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Home , April Webster, Emilie de Ravin, Evangeline Lilly, Ian Somerhalder, Jorge Garcia, Larry Fong

l o s t o r a l h i s t o r y

These days, looks like it was destined for success. But a decade ago, it was the wildest, costliest gamble in TV history. Cast and crew look back at the epic ...

w o r d s nick de semlyen a d d i t i o n a l r e p o r t i n g james dyer, ian nathan, nev pierce, james white

110 empire mAY 2013 mAY 2013 empire 111 l o s t o r a l h i s t o r y

remark and the session ends. But Thom fans of Alias. We met on a Monday Lord Of The Flies and they were doing THE BEACH Sherman, who ran drama for me, came afternoon. I was very nervous and Lord Of The Rings. One was magical over and said, “Lloyd, I kind of like this wearing a Bantha Tracks fan club T-shirt, and science-fictiony. The other was about “it looked so A handsome man in his late thirties slowly idea...” I go, “You do? Well, let’s find which I’ve owned since I was a kid. It’s the gritty ugliness of people. I guess if opens his eyes. Blinks. a writer. Let’s run with it!” my good-luck charm. J. J. immediately you pitch the gritty ugliness of people,

(“LOST” ABC OUTLINE — J. J. JEFF LIEBER: (Writer, original draft) pointed at it and said, “Bantha Tracks!” the studio might not go for it! Abrams/. 1/16/04) I got a call saying, “Would you be J. J. ABRAMS: (Co-writer/ director) He BRAUN: I got the outline on a Friday serious and real, interested?” I said yes and created a pitch was wearing a shirt. I loved him night, took my daughter horseback LLOYD BRAUN: (Former chairman of that was all about world-building, society, immediately. We started riffing on what riding, then went to see my friend Marc ABC Entertainment) The story begins in survival. At the centre were two brothers, this thing could be. And then we wrote Gurvitz, a big manager. I threw the i just started 2001. I was watching a reality TV show like Kane and Abel. After the plane an outline in five days. outline on his table and said, “See that Conan O’Brien produced called Lost. crash, the rich one takes hold inland, LINDELOF: Jeff Lieber’s pilot was this? It’s ER.” I remember thinking, “That’s the best title in a fortress. The less affluent one takes pretty straight-up plane-crashes-on- ABRAMS: On the Saturday morning, for a show ever.” The show got cancelled hold on the beach. The rule structure island. And it took place over about six we got a call. They were greenlighting laughing.” and I stuck the title in a corner of my I was told was: “This has to be hyper- months. By they’d already built a two-hour pilot. We had 11 weeks to brain. Cut to two or three years later: I’m real.” I was hooked up with National • Top: J.J. Abrams And it’s all these bodies of people who Swiss Family Robinson-type structures write it, cast it, shoot it, cut it and turn prisoner in chains — who became Kate. in Hawaii with my family at the Mauna Geographic to figure out whether it was talks Evangeline have drowned. The horror and revulsion and were starting to ease into the long- it in. It was insanity. There was a nurse, who became Jack, the Lilly through Kate’s Kea Beach Hotel. One night, [Robert an islet or an archipelago. At one point sterling first-ep of that was the end of Act 3. term mechanisms of being stranded. LINDELOF: We were off to the races. spinal surgeon. But really we were starting Zemeckis’] Cast Away is on TV. The next I pitched a shark attack, but I was told, efforts. Above: The BRAUN: I start reading the script and J. J. and I collapsed the action into a day: from scratch. day, there was a clam-bake for dinner “No, no, no! That’s not realistic!” mangled wreckage I hate it. It represented, to me, all the we wanted the show to feel like it was in ABRAMS: We were writing it while we of doomed Oceanic on the beach. I sat there with a drink, BRAUN: Over the course of the year, I’d Flight 815. Above pitfalls people were worried about. I’m real time. THE VISTA were casting it. thinking, “Boy, I wish I could figure out get updates on my pet project. Finally, right: Jack (Matthew just enormously bummed out. So I say BRAUN: They came up with the idea for APRIL WEBSTER: (Casting director) how to do a show like that.” Shortly around Christmas-time, I was on holiday Fox) and Hurley to Thom, “We have to do this now. And flashbacks, which is ingenious, because it Jack stops dead. CLOSE on him. His eyes God only knows how it all worked out, (Jorge Garcia) rescue thereafter, we had a big ABC retreat, and had a pack of scripts to read. Thom a stunned Claire there’s only one guy who can save this.” gets us off the island a little bit. welling up as he processes what he’s looking because it was chaos. They were adding about 100 to 200 people, and everybody had told me Lost was among them, but (). “Who?” “J. J.” LINDELOF: I was energised by the at. The sheer ENORMITY of it. And now in characters and changing others all the had to pitch something. I couldn’t find it. Finally I get to a script DAMON LINDELOF: (Co-writer) ABC character ideas. I said, “If they get off we understand why, because it’s — time. Hurley was originally a 50 year-old

