"I'm lost!" actor Doug Hutchison revealed with a laugh in an interview with SCIFI WIRE, referring to the return of his character, Horace Goodspeed, to ABC's SF series Lost in the upcoming fifth season for at least a four-episode arc.
Hutchison will reprise the role of the hippie Dharma Initiative member, who was apparently killed in an earlier season. He begins shooting sometime in the next two weeks.
Hutchison--a genre fan fave as Victor Tooms on The X-Files and as Loony Bin Jim in the upcoming Punisher: War Zone movie--admitted that prior to the offer to appear on Lost during season three, he'd never seen the show.
"I never really got into Lost," Hutchison said. "I never knew what it was about. I didn't understand it. The only thing I understood was that it was insanely popular with its fans. But my agents called me and said, 'They're really interested in you at Lost for this particular role.' I don't even remember what the role was, but it was a flashback, and that was it. It was basically one flashback in this episode, and, not having seen the show, I just made this silly assumption that this character and this flashback was finite."
Hutchison added: "So I really wasn't interested in just going to do one flashback in Lost, no matter how popular it was. On top of it, they wanted me to go and audition for this, because it's a huge show. Now, mind you, I'm not beyond auditioning at all. I've gone in to fight for roles that I love on television or movies or whatever. But it's got to be something I really want, that I'm really passionate about, for me to go in and try to fight for it. So I passed. I told my agents, 'I pass.' And they were not pleased. They were like, 'This is Lost. You don't understand.'"
Eventually, the Lost producers dropped the need for an audition and made a straight offer--the lure of 10 days in Hawaii won out, and Hutchison's portrayal of the easygoing hippie immediately stood out. "He's part of the Dharma Initiative," Hutchison explained. "He's this cool, weed-smoking sort of just laid-back throwback to the '60s. He's this cat who has flashbacks from the '60s to the '70s, all the way up to the '90s, and he's an integral part of the role of Ben [Michael Emerson] on the show and how Ben got started, because he knew him when Ben was a little boy."
Goodspeed was introduced, and died, within one episode. "So imagine my surprise when this past season, I get a call from my agents [saying], 'They want you again on Lost,'" Hutchison said. "I said, 'Well, wait a minute. Are these more flashbacks?' They said, 'No. It's current.' I said, 'I'm dead!' And they said, 'Yeah, well it's Lost.'"
"I got the script, and sure enough, now Horace Goodspeed…I don't know," Hutchison added. "I don't know what's going on. Nobody knows what's going on on that island, but I'm either a ghost or a memory, a figment of one's imagination or a piece of the island. I could be I'm conjured by the island. I shot that out in a day, and now I got a call from my agent about a month ago saying, 'Lost would like to have you do at least four episodes for this coming season, pending your availability.' I don't know what they have up their sleeve. I'm lost!"
All Hutchison really knows is, Goodspeed will be "resurrected in some incarnation."
As for other characters returning for season five, it's been leaked through various sources that Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) will be back, as will Ana-Lucia (Michelle Rodriguez). Emilie de Ravin is rumored to be back for season six.
Hutchison will next appear in a supernatural Western called The Burrowers (currently making the film festival circuit) and as a comic-book villain in Punisher: War Zone (Dec. 5). He is also the producer and creator of a new Web series called Vampire Killers!, which is set to debut on Oct. 1. Lost returns with new episodes in February 2009. --Staci Layne Wilson
