New Michael Emerson Interview
Thanks to Molliva for the heads up. Here are the spoilery parts.
So you are filming right now? Is this an okay time to talk?
We were just shooting a scene with a huge explosion in it. They load all this wood and sawdust in these cannons and shoot them with a giant blast of smoke and stuff, and it just poured down on us, and we're all covered in sawdust.
How much more do you have left?
We are shooting the twelfth episode of eighteen, so there's six more episodes to shoot.
I imagine there isn't much you can even say about what is happening.
I know certain plot developments just because I've shot now more than ten episodes. But honestly, I don't think there are any actors on the show that would say they know what's going on or where we're heading. I thought when we filmed this final season, that I would be able to see the end coming, that things would begin to wrap up or the various threads of the story would begin to knit together. But the contrary has been true: the show just continues to tackle more and more new events. There's a whole new storytelling device at work this season. I can't tell where we're going, and how it will end is anybody's guess.
Does that make it more exciting to be there?
Yeah. It's just the way it always has been. We don't get scripts until usually the day before we shoot them, so we're always in the dark about what developments are coming. I won't say that there haven't been big resolutions of issues in the show. Bit by bit a bunch of stuff is falling into place and being explained. At the same time, new questions continue to arise. It's interesting.
What is it like to get the script each week? Are you just sitting there thinking "oh my god!"
You want to hurry up and read it because you want to see what you have to do. And you want to see if there's stunts or something terrible, or if your character does something terrible.
So what do you think fans should be thinking about as they approach this final season?
I think the passionate fans are going to bring to it what they've always brought to it, and that'll be appropriate. Lost will continue to do the things it's always done. There's no quantum change in the way we tell the story, but there are, like I say, amazing new developments and [an] additional narrative complication that is stunning, thought-provoking. It keeps expanding. It's like the universe, and it's always growing outward and larger. (Laughs)
Very cryptic. What do you think you will miss the least about doing this show?
Combat. Guns. The physical stuff. It's hard and you cannot avoid getting hurt.
So most of the remaining questions I have at this point are of the "are we going to see this again?" variety.
You will see characters that you thought were long gone. And you're going to start to see - already we're starting to have casualties. As we get closer to the end, I guess it's obvious that not everybody is going to get out of it alive. In fact, we were talking today because there's a shocking event in the episode we're filming, and it made us all think, "Oh wow, nobody's safe on this show." Who's next, and how many are going to drop every episode from now until the end. In different, shocking ways. Now I'm thinking, "wow, how close to the end will Ben get? Will he go all the way?"
I do have a few questions about Ben's backstory, still. For example, I've always been interested in an idea of a flashback to the Henry Gale days to see him get kidnapped again, to see if there was more happening there.
I used to hope that Ben's backstory would get fleshed out more. His childhood. I always hoped that the mass killing of the Dharma Initiative would be put in a new context. I always thought that we would find that someone else had survived the Dharma Initiative massacre, and that Ben was connected to them somehow. Remember there was a doll that Ben used to carry with him - a little carved wooden figure. And I always thought we're going to go there. We're going to explain that figure. But now, we're too close to the end. Some stuff just falls by the wayside, and it will be forever a tantalizing mystery. But I'm at peace with that. I don't think we are under any obligation to answer everything. Just to give satisfaction.
Full interview @ The Phoenix
So you are filming right now? Is this an okay time to talk?
We were just shooting a scene with a huge explosion in it. They load all this wood and sawdust in these cannons and shoot them with a giant blast of smoke and stuff, and it just poured down on us, and we're all covered in sawdust.
How much more do you have left?
We are shooting the twelfth episode of eighteen, so there's six more episodes to shoot.
I imagine there isn't much you can even say about what is happening.
I know certain plot developments just because I've shot now more than ten episodes. But honestly, I don't think there are any actors on the show that would say they know what's going on or where we're heading. I thought when we filmed this final season, that I would be able to see the end coming, that things would begin to wrap up or the various threads of the story would begin to knit together. But the contrary has been true: the show just continues to tackle more and more new events. There's a whole new storytelling device at work this season. I can't tell where we're going, and how it will end is anybody's guess.
Does that make it more exciting to be there?
Yeah. It's just the way it always has been. We don't get scripts until usually the day before we shoot them, so we're always in the dark about what developments are coming. I won't say that there haven't been big resolutions of issues in the show. Bit by bit a bunch of stuff is falling into place and being explained. At the same time, new questions continue to arise. It's interesting.
What is it like to get the script each week? Are you just sitting there thinking "oh my god!"
You want to hurry up and read it because you want to see what you have to do. And you want to see if there's stunts or something terrible, or if your character does something terrible.
So what do you think fans should be thinking about as they approach this final season?
I think the passionate fans are going to bring to it what they've always brought to it, and that'll be appropriate. Lost will continue to do the things it's always done. There's no quantum change in the way we tell the story, but there are, like I say, amazing new developments and [an] additional narrative complication that is stunning, thought-provoking. It keeps expanding. It's like the universe, and it's always growing outward and larger. (Laughs)
Very cryptic. What do you think you will miss the least about doing this show?
Combat. Guns. The physical stuff. It's hard and you cannot avoid getting hurt.
So most of the remaining questions I have at this point are of the "are we going to see this again?" variety.
You will see characters that you thought were long gone. And you're going to start to see - already we're starting to have casualties. As we get closer to the end, I guess it's obvious that not everybody is going to get out of it alive. In fact, we were talking today because there's a shocking event in the episode we're filming, and it made us all think, "Oh wow, nobody's safe on this show." Who's next, and how many are going to drop every episode from now until the end. In different, shocking ways. Now I'm thinking, "wow, how close to the end will Ben get? Will he go all the way?"
I do have a few questions about Ben's backstory, still. For example, I've always been interested in an idea of a flashback to the Henry Gale days to see him get kidnapped again, to see if there was more happening there.
I used to hope that Ben's backstory would get fleshed out more. His childhood. I always hoped that the mass killing of the Dharma Initiative would be put in a new context. I always thought that we would find that someone else had survived the Dharma Initiative massacre, and that Ben was connected to them somehow. Remember there was a doll that Ben used to carry with him - a little carved wooden figure. And I always thought we're going to go there. We're going to explain that figure. But now, we're too close to the end. Some stuff just falls by the wayside, and it will be forever a tantalizing mystery. But I'm at peace with that. I don't think we are under any obligation to answer everything. Just to give satisfaction.
Full interview @ The Phoenix
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