For Chris Carter, the name was no accident. For The X-Files not only explores the evil that lurks out there, but also the machinations that go on over there, as in Washington.
The name and the character Deep Throat remind us how easy it is for a government to hold a country hostage, and how ignorant we are about what our elected–and unelected–officials are up to.
For native Texan (and RADA graduate) Jerry Hardin, veteran of such movies as The Firm, Reds, and Tempest, as well as numerous episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, the role of Deep Throat was a plum that got juicier with each of the seven episodes he appears in. Who is this guy? Friend? or foe? A bit of both, it seems. And who is he? CIA? Military? Kitchen cabinet? We don’t know exactly. But everything he reveals is a piece to slot into a puzzle that may have too few–or too many–pieces at the end. (Remember “E.B.E.,” in which he reveals to Mulder his participation in the top-secret assassination of an alien in Vietnam?)
For a supporting character, Deep Throat generated huge amounts of mail and endless hours of theorizing. And his death sent a signal that on this show, anything is possible. That night, his dying words to Agent Scully–“Trust No One” replaced the usual teaser “The Truth is Out There.”
While Hardin would have enjoyed playing Deep Throat for a while longer, he takes some consolation in the fact that death on The X-Files is not quite the same as death in other venues–you never know who’s going to pop up where.
Name: Cancerman calls him “Ronald” in “Musings.” The actual name “Deep Throat” (taken from the name of an informant in the Watergate affair and a rather sly double entendre) is not given in the show until Scully uses the name in “The Erlenmeyer Flask.” In “EBE” he is called merely a “source of deep background” – the same phrase as was used of the real Deep Throat.
We, however, have known of the name since the episode called “Deep Throat.” However, in true X-Files cryptic style, the name is never mentioned within the episode itself and is merely in the title.
Background:He used to work with the CIA (“Musings” and “EBE”) Along with Cancerman and Bill Mulder is looks as if he was part of a CIA Black Ops unit operating within the military.
He was in Vietnam with the CIA when the Marines shot down an EBE over Hanoi. He was the one who had to shoot it, true to a 1940s secret international agreement that whichever country found a live alien had to destroy it. They way it looked at him as he killed it has haunted him ever since, and his helping Mulder is an admittedly very belated attempt to atone.
He appears, along with Cancerman, WMM, Bill Mulder, Victor Klemper and others in the photograph taken outside the Strughold Mining Company in 1972 or 1973.
In 1991, according to “Musings,” another UFO was shot down, similar to the one in Hanoi. Deep Throat and Cancerman met at Dogway, West Virginia, where Deep Throat demands that the alien is killed as part of UN Security Council Directive 1013, which states that “any country capturing such an entity is responsible for its extermination.” Cancerman thinks that a living alien would make great progress for “Bill Mulder’s Project,” but Deep Throat convinces him that all the work they’d done over the years could be destroyed if knowledge of this were to get out. They flip a coin, and Deep Throat loses. Reluctantly, he executes the alien.
“Musings” could be taken to suggest that Deep Throat was the Consortuim’s chief propagandist
Style: He always wears a suit, even at dead of night. He usually seems quite calm and polite, and sounds quite cultivated.
How he contacts Mulder: Clicks on the phone (“Eve”) to arrange a meeting. Mulder signals his desire for a meeting by shining a blue light through the window (“EBE”)
Does Scully know about him? In “Deep Throat,” Mulder tells her that he was approached by “a man” in Washington who warned him off. However, by “EBE” she still doesn’t know anything about him. This seems to be the first time Mulder tells her anything about him. She finally meets him in “The Erlenmeyer Flask.”
Interests: Like Mulder, he is fond of sport. In “Eve” he offers to take Mulder to a Warriors game, as he was “just in the neighbourhood.” In “EBE” he and Mulder lament the fact that they can’t catch a game together at the Camden Yards. Of course, Deep Throat says, they couldn’t sit together, which Mulder says is a pity as he’s sure Deep Throat has the connections to get the best seats. Deep Thoat says he can indeed – “any park in the country.”
Death: May 1994. Shot in the heart by Crewcut Man. Buried at Arlington Cemetery. Mulder observed the funeral through binoculars from a distance.