead roles in ANACONDA (Jennifer Lopez), DOGMA, and VOLCANO. [bold]GILLIAN ANDERSON SHUNS HOLLYWOOD FOR LONDON[/bold] [bold]March 29, 2011[/bold] [bold]In order to find substantial roles in films and TV, Gillian Anderson says that she has focused her career on the U.K. In an interview with the BBC magazine Radio Times, the former X-Files star said that in Britain, “There’s a broader understanding of my capability,” whereas in Hollywood, she said, she had sometimes thought “of throwing in the towel when I’m doing a crock of s***.”[/bold] In fact, she disclosed, she got her role on The X Files against the wishes of Fox network executives who wanted a big-breasted blonde. “That’s the only way they knew how to market television. … No one expected The X-Files to be popular.” Since 2005 she has appeared in such productions as a BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens’s Bleak House, a comedy about the London art scene called Boogie Woogie, a four-part Channel 4 miniseries, Any Human Heart, in which she played Wallace Simpson, for whom King Edward VIII abdicated the throne to marry, and The Crimson Petal and the White (to air next week), in which she plays a brothel owner in Victorian England. [bold]“They don’t know what to do with me in the States because they don’t realize I’m a character actress,” Anderson said. “They wouldn’t for a second imagine I could play Wallis Simpson.”[/bold]

  http://www.studiobriefing.net/2011/03/gillian-anderson-shuns-hollywood-for-london/

• r26 Matt LeBlanc is a huge star in the UK? What are you smoking?

• She's a UK citizen

• I am glad that she's happy with her life and career over in the UK.

• What's with the all the stories of her being a drunken psycho on airplanes?

• Joan Rivers is a huge star in the UK? What are you smoking?

• R16, you probably have a tin ear.

• Why does Kevin Huvane, partner at Creative Artists Agency, keep Gillian Anderson as his client? Gillian surely cannot be making him any money. His other clients include Meryl Streep, Sandra Bullock, Oprah, Sarah Jessica Parker, Jennifer Aniston, Nicole Kidman, Julia Roberts... Basically, they make him money. Gillian? Not so much...

• She's constantly working, I'm sure she makes him plenty of money.

• "Anderson grew up in Britain so her Brit accent is a natural one. She moved to Michigan from the UK when she was 11." Ha-ha, most Brits who've lived in the US for a long period of time usually lose their accents if they came here as small children, compared to other foreigners who move to the US and continue to speak 'their' language. These foreigners never seem to lose their accents. A relative's Austrian in-laws have lived in the US since 1955, they still have heavy Austrian accents. The only explanation is that they rarely speak English. A huge problem is when these immigrants talk to their babies, and small children, in their languages, these kids end up unable to speak English when then get into school! Thus, the need for 'English as a Second Language' classes. It's amazing how many small children born here have heavy foreign accents by the time they enter school. A relative is a school teacher and she sees this all the time. I saw Gillian Anderson on Graham Norton's BBC America show a few years ago, she was speaking in a heavy British accent, what a joke.

• I meant to say I spoke Spanish until I was 10.

  R16

• Technically, Gillian Anderson is British, right?

• This is what I don't get about her accent. She works in the US for years, goes on talk shows,etc with a perfect american accent (she grew up in the midwest), moves to England, works there, and then appears on their talk shows with a british accent. Now I can understand that she may have had one when she left England as a child but it had to have faded once in the US. So either she was faking an american accent during interviews, which is quite strange or she's faking the british accent. All of the actors from australia/England, when they're interviewed here, they speak in their normal accent. So what the hell is her 'normal' accent?

• She almost broke my heart in Bleak House- she's a very good actress, and very easy on the eye too.

• r42 She's bi-dialectical. Like Barrowman.

• R37, Gillian Anderson is represented by a British talent agency that I think is responsible for all of her acting jobs in the UK. r41, no, she is not British. She's American. R43, she speaks with an English accent when she is on British talk shows, and she speaks with an American accent when she is on American talk shows. Recently, she was doing interviews in Australia, and she spoke with a mixed British/American accent. "When in Rome..."

• She's been very clever. She thought she'd try to make a career away from America where she felt pigeon-holed. She'd lived in England as a child, so she went there and she's made a success of it. There's not a lot of quality work in England, but she's found her way into many of the few good things that are being made. The accent thing is hard to fathom. I wonder which accent she THINKS in.

