After playing the womanizing Hank Moody on Californication, David Duchovny, 54, returns to TV with NBC’s summer series Aquarius, premiering June 4. He’s set to reprise his role as Special Agent Fox Mulder in the new Fox X-Files series scheduled for 2016.
As police sergeant Sam Hodiak, you’re on the hunt for Charles Manson in Aquarius. You were only 9 when he made headlines in 1969. What did you know about him as a child?
I liked to read about true crime when I was little. I read about the ’20s, Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde. Then around 10 or 11, I started to hear about Manson. It was the crime of the century up to that point.
After Californication, Sam Hodiak is pretty straight-laced. Do you miss the freedom of cable TV?
Nudity
I don’t care about. But as a writer, I wish that there wasn’t this
obsession with language we seem to have on our broadcast networks.
This June, you’re going to reunite with several original cast members to film the new X-Files.
I’m
excited to work with these people again. It’s really hard to get us
together to do it; everybody’s got lives, careers and children, and we
live in different places. Gillian [Anderson] and I have been talking
about it for a long time.
Your alt-rock album Hell or Highwater came out in May with 12 original songs. How did that come about?
Music’s
always been part of my life, but not as a player. About five years ago,
I wanted to actually play it, and I wanted my kids to see me learn
something. I’m always asking them to learn things and telling them not
to get frustrated, because it’s frustrating to learn a new skill.
Parade