#howtofail

[dd-is-my-guiltypleasure]

David Duchovny: ‘The X-Files took up my life, but it was a miracle’

It's behind a paywall so if somebody has access I would love to read the article

Update : got it, thanks @aimsies-mctaymellburg

David Duchovny: ‘The X-Files took up my life, but it was a miracle’

As Fox Mulder in the hit sci-fi show, the actor and singer peddled fringe conspiracy theories. Now the 63-year-old says Mulder’s paranoia is everywhere.

In hindsight it wasn’t a great idea for me to kick off an interview with David Duchovny by suggesting that he was a musical dilettante. You’re most likely to know Duchovny, of course, as Fox Mulder, the conspiracy-theory-guzzling FBI agent in The X Files, one of the biggest shows of the Nineties, watched at its peak by 30 million in America alone. Perhaps you saw him as the womanising writer Hank Moody in Californication or the 1960s detective Sam Hodiak in Aquarius. You may even have read some of his five books.

Duchovny, a New Yorker living in Los Angeles, is less known for music, although he’s been making rather decent folk-rock for a decade — songwriting, playing guitar and singing in a honeyed drawl. His 2015 songHell or Highwater has been streamed more than a million times while Layin’ on the Tracks, from 2020, has pointed lyrics about a certain politician (“It’s a killing joke that no one laughs at/ A stupid orange man in a cheap red hat”). He has released three albums, with a fourth due next year, and this month plays Latitude festival in Suffolk and the 2,000-capacity Shepherds Bush Empire in London.

So does the 63-year-old feel that he should no longer be seen as just a musical dabbler? “That’s part of a lazy person’s perception,” he says, bristling slightly. “It’s a lens through which people want to see me. I think music is an innocent art form — you listen to it and you have a response. To bring any kind of baggage to bear on it in the beginning seems to me to be dishonest, but that’s the way things go.”

YouTube clips of recent shows suggest people were having a lovely time, I say. This doesn’t have the soothing effect intended. YouTube footage lingers “because of the horror of the cell phone”, Duchovny says. “It’s a pet peeve of mine.” Is he tempted to ban them at his shows, as artists from Prince to Bob Dylan have? “I don’t know that I can enforce that view on anybody.”

For Duchovny, it’s as much about phones limiting his performance as it is about the audience not living in the moment. “To do something unique or for the first time, to reach for a note or play a different melody — all these are chances you might take if you weren’t inhibited by the fact that somebody is [recording] it,” he says. “You’ve got to be able to fail and the ubiquity of cell phones makes failure scarier than it needs to be.”

Failure is the key to another of his jobs: podcasting. In his series Fail Better, he adroitly interviews guests including Bette Midler, Ben Stiller and Sean Penn about their failures. “I feel like I’ve been failing my entire life,” Duchovny said on launching it in May. That may sound strange from a man with English degrees from Princeton and Yale, who has won a Golden Globe for The X Files and another for Californication.

Is he familiar with Elizabeth Day, the British journalist who has hosted a successful podcast called How to Fail since 2018? When Duchovny announced Fail Better, Day tweeted: “I might invite David Duchovny on @howtofail to discuss his failure to be original.”

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” he says. “If she wants to be rigorous in her thinking, she would investigate what my approach to failure is. I don’t know what her approach to it is. My sense, since failure is universal, is that there’s room out there for more than one discussion.” This is a rather po-faced response to what seemed like a playful comment from Day, and surprising because Duchovny has a wicked sense of humour. He can also afford to be more magnanimous, given that his podcast is at No 12 in the UK chart and hers is at 54.

Gillian Anderson, his X Files co-star, certainly likes his podcast, writing this week on Instagram that she had listened to all of the episodes and found them “intimate and vulnerable … very smart questions, although I wouldn’t expect anything else from you [David]”.

“It’s very sweet,” Duchovny says. “I will email her and thank her. I’m sure somebody running my social media is … I don’t really like to be on social media.” Later that day his Instagram account replies to Anderson’s post: “Thank you for listening, you have an open invite [to appear on his podcast]!”

That encounter would be worth hearing because his relationship with Anderson is fascinating. Despite their chemistry in The X Files there were rumours of friction — although they looked to be getting on swimmingly when they appeared on Jimmy Kimmel’s talk show in 2016 to publicise the return of the show, which ran for two more seasons.

When asked by Kimmel about frostiness between her and Duchovny in the Nineties, Anderson collapsed into giggles, laid her head in Duchovny’s lap and put any froideur down to the dampness of Vancouver, where the series was shot. Her hair kept going frizzy, she explained, and “for every single take we’d have to stand there and blow dry my hair again”.

