"show in a different direction" while she was pregnant. So Pileggi felt at the start that he "compensated" for the situation of the show, and after a while the character started to grow on the producers and fellow cast, as Pileggi puts it, "the character just started kind of clicking and working". At the end of the second season, the producers wanted Pileggi to return in future episodes, so he signed a six-year contract with them. In an interview with X-Files fan site host Robin Mayhall, Pileggi commented once that he felt David Duchovny's (portrayed Fox Mulder) semi-departure in season eight and the introduction of Robert Patrick's John Doggett, and the fact that he started to believe in Aliens at the end of season seven, Skinner was given the "opportunity to grow", further stating "new avenues" had been opened. While Pileggi stated that he missed Duchovny's presence in The X-Files, he continued saying that he did not have the opportunity to work with him during the seventh season. He even went as far as saying that there was no "interaction between" the two characters. He was positive to the new storyline conceived during Duchovny's departure, saying it gave the show a "shot in the arm," which reinvented the show. I Want to Believe As writers Carter and Frank Spotnitz aimed to avoid complicating the storyline of The X-Files: I Want to Believe with superfluous appearances of characters from the television series, Skinner is the only returning character in the movie. He was included in the film's plot only when a fitting opportunity to involve him arose, and Spotnitz and Carter were very happy to write Skinner into the story. The scenes of The X-Files: I Want to Believe that include Skinner were filmed very late in the movie's filming schedule, and the particular scene that acts as the character's introduction in the movie was filmed, for reasons of time, in two different locations. Reception The character received critical acclaim from fans and critics alike and since became a fan's favourite of the show. Mitch Pileggi received acclaim for his portrayal of the character. While not winning or getting nominated for any of his work alone in The X-Files, Mitch Pileggi and several other cast members were nominated in the category "Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series" by the Screen Actors Guild Awards in 1997, 1998 and 1999