• You know it's like everyone knows Kate Winslet is British but can do an american accent for her movies. but then she's on talk shows anywhere in the world and she speaks in her regular voice, which is british. Yet Gillian spoke american for over 10 very public years and then suddenly, her natural speaking voice is british? Seems affected.

• An affected British accent? How gauche!

  Madge of the Manor

• She always had a slight British accent though. I remember reading interviews back in the early days of The X-Files when she'd be asked about it. I think it's a natural thing. I was born and raised in Texas but most people are surprised here to learn that. But when I'm back in Texas and around family I sound country as fuck, I know it.

• I think that Gillian recently realized that she has to play the game a bit if she wants to be sucessful. She used to dress like a lost hippie, but she has been looking glamorous at events and shows over the last year. She has hired a stylist and a publicist. Plus, Gillian changed her British talent agency two years ago.

• Her career baffles me, too... Okay, so she was brilliant in a huge American hit, was terrific in House of Mirth, was great in A Doll's House at the Donmar Warehouse, and is rather beautiful. Oh, and she's wonderfully droll at British awards shows. Yep. OP, it's a mystery to me too.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DkVojHdpVfJA

• Don't blame her for shunning Hollywood, either. With an estimated net worth of around $25M, I'd say the quality of life she enjoys in the U.K. is probably better than having stayed in the U.S., grasping for roles, for an appearance on Entertainment Tonight, for an ever higher higher rung on the ladder ...and forever being "that X-Files girl." She's had some choice roles in the U.K., and has greater flexibility in what she does with her career, even if she's not pulling down Sandra Bullock bucks for crap blockbuster roles.

• Summer, 2011 American show The Talk with american accent and then Spring, 2011 BAFTA awards with british accent. That's pretty schizophrenic. Why bother changing your accent? Which is the accent and which is real?

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Mb3Cle-_VU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVojHdpVfJA

• r53 she's an actress. there is no real

  Madame Ravenskaya

• It was announced today that Gillian Anderson's upcoming film, SHADOW DANCER, is going to have its non-competition premiere at Sundance in January 2012. Gillian plays Clive Owen's boss in the film. He is an MI6 Agent. Shadow Dancer: Andrea Riseborough (seen lately in Madonna’s W.E.) stars as a widowed mother-turned-terrorist with brothers in the top echelons of the IRA, who must decide whether to share what she knows after being arrested for a failed bomb plot. Co-stars: Aiden Gillen, Domhnall Gleeson, Gillian Anderson (The X-Files) and Clive Owen (Director: James Marsh, Screenwriter: Tom Brady.)

  http://insidemovies.ew.com/2011/12/02/sundance-girls-robots-wanna-have-fun/

• [quote][R43], she speaks with an English accent when she is on British talk shows, and she speaks with an American accent when she is on American talk shows. A bit like all the DL-ers on the 'How big is your cock thread' claiming above averages thread, only Gillian is fabulous.

• BBC One has released its Christmas drama promotional commercial that highlights its shows, and Gillian Anderson as Miss Havisham in "Great Expectations" is the first clip:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygTwSjH5Vq0

• Here is the first commercial for GREAT EXPECTIONS:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlR1ll0exBg

• Apologies, that should be "GREAT EXPECTATIONS".

• The bitch looks great. Here is a new interview where she talks about Great Expectations: [italic]The Saturday interview: Gillian Anderson 'You've changed," I tell Gillian Anderson. In 1996, she was chosen as the world's sexiest woman by FHM magazine's readers; this Christmas she will be bald and on fire as Miss Havisham in the BBC's adaptation of Great Expectations. So what made her take this role? Anderson bristles: "That's not really a serious question, is it? The real question is, 'How the fuck did I end up as the world's sexiest woman in 1996?' – not why would I do Great Expectations. Any actor would want to do Great Expectations. I never set out to be the world's sexiest woman."[/italic]

  http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2011/dec/17/gillian-anderson-interview-miss-havisham

• BBC NEWS Great Expectations: Miss Havisham given 'youthful' air 24 December, 2011 Gillian Anderson portrays Miss Havisham as both tragic and consumed by the need for revenge.Great Expectations begins on Tuesday 27 December at 21:00 GMT on BBC One and continues on 28 and 29 December. Tortured, ghostly, eternal bride-to-be Miss Havisham is returning in a fresh screen adaptation of Charles Dickens' literary classic Great Expectations. The wealthy heiress, who was jilted on her wedding day and lived as a recluse for decades afterwards, haunts her tumbledown mansion clad in a dusty matrimonial gown. Miss Havisham - with her white matted hair and wedding feast table preserved in cobwebs - has been played by older actresses in previous major incarnations. Joan Hickson played her at the age of 75 in 1981, while Anne Bancroft was cast in a 1998 modern reworking of Dickens's story at the age of 67. But for the new take on Great Expectations she is portrayed by Gillian Anderson, who at 43 is the youngest screen star to play the woman who casts a huge shadow over the life of Pip, hero of the tale.

  http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/65320544.html#comments#ixzz1hUiuhfiL

• She came across as such a cunt on Graham Norton last night. You can see for yourself in a few hours on BBC America.