“And I got pissed at that?” Duchovny asked.

“Well, I think it added to the tension,” Anderson said.

“It kinda makes me sound like an asshole,” Duchovny replied.

Anderson had nothing to do with him leaving The X Files in 2002, he says now. “That was just me wanting to have a family, but also to try other things. It had kind of taken up my life. There was no animosity with the actual show and the people that I worked with. I am proud of the show — it was culturally central in a way that it’s very hard to do these days in a fragmented landscape. There’s so many lightning-strike aspects to it that I can’t help but think of it as some kind of a miracle.”

The X Files gave conspiracy theories a kind of nobility — “the truth is out there”, as its tagline ran. Now they are more widespread and pernicious. “Mulder’s way of looking at the world was through conspiracy and that was the fringe at that point,” Duchovny says. “It doesn’t seem to be so fringe any more. It’s really the world that [The X Files creator] Chris Carter foresaw happening almost 30 years ago. He’s almost clairvoyant in that case.” Is Duchovny more evidence-based than Mulder? “Not at all. I’m an artist — I am associative-based and I see poetry as science and science as poetry.” So are there some conspiracy theories that he buys into? “No, I’m talking about art. I think conspiracies are mostly just lazy thinking.”

One failure that has shaped Duchovny is that of his marriage to the actress Téa Leoni, who starred in Bad Boys and Deep Impact. They married in 1997 and have a daughter, West, 25, and a son, Kyd, 22, but divorced in 2014. “That darkness does deepen you. It makes you more empathetic and humble,” Duchovny says. One of the themes of his podcast is “the difference between humiliating and humbling. Often we focus on humiliation in our culture. I don’t see any positives coming from humiliation, but I see a lot of them coming from humility.”

One wonders if the reference to humiliation has something to do with Duchovny checking into rehab for sex addiction in 2008. Could him playing the bed-hopping Hank in Californication be a case of art imitating life? “People never tire of trying to figure that out,” he says with a sigh. “But to me, that’s not what acting is about. I don’t look for things that are mirroring my life in any way.”

Well, there are parallels in Reverse the Curse, the 2023 film that Duchovny directed, starred in and adapted from his book Bucky F***ing Dent. He plays a would-be novelist who has “sacrificed his artistic dream to put food on the table”. His father, a publicist, did the same, publishing his debut at 75, the year before he died. The film has some really funny scenes, including one where Marty and his son have a farting competition in a motel room that ends up smelling like “an aquarium that fed a sock”. That may have come from a line in Aquarius where someone says something similar about a police station. “I might have ripped it off, I’m not sure,” Duchovny says. “ You can ask Elizabeth Day about that.”

David Duchovny will perform at Latitude festival, near Southwold on July 25 and 02 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, W12 on July 27

[thefeliciastarks]

This is what happens when summa y'all wanna DIY instead of hiring someone to do what they do BEST or help you get BETTER RESULTS! 🤦🏾‍♀️ . . Just hire the baker Just hire the trainer Just hire the coach Just hire the stylist Just hire the marketing expert Just hire the hair stylist Just hire the make-up artist . . You get it? . Yes, there are things you are highly skilled at doing, however, if you know someone is skilled at doing it, hire them & take the pressure off yourself! 😉 . . #accountabiltyninjaQueen #fitspo #fitfam #fitnesslifestyle #fitmomomsover45 #howtofail #diy https://www.instagram.com/p/CRMrShIDedh/?utm_medium=tumblr

[thebookkatblog]

Welcome to the How to Fail book tour! Today I’m helping to celebrate this wonderful new release by @elizabday ! . Do I know how to fail? If I’m honest, it feels as though I’ve been failing a lot lately. This book birthday/ book tour couldn’t be better timed if we tried. Since moving to the UK, and completely upheaving my life, it has felt as though I’ve been failing, over and over again. I have been in the UK 15 months and still can’t find full time work. And definitely not from a lack of trying! When I left Aus, I left my dream job. It took blood, sweat and tears to get my foot in the door at Penguin and although it hurt to leave, I was excited for whatever adventure came next. What I didn’t anticipate was the soul-destroying UK job market, and the struggle to make ends meet. My sense of failure was attacking from all angels; I felt as though my struggle to get full-time work was because of me personally (assuming I wasn’t good enough/ smart enough/ worthy enough) and also, that I was meant to be having the greatest adventure of a lifetime living overseas, and I was loathing it. I feel like a miserable burden. Failure, failure, failure. . And yet. I have the most wonderful partner in the world. We have a beautiful, cosy, book-and-campervan filled home. We are happy, and very much in love. I might not always have enough hours to pay the bills, but I have a full life of the things that matter the most. My sense of failure is centred around my discomfort at being vulnerable. It doesn’t feel good. It can be really difficult to put a positive spin on failure, especially when you feel like you’re still smack-bang in the middle of it. . I am loving this book. I am about half way through and every word Day writes is resonating with me in some way. Like Day, I know this experience will only make me stronger. If you’re struggling, or feeling like you’re failing, know that you’re not alone. This book will hopefully remind you ❤️ . Thank you to @elizabday and @4thestatebooks for inviting me on this tour. Tomorrow @theclubofbooks will be sharing their story. Let us continue the conversation below ❤️ . #howtofail #elizabethday #booktour #bookreview #shelfie #bookstacks (at Liverpool) https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv6PpR_n_ER/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1ep6hle4cfjwv

