Gillian Anderson Finally Explains Kissing David Duchovny at 1997 Emmy Awards

Gillian Anderson made headlines, and raised eyebrows, when she kissed her 'X-Files' co-star before her then-boyfriend Rodney Rowland after winning the Emmy for her work on the popular Fox show.

Gillian Anderson was riding high in the late '90s, star of one of the most buzzed-about and popular shows on television, The X-Files . It was all about exploring the mysterious, which is just what fans found themselves doing after she kissed costar David Duchovny at the Emmys.

The dateline was September 14, 1997 at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium in Pasadena, California. The moment was the announcement of the winner for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series at the 49th Primetime Emmy Awards. The players in this drama included Anderson, her then-boyfriend Rodney Rowland, seated beside her, and Duchovny, in the row behind her.

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In the euphoric moment after her name was called, the camera was on Anderson and she inexplicably reached behind her to plant a kiss on Duchovny's lips ... before sharing a kiss with Rowland.

Taking to her TikTok over the weekend, Anderson had decided to share stories from her life, and this one in particular rose to the top. So what's the explanation?

"David and I were actually living together and Rodney was my beard," she quipped with a deadpan expression after misidentifying the award show as the Golden Globes. She quickly clarified, "I'm joking. That's just a joke. Was that really mean?"

"I don't know why I kissed him first," The Crown star conceded. "I guess because he was on the show with me and we were practically married because we spent more time with each other than we did with our loved ones."

"We were there to celebrate the series and so, yeah, maybe that's what it was," she added. "I don't know."

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She also clarified that the moment didn't make things awkward between her and her boyfriend at the time, either. Calling Rowland a "great guy," she said she doesn't "think it bothered him. He understood. It was complex."

Unfortunately, for anyone seeking more clarity about the situation and what was going through Anderson's head, she concluded her message, "That's all I got." Duchovny and Anderson's on-screen partners shared a slow-growing romance across the series' original nine seasons.

For the record, as part of their coverage of Anderson's viral message, Today noted that while Anderson misidentified her Emmys moment as the Golden Globes, based on the details she was discussing, she did also lock lips with Duchovny at the Globes when she won there.

We'll call it a testament to how close they were as costars for all those years, and how that chemistry kept fans on the edge of their seats through the will-they-or-won't-they-years, and was enough to bring the show to the big screen in 1998 and 2008, and back on TV for a two-season revival in 2016 and 2018.

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Duchovny also put the kibosh on any romance speculation between the longtime friends. In a 2015 interview with TVLine , he said, "The whole thing about Gillian and I dating is so weird. It's never happened, it's not going to happen, we're friends. I don't want to rain on anybody's parade, but no, it's not gonna happen. It hasn't happened."

He was responding to yet another kissing incident, when he was spotted kissing her at a concert to promote his debut album, Hell or Highwater . "I see Gillian, I kiss her hello. She’s my friend," he told the outlet. "If somebody gets a picture of that, if it’s on stage and she comes up to sing with me, I’m going to kiss her hello."

"I wish the show would be enough. I don't understand why people want more from Gillian and I. I really don't," he added. "You can have Mulder and Scully, and that's gonna have to be enough."

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