HEATHER KADIN: (Former VP of called Nowhere. And I’m like, “Oh no. were trying to cajole J. J. into writing the the island, the show’s over. So the answer redneck NRA guy. He ended up being

Drama, ABC) Lloyd stepped up and Don’t tell me this is it...” pilot. But he was very busy with Alias and is to populate it with people who don’t A PLANE CRASH. Passenger played by Jorge (Garcia) because J. J. had said, “I want to do Cast Away: The LIEBER: I thought Nowhere was a another pilot called The Catch. So J. J. want to leave.” What J. J. brought was the AIRLINER. 250-seater. seen him the night before on Curb Your Series.” All of us assumed, I think, that perfect title. “Where the fuck are we?” agreed to meet me, as a possible partner. mystery. He pitched The Hatch and The Enthusiasm, playing a drug dealer. he meant, “I want to do a series about “Nowhere.” My show was darker, Our paths had crossed before, backstage Others, among many other things, in our LINDELOF: We built it from the ground : (Sawyer) Early a guy and a volleyball.” emotionally. At one point in the pilot, at a Bruce Springsteen concert, but I was first meeting. He felt that the island they up. There were some similarities in terms on I was supposed to drop Hurley off BRAUN: Deadly silence. You could hear a kid runs up and says, “Look! There too starstruck to introduce myself to him crash onto should be really insane. of archetypes to the Lieber draft. He had a cliff in the pilot, because he was too a pin drop. I make some self-deprecating are people swimming in the water!” at that point; my wife and I were huge LIEBER: I always joke that I was doing a fugitive on his flight — an Australian heavy to hold. >

112 empire mAY 2013 empireonline.com subscribe at www.empireonline.com/sub mAY 2013 empire 113 l o s t o r a l h i s t o r y reservations about my character. Being someone who has been very careful not to portray stereotypes, when I that Jin didn’t speak any English and was, shall we

say, not kind to his wife, I hesitated. J. J. and Damon said, “Trust us. Things on this show are not necessarily what they seem.”

LINDELOF: Because J. J. was directing, he focused his energy on location scouting and production decisions. Especially transporting the L-1011 jumbo jet from the Mojave Desert to the north shore of Hawaii. “He tries BRYAN BURK: (Producer) I produced Matt Reeves’ thesis film at USC. And ironically there was a scene in it where