[winmipodcast]

Which way are you gonna do it...?⠀ ⠀ The past two guests have given us a lot to digest and think about with regard to how we practice and train to mindset and #lessonslearned from setbacks and missed opportunities.⠀ ⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ .⠀ ⠀ ⠀ Reposting @weeditpodcasts:⠀ ...⠀ Failure happens...but it’s the next step that matters. So whether last week brought success or failure, the good news is, you get another shot every Monday.⠀ ⠀ #failureisnotfinal #mondaymotivation #auditions #howtofail #failurequote #auditionlife #rejection #actorslife @JoshCantwell #producer #broadway #musicaltheater #quotesforlife #performerlife #performingarts #theaterpodcast https://www.instagram.com/p/CHqzUWpjXAO/?igshid=1xboqrhbz0fvt

[tyzerevans]

Just had an amazing podcast with the great and powerful @thebassettway! Devin has a powerful story that is very inspiring about transitioning from full time Mom to an IG expert who created a crazy following in a short of amount of time, and now is onto something even bigger. I’m excited to get this one launched in the next coming weeks. I’ve been fortunate to connect with a lot of individuals who have incredible stories, I’ve got about 8 podcast lined up for everyone, so if you haven’t checked out the podcast, head to the link in my bio. Follow 👉🏻 @tyzerevans Follow 👉🏻 @tyzerevans Follow 👉🏻 @tyzerevans ⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ .⁣ #tyzerevans #consultancy #motivation #podcastone #photoshoot #midsizeblogger #spotify #photography #sale #d2d #music #pentek #store #podcastlife #model #influencer #midsizegals #mondaymotivation #howtofail #streamer #lifestyle #applepodcasts #torontopodcast #podcasting #podcasts #smile #instagood #feminizmus #loa #igexpert (at Houston, Texas) https://www.instagram.com/p/CHd5t0AnV7E/?igshid=kpq3m4e8ixzh

[bunnybookandbrew]

��️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “Adults assumed I was capable because, by now, I was tall and good at exams and well behaved in class, but really I was just trying to work things out and I still barely knew myself.” REVIEW *no spoilers* : 🐇 How to Fail by Elizabeth Day offers a frank discussion about some of the major ‘failures’ we may experience over the course of our lives. As someone who struggles to accept and overcome setbacks, this book was sorely needed. I know I am not alone in my blind terror of failing, and recommend this book to anyone who has ever experienced it. So, everyone ever. 🐇 Elizabeth Day is a delight to read; her writing style is concise and conversational, so her ideas are easy to absorb while maintaining importance and honesty. She is so innately likeable as a narrator that we associate even with the failures we haven’t experienced ourselves. We can learn from the lessons of Day and her friends. . #bookstagram #bookshelf #instagrambookclub #readingtime #reads #readwithme #bookworms #bookflatlay #bookphoto #paperbacks #review #nonfiction #howtofail #elizabethday #failureispartofsuccess #selfimprovement #goodreadschallenge2020 #failureisnotfinal #booksandreading #bunnybookandco @elizabday https://www.instagram.com/p/CDb9oeTJRth/?igshid=rd86kjmi31f0

[lettersandmiles]

Detail about the paper is on my story. . I've been listening to a lot of podcasts lately, and to be honest I enjoy very much ladies being fun and fearless as they are, I might be bias but guys on podcast is not my favorite. Loving the recent go to fun chat of @howtofailpodcast and @missesambitious And my all time favorite @me_and_orla ❤️❤️❤️ . They are just simply magical human being . . Do you guys love podcasts? Who's been your inspiration these days? . #handlettering #brushlettering#brushcalligraphy #moderncalligraphy#watercolor #copperplate #flourish #flatlay#whiteinkcalligraphy #whiteink #bleedproofwhite #blackpapercalligraphy #bpwink #motivationalquotes #magicalladies #favouritepodcast #podcast #hastagsauthentic #howtofail #missesambitious #funfearless #women #WomenEmpowerment #beingwomen #smallbusinessowner #smallbusiness http://ift.tt/2jcXXbC