• And she provides no explanation for her inexplicable English accent. She even admits she's American!

  Lynn%20Stairmaster

• She seemed annoyed that the Dr. Who guy was getting more attention than she was.

• Well she did say that the family would go back to England every year after they moved to America. After learning British in your formative years, then going back as an adult and living a the rest of your life there, it's easy to relapse into the accent. Doesn't John Barrowman do the same thing?

• [quote]She seemed annoyed that the Dr. Who guy was getting more attention than she was. Maybe that's just your interpretation. I'm always amazed at how people on the internet call someone bratty or snotty and yet when I watch them (and expect to see what's been said) it's rarely if ever, as bad as that. I can't wait to see her in Great Expectations, she looks amazing, gives Miss Haversham a creepy etheral beauty; her eyes look like glass and they have her dressed in dusty white. Adult Pip, btw, looks like one smoking HOT twink with lips that make Tom Hardy look mealy mouthed. You guys will love this adaptation.

• I never watched the X Files. That being said, Gillian Anderson was wonderful in BLEAK HOUSE. I think that's the first thing I have seen her in.

• you have never been around someone with an accent that becomes more pronounced when they return to the place where they first acquired it? Or around someone who has picked up one or two regionalisms after living there for a few years? Accents are funny things. THey aren't just about how you form your vowels, but they also involve syntax, idioms, and tone of voice. Its everyones natural tendency to adapt to the language of the people around them, I dont think Andersons vacilating accent suggests anything about her character. The manner of our speech is dictated by situation, not the relative authenticity of out character. Only people with limited life experience would think otherwise.

• [quote]Maybe that's just your interpretation. I'm always amazed at how people on the internet call someone bratty or snotty and yet when I watch them (and expect to see what's been said) it's rarely if ever, as bad as that. Yep. People project a lot.

• [quote]And she provides no explanation for her inexplicable English accent. She even admits she's American! I really don't think there's any great mystery to this. She resides in London, the father of her kids/her partner is British, her youngest children are British-born and above all her career and work requirements are primarily in Britain now. It's probably to her benefit to perfect an accent in a country where she will be working possibly for the rest of her career. If her work is more skewed towards UK tv/drama as well as theatre then a heavy US accent is little help in Victorian and Tudor period pieces. I don't think she's doing this to spite anyone or turn her back on her roots, it's just probably easier for her and maybe she slips naturally back into it too having spent some time in the UK as a child.

• I'm an Anglo American too and I've never, ever come across anyone who's accent vacillates the way her's does. Using a local accent for a movie is fine, but to turn up on various talk shows with completely different accents is very strange indeed.

• R71, you should see Tom Hardy if you think GA is bad. He once turned up to a talkshow with a quasi West Indian accent and did the entire interview with a straight face. It was ridiculous.

• Accents changing because of environment is common enough for a syndrome to be named after it. I just can't remember what its called.

• Uhhh, R73, it's called being pretentious.

• I don't know, as was said by the previous poster, accents are a funny thing and vary between everyone. There are numerous other examples. Naomi Watts calls herself English, as she should as she lived in Kent till age 12, just past the age of natural natural acquirement - as they say around the onset of puberty. It does annoy me as well, but some people do the multiple accent thing. Whenever in London Monie Love went back to a British accent. Whereas Donovan left Scotland at a very young age and still retains some of the accent. It took Sheena Easton years to shake off her Scottish accent. And then there's that cunt Lulu, another one who goes back to her original accent whenever she's in Scotland. I find it very insulting and patronising.

• Cilla Black is another one with a clear fake exaggerated Scouse accent. Jane Leeves surprisingly still has her old accent. Australians are especially good at American accents (bar Kidman) - like Melissa George. Anthony LaPaglia had deliberately tried so hard to lose his Aussie accent, that he couldn't get it back and a dialect coach was needed for Lantana. I do sort of understand it though, I have an Uncle and Aunt who moved to Manchester and Surrey respectively and completely lost their accent. A lot of it is the environment and picking up things, but I also think if you've got a strong accent you consciously tone it down and naturally do that in other places so you're understood. Eventually the new accent takes over altogether...

