Gillian and Cast

Our informant also supplied a photo of the cast, out of costume but loosely in character; Gillian is kneeling on the left. Our further investigations, cross-referencing the cast list with yearbook photos and other confidential sources, have uncovered information about several other cast members. The other short red-head, the one hugging our informant, is Amy DeYoung, who played Mortimer's lovely girlfriend Elaine and also endured years of riding the same bus as Todd. Next to Amy is Sue Trowbridge, a classmate and friend of Todd's whose fiancé won some money (but not the grand prize) on the "Millionaire" show. Not in the picture is Michael S. Smith (already a veteran of local community theatre, who probably could have acted circles around any of them, but was instead making things happen off-stage), who went on to produce and direct the excellent documentary "Jesse's Gone" which appeared on PBS's POV. We find it fascinating that key medium-grade celebrities were there at the beginning of Gillian's career. Perhaps strategically placed there to ensure that she would get into acting? Unfortunately, we have insufficient evidence to either confirm or debunk this theory.

Deep Thought denies any participation in such a conspiracy... or that he even knew Gillian beyond sharing a stage with her. "She and I weren't actually friends; we weren't even in the same grade. (I was a senior and she was a freshling that year... which is why I had a starring role and she had just a bit part.) And if she saw me on the street today, she probably wouldn't even recognise me beyond a "don't I know you from somewhere?" reaction... especially since I've lost my thick head of hair and added glasses. (To be honest, even though she still looks pretty much the same - but a little taller - I didn't recognise =her= when I first saw the adverts for that new paranormal-investigators show on Fox, and her name didn't register when I saw it in the credits the first time I watched it.) But I =can= say that I was there at the very beginning of her acting career, and that evidently I didn't do anything to turn her off from acting altogether. A modest claim, but an honest one."

We grilled him about what Gillian was like back then. "I didn't really know her well, so take this with a grain of salt. At the time I thought of her as kind of snooty, but she'd been living in London, and an English accent can make anyone sound that way. {grin} I also found her annoying at times, in the way that only a 14-year-old girl can be to a mature senior. Her background living abroad was cosmopolitan and exotic enough to make Grand Rapids, Michigan incredibly tedious and narrow-minded by comparison... trust me! So she was a bit rebellious, which is hardly surprising considering her age. In many ways, she was definitely unlike the character of Dana Scully; I wouldn't have imagined Gillian going into medicine and certainly not law enforcement, and she probably did believe in UFOs and the paranormal. But like Dana, Gillian was definitely smart and assertive, so that aspect of the role had to be pretty easy for her to pull off. I can't say I anticipated her success as an actor. But I certainly wasn't surprised by it."

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