More than a decade after the end of Lost, actor Matthew Fox is back on television with the apocalyptic thriller Last Light, which premiered Friday at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival.
The show, which will air on Peacock and is produced by MGM Intl. Television production, visualizes a society mired in chaos when oil supplies are threatened. Fox plays one of the world’s leading petrochemical engineers, while Joanne Frogget plays his wife in “Downton Abbey.” Among the broader crises is a battle to save their families.
At a press conference in Monte Carlo Saturday, Fox spoke about his resignation from the job. Since “Lost” ended in 2010, he has not appeared in another TV series, and after a series of films, including “World War Z”, “Extinction” and finally “Bone Tomahawk” which he portrayed in 2014, he has not acted at all.
“I kind of had a bucket list in my mind of things I wanted to achieve at work, and after I did Bone Tomahawk in 2014 that kind of completed the list of things,” he said. “I wanted to do a western. It’s a very strange western, but it is western. And that’s how I complete this kind of list of combinations.”
He added, “At that time in my life, our kids were at an age where I felt like I needed to really re-engage. I had been focused on working for a while, and [my wife] Margherita ran the family very beautifully, but I felt like it was time to go home, and really felt like I was retiring from work, working on other creative elements that really belong to me – some music and writing. “
He offered to join “Last Light” as both the star and executive producer changed that. “It kind of got to a point where I thought maybe the bucket list would include an executive production,” he said. “I’ve never done that before. The Last Light opportunity came up, so I wanted to give it a try. And I just felt like it was the right time.”
Fox previously worked with Last Light’s director of “Party of Five,” Denny Gordon, which made the decision easier. “So it all came together. I felt like it was time to jump in again, see how it felt to be in front of the camera again, act again. And it was surprisingly rewarding. And I felt really comfortable doing it, and with such a wonderful group of people And the collaborative aspect of it, how connected we all are, how much we believe in the project. And it turned out to be a great experience.”
Fox says the stunts in the movie were a challenge. He said, “I had a lot of moments where I thought: ‘You know, I should have gotten a little better for this.’ Playing his character also requires subtlety to reveal his true nature. He said it was ‘a bit mysterious’ what was going on with him, And it was “like unearthing…kind of like an onion being peeled off.”
Fox had two difficult years in 2011 and 2012, as he admitted to Interview on “Ellen” In October 2012, in connection with an alleged incident in Cleveland, Ohio, and the legal wrangling that followed. More fuel was added to the fire with a teasing tweet from Dominic Monaghan, another former member of the “Lost” cast. Fox repeatedly refuted the allegations against him.
Fox has lived a quieter life since then, and may have been nervous to get back into the fray, but felt ready to re-engage with television. “I just spent seven years living my life with my family and pursuing the things that I am passionate about,” he said, “but telling stories in my DNA somehow, and I felt that this form of storytelling was something I wanted to re-engage with, and see how I felt. And I’m really glad I did – it was so good.”
Gordon added, “I’ll just say it wasn’t an easy feat to get Matthew out of retirement, and it took a project of this caliber, this cast and this important story to literally seduce him because he’s living a beautiful life with his wife and kids.. And it wasn’t easy to seduce him. But we felt so privileged.” So much so that we pulled him off the couch.”
Since Fox and Gordon worked together on “Party of Five” early in his career, his acting style has evolved. “I think I approached work very differently at the time. So I think it might not have been a collaborative experience at the time, because I was very careful about it all.”
“But this experience was very collaborative,” he added. And it was phenomenal. And we had a huge story to try to put it together and try to trace this character through this arc over five episodes.”
He credits the broadcast as having “opened a whole new field of premise that only required five chapters”. He expanded: “It’s way too much story to tell in a movie, but it’s not enough story to tell even in one 10-episode series. And I think it was really good for TV, because one of the things that I’ve been frustrated with in the past is that you have these overtures being pushed. A little longer than it should be, right, and the audience gets a feel when something is stretched out.”
He continued, “Live broadcasting leads us in a direction where stories are told at the same time that they need to be told, and that will always be very useful for storytelling.”
Gordon added, “I’d like to add to that by saying that we were kids when we were kids divorced ‘Party of Five.'” And in those days, television shows were primarily filmed on vocals. In this new age of great broadcast material around the world, it’s Public expectations are very high.
“So what we are required to offer is not ordinary television, it is extraordinary television. And that is why it was so important that we go to the site, have extraordinary sites, give them a global reach. We tell a global story. And that production value was very important for all of us to deliver our story. Through the techniques of filmmaking as long as possible.
“I think in the new age of television, the bar is very high and we’re watching it internationally all over the world, things that are being done all over the place — ‘Tehran,’ you know, so many great series that we love in America that have been done on foreign soil. So I think it’s an extraordinary time for all of us to work on this business.”
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