  Post%20too%20damn%20long%20for%20one%20part

• [quote]you should see Tom Hardy if you think GA is bad. He once turned up to a talkshow with a quasi West Indian accent and did the entire interview with a straight face. It was ridiculous. I saw that. It was very peculiar. He's very odd. Here's the yucky link.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DIrMh4cRH6e0

• You're on target, r70.

• When did Christopher Hitchens and others like Anna Wintour and Tina Brown move to America?

• What about Julie Andrews and Angela Lansbury?

• What's wrong with having 2 accents? I don't like taking his name in vain but Jesus Christ you're some bitter muthercunters!

  Melanie Amaro, winner of X Factor's first season

• Exactly, R79. Why is it they still put it on thick even though they've lived here for decades? This whole switching accents on a whim is pretentious and obnoxious, and the explanation regarding her childhood is nonsense because she's already shown she speaks with an American accent. She wasn't Sienna Miller who actually grew up over there. Ted Koppel left England when he was 13. He managed to lose his accent. I saw about ten mins of the Norton show and she came off like a complete tool. It was even thicker than the accents of the actual Brits on the show.

• Well, her English accent is helping her to have a strong acting career in the UK, so...

• [quote]And she provides no explanation for her inexplicable English accent. She even admits she's American! I like to think she does it to piss Meryl, Renee and Gwyneth off, because she can do it perfectly with zero visible effort. Let's face it, in her position, wouldn't you too?

• Jennifer Ehle is another one. Was considered British throughout the 90s and then reinvented herself as an American. She has dual heritage (her mother is Academy Award nominee Rosemary Harris) and I remember she got very haughty when Tony Blair called her his favourite British actress - "I'm American" she declared. This is one of her English interviews. Caron Keating, the female presenter, died several years ago from breast cancer.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6NmvYThFtM

• Who cares. She is sexy doing either accent.

• New interview with [bold]THE TELEGRAPH: Gillian Anderson: 'When he was just 30, my brother was prepared to die’ Actress Gillian Anderson talks about love, the loss of a sibling and the challenge of playing Miss Havisham. [/bold] By Bryony Gordon 7:30AM GMT 26 Dec 2011 Gillian Anderson has a tattoo on her right wrist that is in Sanskrit, and when I ask her what it means she tells me, laughing, that its rough translation is “none of your business”. Anderson is a curious mix of cautious and carefree, clamming up about some skin ink yet talking openly about her brother, Aaron, who died three months ago of a brain tumour. He was just 30. I remark, rather obviously, that it must have been a tough year. “Well, there’s certainly been a lot happening this year. But I feel like I’ve learnt. I feel like I’ve changed in a positive way.” Aaron was diagnosed with neurofibromatosis when he was just three years old. It is a rare condition with no known cure and causes tumours to grow on nerve tissue, leading to skin and bone abnormalities, but Anderson says that “it’s questionable as to whether this was related to that. His condition involves tumours but not very often brain tumours, so the fact that he had an inoperable one was shocking and not commonplace. He was getting his PhD at Stanford. He was in the middle of a young life.” Aaron was a Buddhist “and because of that he was prepared. He was diagnosed [with the brain tumour] at 27 and it got really rough at the end, but he was completely ready. So it was kind of remarkable for everybody who got to witness it and witness his journey.” Was it almost tougher on those watching than on Aaron himself? “Yes and no. I mean, my parents are kind of extraordinary…” she trails off. “I think it comes down to his perception of everything, his acceptance of his path. None of us were hanging on and trying to pull him back into the world. We didn’t want it to be any different than the way it was happening because it was really clear that he was OK.” A lot of interviews dwell on Anderson’s spells in therapy, her peripatetic childhood that saw her move from Chicago to Puerto Rico to London to Michigan, the panic attacks she has suffered while doing theatre. “I mean, the amount of times I read the same f------ things!” This, Anderson says, “boggles my mind”, because she doesn’t feel it is representative of the conversation she has had with journalists. It makes her seem like a self-indulgent luvvie, when in actual fact she is terribly good company. We meet in London (this is home, with her partner and three children) to discuss her role as Miss Havisham in the BBC’s Christmas adaptation of Great Expectations, her second Dickens role for the corporation, having played Lady Dedlock in their adaptation of Bleak House. [bold]Anderson is quite astonishingly beautiful, far more so than on screen, and speaks with a British accent, which somehow seems to suit her better.[/bold] She arrives alone, roaring up in a 4x4 and apologising for being late, explaining that she almost ran out of petrol on the M4, while travelling to London from her place in the country. Where in the country? She clams up again, and when I tell her I only asked out of absent interest, that I’m not planning on noting down her entire address and then printing it in the paper, she relaxes a little – enough, at least, to name the county as Wiltshire.

