Young at Heart (The X-Files) - Production

Production

This episode originated as a script from freelance writer Scott Kaufer, who was an acquaintance of Chris Carter and former employee of California magazine and Warner Bros comedy development department. Chris Carter rewrote the script, which included the addition of Barnett's salamander hand. Fox's standards and practices department fought with the producers over the scene where Barnett strangles Reggie Purdue, and as a result the producers were forced to reduce the length of the scene. The footage of the young girl with progeria was filmed after the production crew contacted the Progeria Society and were put in touch with the family of Courtney Arciaga, who was a young girl with the disease. She and her family were fans of the series, and were flown from their San Diego home to Vancouver to shoot the scene.

Director Michael Lange felt the episode offered him excellent scope to try new techniques, noting that the series producers "encourage cinematic stuff". He felt a highlight of this approach was in shooting the episode's climactic stand-off, explaining that "instead of shooting at a normal eye level as the Salamander Man takes the gun, I tilt up, and now I'm shooting up his nose almost, and it was kind of like very disorienting. The show's got a certain ennui that appeals to me, the film noir-y movies of the '40s look, an undercurrent of tension and anxiety 'cause of all the weird things going on".

William B. Davis makes his second appearance of the series in this episode, although his role is simply credited as "CIA Agent", rather than "Smoking Man", as per his credit in the pilot episode. The character of Reggie Purdue would later be referenced in the fourth season episode "Paper Hearts", and the fifth season episode "Unusual Suspects".