20+ Curious Facts About”Lost”

The name

The first drafts of the script were originally titled Nowhere, and it was even approved as the official title, however, later it was rejected in favor of Lost.

Actors and characters

According to the first script, the leading male character of the series, Jack (Matthew Fox), was supposed to die in the pilot episode. Moreover, initially, the filmmakers wanted to invite Michael Keaton to play this role. But they decided against both of these ideas.

The character Sun, who was Jin’s (Daniel Dae Kim) wife in the series, was created especially for Yunjin Kim who initially auditioned for the role of Kate. Also, Hurley was created for Jorge Garcia, who originally applied for the role of Sawyer. In his turn, Josh Holloway, who got the role of
Sawyer, brought eccentricity to his character because the producers liked how he kicked a chair when he forgot his lines at the audition.

Basically, the features and destinies of many characters were shaped up during casting. For example, the producers initially saw Kate as a middle-aged businesswoman whose husband allegedly died in a plane crash. But when they saw Evangeline Lilly, they decided to give these features and fate
to Rose Nadler.

Even though Evangeline Lilly had successfully passed the audition, among 75 candidates for the leading female role, she had some difficulties after the approval. It took the actress at least 20 attempts to get a work visa in the United States (Evangeline was born in Canada) that’s why she arrived at
the shooting with a 24-hour delay.

Shooting

All episodes were shot in Hawaii, mainly on Oahu island. It was uncomfortable for some actors to live on the island permanently during the shooting. For example, Emilie de Ravin, who played Claire, would fly home to California 1-2 times a week to see her husband and poodle.

In order not to part with his loved ones, Matthew Fox rented a house not far from the set and moved his family there. However, Jorge Garcia had to miss his sister’s wedding due to a hectic shooting schedule.

Since the events taking place in the series developed much more slowly relative to the filming process, this caused some difficulties: the children had to remain at about the same age, but they were growing up in real life. In order to make little Aaron look relatable to the TV series’ timeline, more than 50 babies portrayed him.

Many viewers wondered why the character played by Jorge Garcia, Hurley, wasn’t losing weight in the desert island conditions. In fact, the actor lost a significant amount of weight after shooting the pilot episode, but the series creators asked him to sustain his weight — not only because time goes by slowly on the island, but also to be able to shoot episodes from the character’s past, before the plane crash.

Hidden messages from the creators

This TV series creates riddles not only for its characters but for its viewers as well. The names of some characters hide hints for famous writers, scientists, and thinkers of the past. Ben Linus, the leader of the Others comes from the chemist Linus Pauling, the surname of the French woman. Danielle

Rousseau comes after the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Daniel Faraday — after the physicist Michael Faraday. The names of John Locke and Mikhail Bakunin are direct allusions to famous philosophers.

Moreover, there are intersections with the life of prototypes in the plot. For example, John Locke tells Claire to pacify the crying baby with the help of swaddling, however, the British philosopher himself was against swaddling and even wrote a scientific treatise about it.

The collection of allusions are complemented with anagrams in the names. In the final of the third season, Jack attends the funeral organized by the “Hoffs/Drawlar” funeral parlor. Its name is actually an anagram of the “flash forward” collocation and makes the viewer understand that
this is a reference, not to the character’s past, but to their future.

In the fourth episode of the fifth season, the coffin of John Locke shows the “Canton-Reiner” logo. It hides the word “reincarnation” that hints it’s too early to say goodbye to this character.

Black and white

In addition to the fact that the title of the series in the screensaver is written in white letters on a black background (in the final of the fifth season, it is written in black on white), the combinations and contrasts of these 2 colors constantly surround the characters.

In the second part of the pilot episode, John Locke explains to Walt Lloyd how to play backgammon, outlining that there are 2 players, 2 sides — one is light and the other one is dark.

In the sixth episode of the first season, Jack finds a leather pouch with black and white stones. Their meaning is revealed in the sixth season: Jacob and the Man in Black used them to play a game.

One of the main and the most mysterious characters of the series is the Man in Black, who possesses supernatural abilities and appears in the physical forms of other people or in the form of black smoke.

Numbers in the series and around it

Boone Carlyle’s (played by Ian Somerhalder) T-shirt has a Chinese sign which means “84.” If written backward, this number becomes 48 which is the number of people who survived in the plane crash that is talked about in the first season.

The mysterious line of numbers “4 8 15 16 23 42” is the fictional Valenzetti equation, which encrypts the end of the world.

The 108 minutes that are given to enter numbers in the computer in the bunker is the sum of the number line from the aforementioned equation.

The sum of 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42 has another meaning. Yuri Gagarin’s flight in space lasted for 108 minutes. However, the series creators don’t reveal the idea, so the viewers don’t know whether it is just a mystical coincidence or a well-thought-out move.

The Lost TV series became the highest-rated TV show of its decade (from 2002 to 2012). It left behind series like House, How I Met Your Mother, Gossip Girl, and Dexter.

It is one of the most expensive TV shows ever. $45 million was spent on the creation of the first season only, and $14 million — on the shooting of the pilot episode.