  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/8971145/Gillian-Anderson-When-he-was-just-30-my-brother-was-prepared-to-die.html

• [bold]And that’s the thing about Anderson: she is fluent and articulate when asked about feelings and experiences, all the personal stuff, but get her on seemingly innocuous things and she becomes oddly private.[/bold] The 43-year-old would probably refuse to tell you what she had for lunch, but ask her if she was aware of how young she was, by modern standards, when she had a baby and got married (she was 24), and she goes off on one. “Well, I’ve never really been aware of anything in my life. I mean, when I was doing The X-Files, people used to say 'Oh my gosh, what a whirlwind life you’ve had – you got this job at 24, you got married, you got pregnant, you got divorced.’ But my response was always: isn’t that just what people do? It never really hit me over the head in the way people were saying.” And then, without prompting: “I think that… maybe the problem is… I mean, I don’t have any regrets whatsoever, because any regret would mean that I wish that I hadn’t done the series or had Piper [her first child], but I guess if I were able to talk to my younger self, I might have wished for a little bit more consciousness. And I wish I had known that I had choice. Not choice in terms of whether or not I had the baby. I just think there were a few times in my life when I could have said no, or I could have stepped back. But I always just went whichever way the wind blew me.” She has been divorced twice, from a cameraman on The X-Files (the father of Piper, who is now 17) and the documentary maker Julian Ozanne. Might she marry Mark Griffiths, the businessman with whom she has sons of three and five? Or is she done with marriage? “Neither. I have no idea.” She says she likes having children now, when she is “not working 16 hours a day. [With Piper] I was shooting The X -Files and she was in my trailer while I was on set. And I also think that being a bit older makes a difference, just in terms of the kind of attention and appreciation for the child.” Did she feel a little trapped playing FBI agent Dana Scully? Anderson nods. The series ran for just under 10 years, and there have been two X-Files films, but you get the sense that she would be happy never to reprise the role again, that she has only relatively recently started getting the parts she really wants. [bold]Last year she was nominated for an Olivier for her portrayal of Nora in A Doll’s House at the Donmar. There was a part in The Last King of Scotland, a wonderful turn as Wallis Simpson in Any Human Heart, and she starred as Mrs Castaway in the recent adaptation of The Crimson Petal and the White. Anderson is a fabulous character actress, and won Bafta, Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her Lady Dedlock performance, though taking on Miss Havisham somehow seems a greater challenge, perhaps because she is a more iconic Dickens character, who has been played by everyone from Martita Hunt to Anne Bancroft and Charlotte Rampling (Helena Bonham-Carter will also take on the role in a BBC film to be released next year). Some have said Anderson is too beautiful, young and glamorous to play Miss Havisham, with one Dickens expert describing the actress as a “cougar rather than a crone”. But on screen, Anderson is crack-lipped, scratched, and her performance has an almost ethereal quality to it.[/bold]“It’s an interesting argument [regarding the age of Miss Havisham], because of course it’s written from Pip’s perspective, and when I was 12, anybody above the age of 25 looked ancient. Presumably Miss Havisham was jilted at the altar when she was 18 or 20, and it’s 25 years from then…” And actually, Anderson wonders “if it’s not more interesting if she’s not 70. Because then it’s certainly more provocative when older Pip shows up.” So a little cougar-ish then.

  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/8971145/Gillian-Anderson-When-he-was-just-30-my-brother-was-prepared-to-die.html

• Ehle would be a shoo-in if they ever do a Meryl Streep biopic, R85. I was actually distracted by the likeness when watching the shitty Contagion.

