Matthew Fox

Matthew Fox is a fabulous guy and we really appreciated his time. Here’s what he had to tell us about "Vantage Point " as well as his upcoming "Speed Racer," what it was like working with the Wachowski brothers, and the impact of the writer’s strike on finishing the fourth season of the survival drama "Lost":

Q: I was wondering whether earlier on in the script there was more detail about your character’s motivation? Did you care about his motivation?

MATTHEW FOX: Obviously I had to figure out some things – yeah. I cared very much about his motivation, but I think as a film I like it better that you don’t know why he does it.

Q: One thing I really liked about this film is one of the things I like about Lost which is you’re never sure where people stand on the line dividing good from evil. What is it about these morality plays that attracts you as an actor and us as an audience?

MATTHEW FOX: I don’t know, I guess I’m really interested in the gray areas, and this concept that I’m not necessarily really sure about any concept of good and evil, black and white, good and bad. And I’m also very interested in the concept of perspective, it’s something I think about all the time in my life, the ability for one event to happen and for two people to perceive that event so differently, depending on where they’re standing and who they are and what kind of agenda they had in how they perceive it. It’s astounding to me, it really is, and I find myself running into it in my own life, just in my own micro-world, and in my relationships with family and friends and those types of conflicts, and then you extrapolate that out into conflicts between nation states. It’s just unbelievable to me how many people walk around in this world thinking their version of reality is the only one that exists.

Q: Is that why you were attracted to this movie in the first place?

MATTHEW FOX: That was a big part of it, yes, absolutely. It was Pete Travis and I thought the script was very smart, and I really loved what the movie is dealing with. And then it’s an action thriller, but it does deal with something that I think is pretty fascinating.

Q: What challenges do you have finding stuff that is different from your character on Lost?

MATTHEW FOX: I’m really having a great time right now, I’m getting a lot of opportunities and I’m getting an opportunity to meet with and work with really great directors, and so I think that television is more of a writers’ medium and filmmaking is more of a directors’ medium, and getting an opportunity to work with these types of directors is really rewarding to me. I’ve been doing this business for quite awhile. I’ve taken it very slow. I always felt that it was a marathon and not a sprint for me. I think that the people that really go quickly in this business, is sort of the sprinters, they go away kind of quickly and a lot of times they’re not in it for the right reasons anyway. They’re sort of after something else other than just doing the work. For me it’s been sort of a slow, steady, finding the right projects, never doing a project as a means to an end, or just because I feel compelled to be a part of it and it had those elements come together.

Q: Because of the strike have you been sitting there waiting to find out if Lost is going to start up next week or the week after?

MATTHEW FOX: Yeah, that’s been part of – we shut down in November. For me I’ve been working none stop for two years, I’ve done four films and Lost in the last two years, so I understand that the strike was very, very difficult for a lot of people and I’m very well aware of that. For me it was like a forced hiatus in which I got to spend all of December and the holidays and most of January hanging out with my family.

Q: In Hawaii?

MATTHEW FOX: In Hawaii, and also in Oregon. Family is important to me, so it was a chance to get connected. And I knew that I had these two films opening up in the spring, and that I was going to have a lot of publicity responsibilities, and sort of gearing up for the travel that that requires and the time that requires away from my family.

Q: Is there a cut off date when they’re going to decide this season is done?

MATTHEW FOX: I think there is a drop dead date, but there are some conversations going on right now. There are conversations about us starting back up.

Q: There are a lot of rumors that the strike is going to be voted on tonight, and possibly resolved by Monday. For fans of Lost, assuming that the strike is over on Monday, how long are you contractually obligated to the show – how many episodes do you think you could make prior to the original hiatus?

MATTHEW FOX: I think they’re in negotiations about that right now, the studio and Damon, and I think it’s possible that we do 4 or 6 of the 8 that we were supposed to be doing right now. I think we would pick back up and maybe shoot another four this spring, which would give this season a grand total of 12.

Q: Peter said you were very passionate about this movie and really wanted to do it, how do you do a movie and a series?

MATTHEW FOX: Touchstone has been very accommodating as far as, I spent three and a half months in Berlin last summer making Speed Racer and there was overlap. There was almost three weeks of overlap between my schedule on Speed Racer and Lost, so Damon literally shot – we shot episodes out of order to accommodate my schedule, which is incredible. They’ve been very, very supportive of these projects I’ve been doing outside of the show, and I appreciate it because I’m really enjoying the process.

Q: Can you talk about your experience working with the Wachowski brothers and did you have any expectations when you went into it?

MATTHEW FOX: I didn’t know Speed Racer at all. Again, getting back to that thing about how directors are very important, when the Wachowskis asked to meet with me, I guess they’re fans of Lost and they had an idea that I might be Racer X, and I went into the meeting never knowing anything about Speed Racer. I wanted to work with the Wachowskis. That meeting went great and I went home with a script, and I got the source material and watched a lot of Speed Racer, and the script blew me away and then I went after that role. I went back to L.A. and I really went after that role, I wanted it, and it took like six weeks. Working with the Wachowskis and the cast on this particular film, and what this film is going to be like, how much it’s a game-changer in my opinion, was an extraordinary experience. It was amazing.

Q: Can you talk about working with those new cameras?

MATTHEW FOX: They’re pretty unforgiving.

Q: You mean every line shows?

MATTHEW FOX: Every pore. But they’re amazing and the information that they’re capturing and then what can be done with that information in post is extraordinary. I ADR’d the movie yesterday with Larry and Andy and, I mean, it’s just unbelievable what it looks like. It’s just unbelievable.

Q: Does the film have a running time yet?

MATTHEW FOX: I think it does but I wouldn’t feel safe saying that.

Q: Like William Hurt did you have to have any security guards in Mexico City for fear of being kidnapped?

MATTHEW FOX: I think all of us had protection, yeah.

Q: Were you able to bring you family, or were you afraid to?

MATTHEW FOX: I did, they came to Mexico City for two and a half weeks I believe. There was some conversation about that. It made us a little nervous but the truth is it was awesome. The kids travel incredibly well. They love it.

Q: You mentioned with Lost you were going to try to do maybe 4, maybe 6 episodes, does Damon plan to take the 8 episode storyline and push it into 4-6 episodes?

MATTHEW FOX: I couldn’t tell you. That would be a question for Damon.

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