to kill me a plane crashes. For that one, J.J. built the tail of a Cessna out of balsa wood and we used smoke machines. Different story with Lost! all the BRAUN: The plane was a logistical monster. We found it in a junkyard, cut it up, got it there on a barge and time.” reassembled it on the beach. Besides the The Lost pilot’s pilot is craziness of pre-production, this was the most expensive pilot in history. It was Abrams’ unlucky charm enormously expensive. YUNJIN : (Sun) All I knew was that > Pausing to do the math, Lost was gonna be huge or fail terribly. It Greg Grunberg reckons he has was never going to be mediocre. known J. J. Abrams since he was three years old, growing up in LA. “He’s more like a brother than a THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT friend,” he smiles. Even if Abrams was that kid in the gang who could A SOUND. A NOISE. A THING. do anything creative: music, drawing, writing... If you’re looking for a Jack sits up. Fires around the fuselage reference point, Grunberg is the fat just embers now. DARK. The others best friend in Super 8. “A lot of his hear it too. Begin to move together… Super 8 movies I star in,” he laughs, their fear UNITING THEM. The admitting they used to cling onto each sound comes again — other to watch The Twilight Zone. “One is a stupid, short movie we shot when It’s close. Just a few hundred yards I was ten. I wake, go to the bathroom, away. Unlike anything we’ve ever heard wash my face and blood comes down before, so why describe it? It’s just because I’ve been stabbed. J.J. was SCARY AS HELL. holding the camera in one hand, and in the other he had the knife, stabbing me! JORGE GARCIA: (Hurley) I remember them. We’re trying to do something bold ever, which had a dwarf, a monkey, • Heroin-addicted TERRY O’QUINN: (Locke) When What ten-year-old can pull that off?!” rock star Charlie reading some Hurley breakdown and it and different, and they’re scared of it.” a witch, everything you can think of, J. J. offered me the job, he said, “The This isn’t a tale of being left () said “redshirt” in it. I didn’t realise it was But the more we thought about it, the “i’m not sure how and I couldn’t even get on that. They realises this is one downside is, it shoots in Hawaii.” I said, behind, though. Grunberg has been a Star Trek reference and he was going more we realised they were right. said, “Sorry, you have bad hair.” I had hell of a bad trip. “I’ll take it!” a cameo regular in Abrams’ projects, to die. I thought it was just that he wore : (Jack) I got cast just got my real-estate licence in the DE RAVIN: I was in snowy Edmonton, still perishing. “He tries to kill me all a red shirt. ten days before we started shooting. mail four days before. Lost saved me. Canada, when I got the job. I bought the time,” he laughs. “Alias, I survived. LINDELOF: The idea was: “It’s Usually I read things before I go into much confidence DOMINIC MONAGHAN: (Charlie) some bikinis, then headed to Hawaii Lost, I died.” It is Grunberg who plays pure survival. Darwin. Dog eat dog.” meetings. But there was no script. When I had a general meeting with J. J. and to defrost. the captain of Oceanic 815, violently Fortunately, once we cast Jorge, we I did finally get to look at something, Damon. We sat down and talked about HOLLOWAY: The first person I met was dispatched by an unknown force, later got pretty married to the idea of not J. J. put me in a room and proceeded to we had at that The Office, Alan Partridge, all this Naveen (Andrews), on the plane over. He revealed to be the smoke monster. killing Hurley. open the door every 20 minutes, saying, English comedy. The day after Return was a very refined Englishman, all dressed He was also the basis for Sean on ALYSSA WEISBERG: (Casting director) “What do you think? What do you Of The King won all the Oscars, my to the nines. I’m a redneck from Georgia. Felicity, a tribute to the the days when came in to read for Jack. think?” I said, “You gotta let me finish!” dominic monaghan agent called to say I was offered the I think he was wary of me at first. the pair were Hollywood roomies, and Obviously, this was before . But I was blown away, from the first stage.” part. I was in a bit of a state. : (Sayid) I remember he used to pitch crazy schemes (“Let’s LINDELOF: Jack was at one point going page. The image of a guy waking up WEISBERG: We cast Kate at the 11th LINDELOF: Sun and Jin were a much being quite close to Maggie (Grace, who open a frozen yoghurt stand!”) while J. J. to die at the end of the episode, and be in a bamboo forest, wearing a suit, hour. had not really done older couple, a grandma and a grandpa. played Shannon). She’s the only one I still wrote his scripts. “But in the middle played by . But ABC was incredibly intriguing. anything besides a commercial. She was And they were Japanese. But Yunjin sort of see from the show. of all of that, we were making prank felt strongly that while there would be EMILIE DE RAVIN: (Claire) There living in and sent us a tape. [Kim] came in to read for Kate and was GARCIA: When I arrived I shared a long phone calls and trying desperately incredible shock value to killing him, the were so many mysterious things going HOLLOWAY: I was just about to quit so amazing that we made them Korean van ride with Terry O’Quinn, from the to get dates!” james white residual effect would be that the audience on. It was a TV show crossed with acting when I got called in. I had recently and younger. hotel in Waikiki to the other end of the wouldn’t trust us. At first we said, “Screw a Sudoku puzzle. tested for Passions, the worst soap opera : (Jin) I had definite island. I’m shy, so getting a conversation >