[thefeliciastarks]

Are you afraid to fail? . . Does that fear of failure keep you stuck in a circular pattern? . . In order to achieve anything, you must be brave enough to fail. Kirk Douglas . . . #fitspo #fitfam #fitnesslifestyle #healthyliving #fitnessnewbie #onlinenutritionspecialist #transformationtakestime #arlingtonfitness #arlingtonfitfoodie #dfwnutrition #fatlosscoach #accountabiltyninja #leanleadiesvip #feliciastarksfitness #fitnessmondaymotivation #howtofail #howtoloseweightfast https://www.instagram.com/p/BzGTaN3juHF/?igshid=1lawcl2xzvoe0

[luckyelephantbda]

So good. 👏👏👏#true #howtofail #Bermuda #LuckyElephantYoga #yoga #gratitude

[bibliobethblog]

Hello everyone and happy #stacksaturday to you all! Today’s post is quite a special one and a #stackforacause that I was tagged in by @the_brazilian_bookworm so I definitely wanted to take part. Like many others, I have been watching the unfolding situation in Afghanistan with horror as the Taliban have taken over. @bibliolucinda created a #pinkstackforafghanwomen For every stack posted until Sept 1st she will donate $1 to @womenforafghanwomen up to a total of $150. If you like, you can also donate to this cause separately. Historically, the Taliban have always suppressed the rights of women and are notorious for their misogyny and violence. They prevent women’s education after the age of 8 which has forced many women into underground schools if they wanted to learn and if they were caught (or any of the other Taliban rules were broken) they risked public flogging, humiliation or execution. Most recently, the Taliban have advised women who work to stay at home because soldiers are not trained to respect them. They have also allowed and in some cases encouraged marriage before the age of 16. Amnesty International reports that up to 80% of Afghan marriages are forced. This is such a worthy cause and if you’d like to join in, please consider yourself tagged. Out of the pictured stack, I’ve read Detransition Baby and Sharks In The Time Of Saviours which were both excellent. The rest are on my TBR. I’ll end this post by just saying his grateful and lucky I feel to be living where I am and to have the privilege I do. I really feel for the people of Afghanistan and hope for a resolution and peace for them soon. #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #bookstack #tbrpile #pinkbooks #pinkbookstagram #afghanistanwomen #howtofail #elizabethday #notthatkindofgirl #lenadunham #sharksinthetimeofsaviours #kawaistrongwashburn #myyearofrestandrelaxation #otessamoshfegh #fiftywordsforrain #ashalemmie #theghoststoriesofedithwharton #edithwharton #detransitionbaby #torreypeters #womenontopoftheworld #lucyanneholmes #booksimexcitedabout https://www.instagram.com/p/CTIG56AAbdU/?utm_medium=tumblr

[howtofailatyourlife-blog]

How to fail at baking... You know we ate it anyway!

[ohhmygeeg]

AMY POEHLER SAYS, "The question you have to ask yourself is: How do you want to fail? Do you want to fail in a way that feels like it respects your tastes and value system?" Bravo, good question/great advice. Why compromise who you are and what you trust in yourself? Must stick to it. Thanks Amy Poehler, and thanks for all the hearty laughs. Smart Girls rule, all day. "100 Most Creative People in Business," Fast Company, June 2015 issue #amypoehlersmartgirls #amypoehler #lifeadvice #howtofail #womenleaders #fastcompany #creativesinbusiness

[topfitnessfranchises]

Some people will believe anything! STOP taking this "fake" advice... #9Round #HowToFail http://t.co/3BelK4g3pi: Some people will believe anything! STOP taking this "fake" advice... #9Round #HowToFail http://t.co/3BelK4g3pi

[feliicitas]

yes.. ni vet hur jag alltid lägger ut massa bilder på att jag fått A i matte? well, såhär går det om man är FÖR nervös inför nationella. jag glömde till och med bort att göra c-delen som satt i samma häfte som b-delen, wow, ibland förvånar jag mig själv... #howtofail #howtocommitsuicide #howtoblowyourownmind (på/i Plusgymnasiet Kalmar)

[thenightmaredash]

Not only does the immense amount of talented people depress me, but the pile of ramen cups in the corner of my room has turned into fuckin mount Everest. Goodbye cruel world. ;-;

[andhislions]

Anyone feel like going for a ride with me??? #AdelaideMetro #PublicTransport #Howtofail #wtf #ridiculous (at Adelaide Railway Station)