• She enjoyed playing Miss Havisham more than Lady Dedlock “because she’s slightly mischievous and naughty and her dialogue is more poetic. And also, Miss Havisham seems a lot more eccentric.” We talk a bit about Dickens – she says she isn’t more of a fan of him than, say, Emily Brontë or Edith Wharton – [bold]and her love of London. “It feels like home and it has for a long time.” Her eyes light up when she talks about the flat she lived in as a child in Haringey, about the “hedge smell” of Crouch End. She apologises but she has to go. I ask where she’s off to and the gates come down again. “I have to go to a premiere,” she says bashfully. Of what? “Um, not anything I’m in.” I press on, and eventually discover she is going to Mission: Impossible 4, because she has “some friends” in it. Not Tom Cruise, it turns out, but a nice British actor whose name she won’t tell me (I gather it is Simon Pegg). You look like you are dreading it, I say. She starts laughing and puts on her best gritted-teeth face. “I’m not quite sure why I am going, but yes, it will be fun. It will.” [/bold] The first of a three-part production of 'Great Expectations’ starts on Dec 27 at 9pm on BBC One

• Her tattoo:

  http://i39.tinypic.com/dpb66w.jpg

• She is marvelous playing a quite different (and younger) Miss Havisham in the new adaptation of "Great Epxectations".

• I'm watching part one right now. She hasn't appeared yet. As for her affected accent, I'm sure her teenage daughter who knew her for her entire life with an American accent has had great fun criticizing her for the absurdity of it.

• R93, Gillian's daughter was around 9 years old when Gillian moved to the UK, so...

• And mommy suddenly has a totally different voice after having been consistently American for a decade, the girl's entire life. You don't see why that would be disconcerting for a child nor why the girl would taunt Mom V.2 over the issue?

• Enty's BI reveal this weekend said that Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny were practically living together now!

• So, is Duchovny living in London? I find that item fishy.

• [quote]Enty's BI reveal this weekend said that Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny were practically living together now! "Enty" is about as reliable as Lainey. I like GA but the accent she puts on for Norton sounds ridiculous to me because she sounds like a little old lady when she speaks with it. When she speaks with an American accent she sounds real and authoritative and someone who would make fun of a person who spoke with that type of british/uk/english accent. I'm sure the daughter makes fun her -- I would; or perhaps the daughter is a pretentious little git who, despite growing up in Canada, has adopted mom's accent. That would be too funny.

• Wasn't sure about Anderson as Miss Havisham. Found the sing song voice a bit limiting and boring. But she was really rather good in the later scenes. If it were an Eddie Murphy production, Douglas Booth would have played Estella (and been better cast in that part). Young Pip is a wonderful actor. He also played that chef (can't remember his name, but he's openly gay) as a child ("Toast").

• I didn't think much of her performance, either. I wanted to like it, but I didn't feel she was really emotionally connecting to the material.

• Though i limes the house of mirth, she was totally wrong for Lily bart, much to serious and stiff. In Her collection of essays, tama janowitz reporta that she attended some gala dinner and GA was at Her table. The only moment when she came Alive was when a camera appearead and GA practically pushed Her out of the photo. According to the article, she had never seem An. Actress that desperate at play, or something like that.

• I think it's schizophrenic to talk out of both sides of her mouth. One month it's no accent, on the talk in the US; then the next month, the accent is back on Graham Norton. Someone should call her on it and ask her why. Does she not realize that shows travel back and forth? Thinking the americans won't understand her 'native' accent. She's gorgeous; it's too bad about this clear personality flaw

• February 3, 2012 [bold]Gillian Anderson confirmed in lead role of Allan Cubitt’s new BBC Two drama series The Fall[/bold] [bold]The Fall is a gripping psychological thriller that forensically examines the lives of two hunters. One is a serial killer who stalks his victims at random in and around Belfast and the other is a talented female Detective Superintendent on secondment from the MET who is brought in to catch him.[/bold] Produced by Artists Studio and written by Allan Cubitt (The Runaway, Murphy’s Law, Prime Suspect), the five episodes will follow the police investigation uncovering the intricate story of the lives entangled by a series of murders – both the killer's and the victims’ families. [bold]Gillian Anderson stars as DSI Gibson, who arrives to conduct a 28 day review at a Belfast station where the police are getting nowhere on a high profile murder case.[/bold] Further casting will be announced soon, with filming starting in Belfast next month. Allan Cubitt says: “When I think of the really great television drama from my formative years I think first and foremost of their writers. I applaud wholeheartedly Artists Studio’s attempt – with the support of the BBC – to put the writer back at the heart – and head – of British TV drama.” Ben Stephenson, Controller, BBC Drama Commissioning, says: “The Fall is a unique, forensic and characterful take on a classic genre that continues BBC Two’s commitment to original British drama in 2012. Cubitt’s rich and complex psychological thriller combined with another compelling performance from Gillian Anderson will keep viewers on the edge of their seats.” Artists Studio, set up by former BOX TV alumni; Justin Thomson-Glover, Gub Neal and Patrick Irwin. Gub Neal and Julian Stevens will produce with Allan Cubitt, Justin Thomson-Glover and Patrick Irwin acting as executive producers. Neal and Cubitt both won Primetime Emmy’s for their work on Prime Suspect 2 and 5. Gub Neal says: “We are delighted to be working with Allan, he is a fantastic writer and handles the subject matter with extraordinary sensitivity and intelligence.” Julian Stevens says: “The development of this project has been a joy ever since the first meeting with the BBC in Belfast and I am excited to be cutting my producing teeth on such an ambitious project.” The series was commissioned by Janice Hadlow, Controller, BBC Two and Ben Stephenson, Controller of Drama Commissioning, and will be executive produced by Stephen Wright through BBC Northern Ireland. With funding from Northern Ireland Screen supported by Invest NI and part funded by the European Regional Development Fund. This commission continues to demonstrate BBC Two’s commitment to original British drama in 2012. It will join a raft of new dramas on the channel this year including Paula Milne’s White Heat, Jed Mercurio’s Line Of Duty, Sir Tom Stoppard’s Parade’s End, a second series of The Hour and a major new cycle of Shakespeare’s four most acclaimed historical works as part of a season based on the Bard’s life and works.

