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X And The Single Girl - Holden - Entertainment Weekly, 1997
Summary: Interview with Laurie Holden on her role of Marita Covarrubias. Some good quotes.
Entertainment Weekly, 25 April 1997, p.53.

'X' And The Single Girl

Entertainment Weekly, 25 April 1997, p.53

Transcribed by Deslea.


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Fox Mulder's Obscure Object Of Desire?

"I think of her as a Mata Hari," says Laurie Holden of Marita Covarrubias, her enigmatic alter ego on The X-Files. "You can't really read what she's saying or what her intentions are."

Duh! This is, after all, the poster show for deception, obfuscation, and inveiglement. And fans can look forward to becoming even more perplexed: on April 27, at episode's end, we learn that the U.N. operative - who has served as a clandestine information source and facilitator to Agent Mulder - is actually in league with his enemies, the diabolical Syndicate. Or is she?

"If I had an answer, I'd tell you. But I think the audience is going to say, 'Watch out, Mulder,' says executive producer Howard Gordon, who cowrote the episode. "Basically, that's the idea - to sort of load the gun and see what happens when it's fired."

The 25-year-old, Toronto-reared Holden snagged the Covarrubias role last summer and debuted in this season's opener. In true X fashion, the character was - and is - as vaguely sketched for her as it is for the audience. "When I auditioned, I couldn't get a script. It was all very hush-hush," says Holden, a 1993 UCLA grad who studied acting with the late Robert Reed (the legendary Brady Bunch patriarch). "All I knew was that it was a woman who worked at the U.N. who had an air of 'intelligent seriousness.' They've always said to me, 'Keep the mystery.'

That she has, tantalizing the show's more fervent devotees, who convene on-line to speculate on her place in the grand conspiratorial scheme of things. (Two theories: Covarrubias is actually an alien; not only that, she's a mutated embodiment of Mulder's abducted sister.) Rumours of offscreen grousing by David Duchovny to provide his Mulder with an on-screen love interest have also fueled suspicion that Holden was cast as more than a successor to previous would-be allies X and Deep Throat. While Gordon denies this scenario, Holden believes her character wouldn't mind a little hanky-panky: "He is very attractive. But any attraction is overridden by the greater task at hand...so far."

Gordon calls Holden's Covarrubias "sultry and brooding. It's an arch part that's difficult to pull off believably." Sound like Mulder? In that way, Covarrubias is a perfect match. Should they hook up, however, Holden might want to brace herself for a backlash from fans protective of Mulder and Scully's sublime, if sublimated bond. On being told that bodacious guest star Bobbie Phillips' character - a brief flirtation for Mulder in the roach-infested "War Of The Coprophages" - was the target of considerable venom at an X-Files convention, Holden shrieks, "Oh God! I'd better get an unlisted phone number." Mulder would insist.

-- by Michael Flaherty.