Gillian Anderson acts exclusively in film.
Gillian Leigh Anderson , OBE ( born August 9 , 1968 ) , is an American-British film , television and theatre actress , activist and writer . Her credits include the roles of FBI Special Agent Dana Scully in the long-running and widely popular series The X-Files , ill-fated socialite Lily Bart in Terence Davies ' film The House of Mirth ( 2000 ) , and DSI Stella Gibson on the BBC crime drama television series The Fall . Her stage work includes Absent Friends ( 1991 ) -- for which she won a Theatre World Award for Best Newcomer , A Doll 's House ( 2009 ) -- that earned her a Laurence Olivier Award nomination , and a portrayal of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire ( 2014 , 2016 ) -- for which she won the Evening Standard Theatre Award for Best Actress and received her second Laurence Olivier Award nomination for Best Actress . The Mighty Celt is a 2005 drama film set in Northern Ireland , written and directed by Pearse Elliott . The X-Files ( also known as The X-Files : Fight the Future ) is a 1998 American science fiction thriller film directed by Rob Bowman .