114 empire mAY 2013 empireonline.com subscribe at www.empireonline.com/sub mAY 2013 empire 115 l o s t o r a l h i s t o r y started is a big thing for me, especially if I know the person from movies or TV. So I just said, “I really like you in The Rocketeer, when you say, ‘The son of a bitch will fly!’” After that, the conversation rolled. KIM: The first thing I saw on my first day was the plane-crash set on the beach. My heart skipped a beat. My whole body tingled with so much excitement. It was exciting and horrific at the same time. FOX: That whole sequence was just holy- LINUS shit big. Wings dropping, explosions blasting, shit burning, people screaming… GARCIA: We were dropped right into the NOTES chaos. It looked so serious and so real that I just started laughing. It was so long after the pilot, the much bigger than anything I’d ever done. show’s villain finally O’QUINN: It was a full-blown movie set. appeared: Michael Emerson’s DE RAVIN: We had cars stopping every five seconds and people reporting to the . We got his take police that there had been a plane crash. on Lost’s twisty evolution… FOX: Because the Steadicam was following me, there was a lot of pressure. I mean, you’ve gotta hit the beats. It’s not > Before he was ever hired the kind of take where you stop in the for Lost, Michael Emerson admits he middle and go, “Uh, you know what, I’m was only peripherally aware of it. “I had not crazy about how this is going down...” seen the pilot and Lost was usually on GARCIA: When I got told I’d be running in our house because my wife (True away from an explosion, I got really Blood’s ) was a big fan scared. I was sitting there talking to long before I worked on it. I sort of paid Matthew and said, “Are we meant to dive attention sometimes and other times out like they do in the movies?” Then wasn’t watching very carefully, but J. J. gets on the megaphone and goes, I knew the basic set-up.” And he had “Okay, guys, I want you to dive onto the their clothes off was a good way to bond. got a call. His daughter had fallen and hit • Far left: Kate was exhilarating, but also terrifying. no idea what it would become under sand.” Matthew and I started high-fiving O’QUINN: I was not one of the ones who her head. She was in the emergency room (Evangeline Lilly) LINDELOF: My journal entries were and Jack (Matthew Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse. each other. “the idea was: ‘it took Matthew up on that offer. I figure, — fine, but getting checked out. And Fox) conveniently filled with panic. Everyone was saying, “I had, perhaps, a false impression LINDELOF: Another big sequence as a general rule, if what you’re going to J. J. just said, “That’s it. Shut everything caught in their first “How are you going to sustain this from the first couple of episodes. was the animal attack. We were having show isn’t good, why the hell show it? down.” It was a major day — 160 people island monsoon. intensity? What’s the 15th episode going Above: The Class Of I thought this was going to be more of all these conversations about boars GARCIA: There was a karaoke place on set — and I was like, “What a badass.” 2004 (l-r): L. Scott to be?” And I was thinking, “I don’t even a survival drama. I didn’t realise what and whether we were going to have is pure survival. we’d all go to. I remember hearing Daniel His values are in the right place. Caldwell, Harold know what the fourth episode is going a metaphysical puzzle the show was a trained boar or an animatronic one. Dae Kim do Dire Straits’ Romeo And KIM: Every take, he’d give me a thumbs Perrineau, Dominic to be! I didn’t pitch this to you guys.” Monaghan, Matthew heading towards becoming.” Then Sarah Caplan, one of the producers, Juliet song. I’m more of a Tom Jones up and say, “Genius!” I’m sure I wasn’t Fox, Evangeline Lilly, I wouldn’t have been at all surprised A big part of that was his if this thing had been a catastrophic said, “I thought this island was weird. darwin. dog guy. Delilah is my thing. all that great, but that’s just his style. Josh Holloway, J. J. character, the manipulative Ben Shouldn’t it be something that doesn’t FOX: I use Hotel California as a warm- GARCIA: When I did a take, he’d come Abrams, Naveen failure. Really. Linus, who appeared midway through belong here?” up. After that, all bets are off. up and be like, “That was good… That Andrews, Emilie de ABRAMS: I got a call from the head of Ravin, Jorge Garcia, the second season. “I’m guessing BURK: The polar bear is one of