  http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2012/the-fall.html

• THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER [bold]Gillian Anderson Says She Turned Down Role on 'Downton Abbey'[/bold] The "X-Files" actress, no stranger to period television, says she was originally approached to star on the hit British series. Downton Abbey could have been a bit different. The British series, which has been a stateside success on PBS, apparently wanted to cast Gillian Anderson in one of its lead roles The 43-year-old X-Files actress, next appearing on PBS' Masterpiece Classic update of Great Expectations, told TV Guide Magazine that she was originally approached to star on the Emmy-winning series. "Hopefully people will embrace it with the same love that flowed toward Downton Abbey," Anderson said of her upcoming period piece. "I was actually offered a part in Downton." She later admitted the role was Elizabeth McGovern's Cora Crawley. Anderson is no stranger to PBS' Masterpiece or Dickensian television -- she starred in 2005's Bleak House mini -- but her participation would have presented a small issue for Downton Abbey: she's a bit young to play the matriarch. McGovern is seven years her senior. It's not a lot, but it makes quite a difference considering Anderson is just 13 years older than Downton's oldest daughter Mary (Michelle Dockery). Still, this is a woman who's playing the the withered spinster Miss Havisham in Great Expectations, a character Dickens' placed in her mid-50s. Downton Abbey is currently filming its third season. It will debut later this year in Britain, with a stateside premiere expected for early 2013.

  http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/downton-abbey-gillian-anderson-elizabeth-mcgovern-300687

• [bold]Gillian Anderson Joins I'll Follow You Down[/bold] Source: Deadline May 29, 2012 Gillian Anderson has joined the cast of the upcoming indie sci-fi project I'll Follow You Down. Deadline has the news, saying that Anderson will star opposite Haley Joel Osment, Victor Garber and Rufus Sewell. The film, from writer/director Richie Mehta, is officially described as follow: [bold]After the disappearance of a young scientist on a business trip, his son and wife struggle to cope, only to make a bizarre discovery years later - one that may bring him home.[/bold] Anderson, who will play the wife, Marika, is best known for her performance as FBI Agent Dana Scully on "The X-Files" and in its two feature films. She recently appeared on the big screen in Johnny English Reborn.

  http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=90795

• X-Files is the seminal work of Anderson's career as a actress, of course she will judged for it, and should be. That's like saying we cannot judge Kelsey Grammar based solely on his role as Frasier Crane. There are maybe 100 people who have seen the 'House of Mirth' and apparently they are all on this thread.

  Trent

• Because in Britain, it's all about one's acting ability and not their "celebrity" like it is in America. In America, some people think Jennifer Aniston is a great actress although she sucks like hell. Most of the crop of new, hot actors and actresses would be laughed out of Britain for their abilities. GA has done Shakespeare and Ibsen for God's sake. I would almost pay to see Aniston do a play by Ibsen.....LMAO.

  AddisonDeWitt

• Here is the trailer for "SHADOW DANCER" (2012). Gillian Anderson plays Clive Owens' MI5 boss. It's a supporting role.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ifVK9Qxqbw

• Did anybody else think she looked like Baby Jane Hudson in Great Expectations?

