•Chris Carter, the creator of “The X-Files,” is set to release his new time-travel comedy film “Queens for a Day” through an unconventional theatrical approach that begins this week in Los Angeles.
The landmark series ran for 218 episodes across 11 seasons and explored numerous science fiction concepts, including several touching on time travel. Notable examples include the season 4 installment “Synchrony,” featuring an elderly traveler who returns to the 1990s to prevent his younger self from inventing time travel; the “Groundhog Day”-like season 6 episode “Monday,” in which Agent Mulder (David Duchovny) and Agent Scully (Gillian Anderson) repeatedly attempt to stop a bank bombing; and season 8’s “Redrum,” where a man accused of killing his wife experiences days moving backward.
The series’ most acclaimed time travel episode is arguably season 6’s “Triangle.” Written and directed by Carter, it follows Mulder as he becomes trapped in the Bermuda Triangle and finds himself aboard the SS Queen Anne, a British luxury cruise ship that vanished in the same waters during World War II. Transported to 1939 just as Nazis board the vessel, Mulder discovers the passengers resemble people he knows from the 1990s—including the Cigarette Smoking Man (William B. Davis) appearing as a German officer and Scully posing as a U.S. spy.
Meanwhile, in the present day, Agent Scully and Mulder’s conspiracy theorist friends the Lone Gunmen (Bruce Harwood, Tom Braidwood, and Dean Haglund) search for him at sea. They eventually locate the SS Queen Anne as a ghost ship drifting empty for decades, boarding it in pursuit of Mulder while the episode alternates between the past and present aboard two very different versions of the same vessel.
Carter’s new film, “Queens for a Day,” follows what its official description describes as “a controversial, hard-edged, modern day television talk show host who, after an accident, is transported back in time to the 1950s finds herself inhabiting her own mother’s body. She finds the cramped, mid-century American existence inescapable and nightmarish, particularly because she now has to raise her younger self, a child she does not even like.”
The film stars Erin Boyes, best known for roles in the Lifetime TV movie “Death in the Cul-De-Sac,” “Sawtooth Mountain,” “Longlegs,” and “The Social Reckoning.” Carter directs a script written by his wife Dori Carter, whose screenwriting credits date to the 1980s, including the 1988 Bette Midler and Lily Tomlin film “Big Business” and several TV movies from that era. Grace Gilroy produces, bringing experience from “The X-Files,” “Alien vs. Predator,” “Grease: The Rise of the Pink Ladies,” and “Bride of Chucky.”
The comedy, according to the official description, “serves as a biting satire on blind nostalgia and the classic warning of being careful what you wish for.” Rather than pursuing a traditional theatrical or streaming release, the film debuts at the Laemmle Royal in Los Angeles this week with three screenings followed by Q&A sessions with Carter on Oct. 16th, 17th, and 22nd. Further venue announcements will follow in a similar format.
Updates regarding future releases can be found on the film’s Instagram page: @queensforadaymovie.
For those awaiting “Queens for a Day,” the source suggests revisiting any of “The X-Files” time travel episodes, particularly “Triangle”—which features the first kiss between Mulder and Scully, even though Scully wasn’t really Scully at the time.
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