my damon lindelof DAE KIM: Those were heady days. There was good… Okay, just do it again.” and ABC, telling me to make sure we shot eats dog.’” . my casting was an experiment to favourite things about the episode. That was a summer-camp feel to the whole O’QUINN: There was this wonderful an ending so they could air it as a movie see what it would be like to have ‘the incongruity offered all the possibilities in spontaneously and then suddenly thing. Some nights we’d all go and see feeling I had from J. J. and Damon, that when it didn’t get picked up to series. other’ embodied on the show, to have the world for where the show could go. stop. It was like Ireland. Dom Monaghan DJ-ing. this show was wide open. Nothing was I remember saying, “If you tell me how to it be a character rather than a notion. HOLLOWAY: A polar bear! What the GARCIA: What I wasn’t prepared for MONAGHAN: When I wasn’t surfing set in stone. It occurred to me one day, as end it, I’ll shoot it!” They never responded. It would have been easy to kill me off fuck, right? My first day was actually were the bugs. Where we were shooting or hiking, I’d be sipping a mai tai or I was sitting on the beach and pondering HOLLOWAY: Before the pilot got cut after a couple of episodes had it not J. J. throwing a furry pillow at me. The is usually a dark place in the nighttime. Hawaiian ice tea. my toes, that the possibilities were endless. together, Bryan Burk invited us to a get- worked out, but they kept me around pillow was standing in for that beast. Suddenly we arrive with all these lights HOLLOWAY: We did get drunk a fair together in to watch the and I think that made them feel bold.” LARRY FONG: (Cinematographer) We and the bugs just went for us. They found bit, and that’s where Sawyer’s nicknames unsweetened dailies: no music, no colour- What followed was a mind- needed to do close-ups of people running their way into my hair. I don’t know if came from. Two of my favourites were THE ISLAND — MORNING grading, no nothing. And my wife and bending array of shifting loyalties, through the jungle and we didn’t have time. they wanted to be there or if they got ‘Stay Puft’ for Hurley — mean but I, we were almost in tears when we left. time-travel twists, spirituality and So I said, “Why don’t we go really tight, stuck there. Between takes, people would funny — and ‘Mr. Clean’, because it so And we’re with JACK, his eyes focused out We were like, “This is going to be morality. Even the cast were caught shake the camera and wave branches in run over and pick them out. Then at described Terry O’Quinn. I kept calling across the perfectly calm water. He stands cancelled right away. It’s terrible.” up in trying to figure it out. “We were front of the lens?” It looked ridiculous at the end of the day, I’d take a shower and Maggie Grace ‘Sticks’ because she had on the beach, completely alone. As the sun DAE KIM: I saw the pilot before the fans of the show too and mystified the time, but J. J. made it work. deal with the bug nest going on there on the long, skinny legs, you know? Have breaks the horizon and lights up the sky, public did, and even then I wasn’t sure. by it. We spent a fair amount of time FOX: The first thing I did was the jungle my head. I got a nickname for J. J.? Well, it would we play the moment of pure ISLAND I knew it was good. I just didn’t know on the set trying to figure out what sequence where the smoke monster is O’QUINN: I didn’t notice the bugs. I grew have to be something to do with perfect BEAUTY. A serenity to it all. if it would stay on the air. the hell was happening, what it after them. Suddenly we were thrown up in Michigan. Jorge’s a California boy. hair. Let’s go with ‘Hair Boy’. MONAGHAN: I’m not sure how much meant and where it could possibly into this wild world: beautiful and big FOX: I felt a bit of responsibility to be the MONAGHAN: Nothing fazes J. J.. CARLTON CUSE: (Executive producer) confidence we all had at that stage. I loved lead…” james white and scary and cool. leader, given the role I was playing. And He’s never flummoxed. He always has We were very much flying by the seat of Cloud Atlas last year, but no-one watched ABRAMS: We shot for 20-some yes, the cast skinny-dipping was my idea. an answer. our pants. At that point, there wasn’t any it. You can never account for taste. days. Every day it would rain At the time I thought everybody taking HOLLOWAY: One day on the pilot, he time to figure out the big picture. Which O’QUINN: I didn’t think it would >

