Garcia's Fate is in the Hands of Lost Producers

JORGE Garcia, who plays rotund Hurley in Lost, figures he's one of the luckiest guys in show business, and is still counting his blessings.
Before finding fame on the island adventure series shot in Hawaii, Garcia was battling away as a stand-up comedian and bit-part actor.

This is not to say Garcia's getting too comfortable. He's well aware Lost producers, known for creating unexpected plot twists, could boot him from the show at any minute.

There's no question, however, that writing Hurley out of the show would be fraught with peril because he ranks as one of its most popular characters.

Garcia smiles when asked how important he sees Hurley to Lost's success.

‘‘Well, you gotta look at the story,'' he says.

‘‘And if the best story to tell involves Hurley dying, well . . .

‘‘Listen, I want Hurley to be there until the end, but you want the show to be the best it can be. And we have a very high standard that we're living up to.

‘‘I was watching Dom (Dominic Monaghan, who played Charlie) handle his destiny (on-screen death). And he was feeling it was the best death we've had and the most meaningful . . . sacrificing for the best of everybody. He had a very noble attitude about it. So I would take his lead.

‘‘Then again, maybe I'd say (to producers), ‘But the audience loves me so much'.''

The cast's sense of isolation, spending so much time filming in Hawaii, ensures there's grief when a regular character is sacrificed.

‘‘It's tough because they move away for one thing. It's not like, you know, you drive 20 minutes and you can go visit them on any afternoon,'' Garcia says.

‘‘They're a plane ride away.''

But Garcia hastens to add that his life is not too shabby.

When he's not at work, he loves heading to his beach house to play with his dog.

Asked if he, like Monaghan, has fallen in love with surfing since arriving in Hawaii, the generously proportioned Garcia says: ‘‘Not yet. I'm working on it. I'm getting another board that's longer and wider and will float me better to, you know, have more success.''

His size raises some questions about how Garcia handles the physical workload on Lost.

Garcia says he relies heavily on breaks in production to catch his breath.

‘‘Whenever they (crew) have to move the camera, it gives you about a half-hour to hang out and chill. But sometimes you need to ask for it (rest), you know,'' he says.

‘‘I remember I did an episode where I was running up the longest escalator I'd ever seen in my life at the Honolulu Convention Centre. And I'm running up with suitcases bobbing through people and I have to make it to the top.

‘‘You do one take and they want you to go down and re-set and I'm already covered with sweat and panting and I'm like, ‘Hold on, the next take is not coming quite so soon'.

‘‘Sometimes you gotta tell them you need time.''

Jorge Garcia is confident Lost can maintain its following, despite signs even its hard-core fans have been frustrated by meandering plotlines.

‘‘I think a lot of fans have issues with the start of the last season, but I thought the season came to a really phenomenal ending,'' Garcia says. ‘‘And now that writers know the time they have left to tell the full Lost story, we've had very solid scripts. It's exciting. It's like the scripts we get now are on the level of excitement we had in season one.''

Garcia has given up trying to work out why Hurley and his fellow crash survivors are on the island. ‘‘I gave up coming up with theories. I enjoy reading theories people come up with, but I now leave that to the fans.''

Source: Herald Sun