  Blanche%20Hudson

• Here's the trailer for Gillian Anderson's new British TV show, THE FALL. Hotties Jamie Dornan ("Once Upon A Time") and Archi Panjabi ("The Good Wife") also star. [quote]“The Fall” is the first investigative series toplining Gillian Anderson since her turn as Agent Scully in “The X Files.” It follows the lives of two hunters: Detective Superintendent Stella Gibson and a cunning serial killer. “The Fall” isn’t a whodunit but a will-they-stop him?, since the killer is known to the audience from the start, and the drama gains in intensity through the cat-and-mouse game. The case shows how a homicide team works when it comes up against every policeman’s worst nightmare.

  http://www.zdf-enterprises.de/en/int-catalogue/zdfedrama/series/crime-suspense/series-the-fall?pager=1b53aa

• It would be more interesting if she was the serial killer.

• She is in the new film by Ursula Meier, who made a fantastic film called HOME a few years ago. I like Gillian speaking French:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DHCOcG0JRrCQ

• Does she speak French with an American or British accent?

• [bold]'Hannibal' casts 'X-Files' star Gillian Anderson -- EXCLUSIVE[/bold] by James Hibberd [bold]Very exciting casting news: Sci-fi fan-favorite Gillian Anderson is returning to broadcast television after a decade to join writer-producer Bryan Fuller’s serial-killer thriller Hannibal.[/bold] And perhaps the best part is the role she’s playing…. [bold]In a multi-episode arc on the upcoming NBC drama, Anderson is going to play Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier — murderous psychiatrist Dr. Hannibal Lecter’s (Mads Mikkelsen) own therapist. [/bold] [bold]“Every therapist needs their own head examined and we are ecstatic that Gillian Anderson has chosen Hannibal to mark her return to American television after 10 years to portray Dr. Lecter’s personal psychiatrist,” Fuller said in a statement. “Her intelligence and sophistication, not to mention her pedigree of ground-breaking TV, make her the perfect actress to match wits and psychological manipulations with one of the greatest villains of pop culture. I couldn’t be more excited.”[/bold] Since Fox’s classic TV series The X-Files concluded in 2002, Anderson has appeared in mini-series such as Encore’s recent Moby Dick adaptation and British TV series like The Fall. According to IMDB.com, Anderson was actually in the running to play Clarice Starling in the 2001 big-screen version of Hannibal after Jodie Foster dropped out of the Silence of the Lambs sequel. But Anderson’s X-Files contract reportedly forbid her from playing another FBI agent. The actress joins a rather stellar cast on Hannibal. In addition to leads Mikkelsen and Hugh Dancy and Laurence Fishburne, the series has also signed on Eddie Izzard, Gina Torres, Molly Shannon, Ellen Greene and Chelan Simmons. No premiere date has been set, but insiders expect the show will likely debut in late Spring.

  http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/74142487.html%23ixzz2Et6ExRaA

• Yay! I remember they offered her the part of Clarice in the Hannibal but she turned it down cuz she thought she was too good for a sequel or something.

• 115, Gillian did not think that she was "too good" for the role. One, she had a contract with FOX and was not supposed to play another FBI agent at the same time, and two, Julianne Moore an Oscar nominee and was offered the rule as Clarice.

• What was the Clarice rule?

• Role, 117

• Because British don't give a shit and watch anything. Look at Madonna!!!

  Lana%20Kane

• Is it true she and Duchovny are currently fucking?

• No it's been denied by all.

• The French is good. If there is an accent, it's American. But there isn't really one.

• Isn't the goss that she had an affair with that black model, Elisha Donowa, and "came out" as bi before Elisha could sell the story? There are whispers that she paid the woman off to keep her quiet. And that they were lezzing when she claimed to still be with Mark Griffiths. Anderson was connected with many women during x-f so I was surprised that she seemed "straight" in Britain. I'm not surprised she was sleeping with women on the side. Open relationship, or just a woman that can't be faithful to one man or one sex?

• The staff at Chateau Marmont was well aware of Gillian's liaisons with with women. When she was sleeping with Alex Kingston (1999? Somewhere in there) they'd often book a room for a couple days at a time, only opening the door for more room service. There were many laughs over that affair. And many complaints about the noise. Alex enjoyed Gillian's sexual talents a bit...too much. *cough* screaming orgasms *cough* I'm not aware of Kingston ever being seen with other women. So Gillian can indeed turn a straight woman gay, at least for a day (or hot weekend).

  off-broadway%20rentboy

• Gillian's new British television show, "The Fall" starts airing next week in the UK and on Netflix USA on May 28, 2013.