116 empire mAY 2013 empireonline.com subscribe at www.empireonline.com/sub mAY 2013 empire 117 l o s t o r a l h i s t o r y “it was this wild FINALE THOUGHTS world: beautiful Musings on Lost’s divisive last episode and big, scary Josh Holloway “I just wanted the writers to get out of it without being assassinated! I was like, ‘I’ve got a cabin and cool.” matthew fox in the middle of the Rockies if you want to hide?’ At least it wasn’t a Sopranos, where everything goes to black.”

Yunjin Kim “The episode was like an amazing gift, wrapped with perfect paper with a thoughtfully crafted bow.”

Terry O’Quinn “People interpret it as: we all went to heaven. Worked for me.”

Emilie de Ravin “Purgatory was our first guess back in the day, and we were told we were wrong. Those buggers!”

Michael Emerson (Ben linus) “It become huge. I had no idea. to keep this up every week?” I suddenly • The stranded took my wife and I a few days to figure ABRAMS: We had nine days to edit became very insecure. survivors explore it out. It’s a Shakespeare comedy.” their mysterious new the show. DE RAVIN: We had a cast and crew home. They don’t MICHAEL GIACCHINO: (Composer) screening and we were speechless in know the half of it... Naveen Andrews “I think it was I felt uncomfortable and uneasy watching our chairs afterwards. intended to create controversy. Damon the episode, and I was hoping to get some ANDREWS: All I ever saw of the series always retained that sense of mischief.” of that feeling into the music. I didn’t was the pilot. I thought, “I should get want it to sound like a normal jungle some idea of what kind of show I’m in.” Matthew Fox “If it had ended with movie, with woodwind and flutes. And I was blown away. It had the sweep a set-in-stone, concrete finish, it would LINDELOF: There was a lot of talk of an epic feature film — Lawrence Of have been very un-Lost-like.” about what the smoke monster would Arabia or Dr. Zhivago. sound like. Bryan Burk brought that BRAUN: When I saw the , I was Daniel Dae Kim “What mattered most great ticka-ticka noise, which he recorded staggered. I was like, “It worked!” were the characters. The fact that the in a taxicab, to the aural LIEBER: I have no hard feelings — what writers addressed their fates together

mélange that made it up. Damon and J. J. did was amazing and I’m made it satisfying for me.” ABRAMS: We really didn’t think ABC proud to have my limited association with was going to pick it up, because it was it. That said, when I saw the pilot and the Dominic Monaghan “I’ve not seen the such an odd thing. But it tested really trees shaking at the end, I chuckled to ending — I was working on I Sell The well and they ended up airing it. myself. Because I was so handcuffed to Dead when it aired, and I’ve avoided LINDELOF: Being on a network turned reality with my draft that I couldn’t even seeing it since.” out to be perfect for Lost. The pulp have a shark attack. I should have pitched storytelling mechanism of having five it as a polar-bear attack! Damon Lindelof “When I saw This Is cliffhangers an episode, because of the HOLLOWAY: When the ratings came out, 40, I thought it was very flattering. But commercial breaks, infused the show we all went to a bar called the Tropicana. I wish they hadn’t shown our ending with an adrenaline I’m not sure it would That was one of the best feelings of the — or at least had a spoiler warning!” have had on, say, HBO. That said, it whole ride. We realised that we had a would have been great to say “shit” phenomenon here. It was just a really and “fuck” whenever we wanted to. wonderful night; we were standing on the Because those characters would have precipice, you know? Shots were drunk. “This show was your baby. It’s important been swearing all the time! O’QUINN: When you’ve got good writers to us that you’re tied to it in a tangible : (Series director) and they’re in a productive stage of their way. So we want to send over a sound I watched the pilot with my wife and lives, you’re in the cat-bird seat. And that’s crew and have you be the voice that says, two daughters. My first thought was that a happy place to be. ‘Previously on Lost...’” I agreed, on

it was phenomenal. Every dime they BURK: Lost is just one of those the proviso that no-one other than J. J., spent was on the screen. And although experiences where none of it makes Damon and I would know. I spent an it was about a scary, mysterious island, sense. We were beyond lucky. hour in a Beverly Hills hotel doing the

somehow it was beautiful. My second BRAUN: J. J. called me up when the show words a thousand times or so, and that

thought was, “You son of a bitch, J. J. was picked up, and it was one of the was it. Just one more secret... This is so fucking good, how am I going sweetest calls I’ve ever gotten. He said, [email protected]

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