About Tom Braidwood / Melvin Frohike |
Tom BraidwoodBorn on September 27th, 1948, Tom Braidwood has degrees in theatre and film arts, has been part of Vancouver's entertainment industry for more than 20 years, from acting in and producing underground theatre productions to his position both behind and in front of the cameras with The X-Files.The one interest he and his “The Lone Gunmen” character Frohike do share is personal computer technology. Much of Braidwood's own training in computer skills was obtained via the 'school of hard knocks'. Tom bought an old MS-DOS [machine] and pretty much taught himself; even designing his own scheduling programs. Braidwood uses his own computers in much the same way most people do -- doing the family finances, playing mystery/puzzle games (current favourite: The Seventh Guest) and, of course, for writing. He also takes an occasional run through the Internet, usually to find a specific piece of information or to track X-Files Web sites. Married with two daughters, he writes scripts and watches videos in his spare time. Tom enjoys gardening and credits himself with a good sense of humor. IMDB Filmography |
Melvin FrohikeShort, unshaven and clad in combat boots, Frohike is the Frog Prince of the Lone Gunman editorial board. Next to Langly and Byers, he looks like the proverbial dirty old man. From his first leering appearance in "E.B.E.," he has made no secret of his attraction to Agent Dana Scully. The photographic and surveillance specialist in the group, he once loaned Mulder a pair of night-vision goggles only after extracting Scully's phone number from him. Yet he has shown a tender side as well, being the only person to bring Scully flowers when she lay dying in "One Breath." Not a great talker, Frohike grows loquacious only when Mulder teases him; he succinctly summarized the atmosphere of suspicion and paranoia in Mulder's apartment during "Anasazi" with one bon mot: "weirdness."Modeled after actor Tom Braidwood’s interpretation of a 'computer wiz' character in a play he and a friend had written during his theatre days, Frohike's the hardware element of The Lone Gunmen crew. Besides being well-versed in the more esoteric realms of electronics, Frohike is also very knowledgeable about current military technology. Melvin Frohike grew up in Pontiac, Michigan and besides his “Gunmen” skills, it seems that he was once a very accomplished tango competitor in Miami. A shocking bit of X-Files trivia was that in the fourth-season episode "Musings of a Cigarette-Smoking Man," the original script of which called for Frohike's death. "Yeah, it was surprising when I read it," recalls Braidwood. "I hadn't been forewarned. I just got the script and said, 'Oh yeah, we've got a part in this one' and I read it, and -- whoops!" Laughing, he adds, "I think once Chris Carter had a look at the script he thought that wasn't the way to go. I sort of went in begging on my knees: 'You can't kill me, I'm one of the good guys!'" |
