The Dominic Monaghan Resource - iF Magazine, 18 March 2010

iF Magazine, 18 March 2010

Articles & Interviews - 2010

Exclusive Interview: DOMINIC MONAGHAN RENDERS THE WORLD UNCONSCIOUS ON 'FLASHFORWARD'

The actor talks about the differences between his villainous Simon on the new ABC show and good-guy Charlie of 'LOST'

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN, Contributing Writer
Published 3/18/2010

Dominic Monaghan knows he’s a one-man nexus of fandom. “I’m like a Comic-Con wet dream,” he jokes. The statement is hard to dispute, as the German-born, Britain-raised actor has played the questing hobbit Merry in all three LORD OF THE RINGS films, troubled but sweet musician Charlie Pace as part of the original cast of LOST and now the potentially world-destroying scientist Simon Campos on ABC’s returning science-fiction drama FLASHFORWARD.

iF: Between LORD OF THE RINGS and LOST and FLASHFORWARD, are you of actively looking for projects that are likely to develop cult followings cults, or do you worry, “Uh-oh, what if it gets a cult?”

DOMINIC MONAGHAN: No, I’m attracted to good projects, and good projects happen to have fan followings. That’s not really something that I’ve set myself out to do, although the reason why I became an actor was because of STAR WARS, so I’m sure there’s some influence in there.

iF: Was there a particular character that affected you in STAR WARS?

MONAGHAN: Han Solo, when I was seven. I thought, “I want to do that,” and then I realized it was an actor, and what that meant, and then I started working on that. At a pretty early age, I knew I wanted to be an actor.

iF: Was ABC looking to have you come back after Charlie died on LOST? Was there any kind of conversation with the network about, “We’d like to put you in something else now”?

MONAGHAN: There was conversation. I think, when I left LOST, they had said, “We still want him in the family,” and my agent had said, “Great, let’s see what we can find,” and I think when this project [FLASHFORWARD] had come about and it was an ABC project, it was very easy to then join those dots and speak to [ABC Entertainment president] Steve McPherson and know my way around the ABC family. I read the pilot, which they were interested in me for a different role, and I said to my agent, “There’s nothing in there, in the pilot, for me to do.” So they spoke to [then-FLASHFORWARD show runner] David [Goyer] and [continuing FLASHFORWARD show runner] Jessika Borsicszky and said, “He really liked the pilot, but he doesn’t think there’s anything for him to do.” David and Jessika said, “Well, can we just meet him?” So we met and they said to me, “What do you want to do? Where do you want to go next?” And I said, “I need to play a character that’s different from Charlie.” And they said, “Well, we think we can write a character that’s drastically different from Charlie, so give us a week and we’ll meet again.” So I went back a week later, and they had this idea of Simon, and pitched it to me, and I said, “Yeah, let’s do that.”

iF: Can you describe the biggest difference between Simon and Charlie?

MONAGHAN: He’s a much darker character, Simon. And that’s probably been my biggest challenge, because when you play dark characters, you go a little darker. I knew it was a dark character, I knew he was not going to be a hugely attractive character. That’s the biggest challenge for me as an actor. [As Simon], I’m a murderer, I’m a despicable character with characteristics that are not attractive. You have to have an audience be intrigued in you enough, so you have to find something … I think I benefit from not necessarily having a dark face. I can be quite bright and I can be quite present, but you know, people like a bad guy as well. I don’t want to go too dark as a person.

iF: Do you find there’s a danger in taking the character home with you, or are you able to leave Simon behind when you leave the set?

MONAGHAN: I pretty much do [leave him behind], although I do have a preying mantis, Gizmo, which is what I base Simon on, so I do spend a lot of time watching my preying mantis, which you could argue would be me continuing to study Simon. But that’s just fun for me.

iF: You’ve been dark for the big screen…

MONAGHAN: That was like six weeks’ darkness, whereas this could be nine months and then a break and then another nine months. You have to be careful how long you’re dark for. I base all my characters on animals. In a sense, a preying mantis is like the assassin of the insect world, it’s just the ultimate killer, which is just my feeling with Simon, which is very different from Charlie. Charlie was kind of a capuchin monkey. He’s cuddly, he’s cute, he’s mischievous, he’s a bit annoying, you’ve got to keep your eye on him. I’m a huge fan of animals and I like the idea of basing characters on animals.

iF: Speaking of Charlie, do you know how much you will be back on LOST in the final season?

MONAGHAN: I think the LOST questions are probably better directed to [LOST show runner] Damon Lindelof.

iF: Have the writers talked to you about what Simon’s FLASHFORWARD story arc will be?

MONAGHAN: I know some stuff – some stuff they told me about.

iF: Given how unrepentantly destructive Simon has been, can you relate to him?

MONAGHAN: You always have to try to, it’s the only way that you can play a character like that. I try to find and remember dark moments in my past, where I felt a little messed up and I try to understand his motives, why he’s behaving this way and why he seems to be acting out or acting badly, whereas ultimately, he has an end goal that he’s trying to achieve, which is to a certain extent good.

iF: Are you looking for Simon to get a little bit lighter, maybe pet a puppy or something?

MONAGHAN: No, not really. No. I don’t really have any inclinations with Simon to get lighter. I like the darkness. If they write him that way, then sure, I’ll play him that way. I enjoy the heaviness.

iF: Jack Davenport plays your character Simon’s partner, Lloyd Simcoe. Was Davenport’s casting based on yours, in that you’re both British?

MONAGHAN: I’m not sure. You’d have to ask Jack that. I’m not sure when in the proceedings Jack was cast. I think I was relatively late, because I think by the time I was being talked about with the show, I knew that Joe [Fiennes] was in it, I knew that Sonya [Walger] was in it, I knew that John Cho was in it.

iF: Have you do any research into the science that Simon discusses?

MONAGHAN: As best I can. I read a book called THE BIG BANG, AND WHY IT’S IMPORTANT, which is really fun, I’ve read some stuff about quantum physics and string theory, and I tried to read A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME and I got to like page seven and put it down. It’s too hard. But you know, you can Google [the information], try as hard as you can to learn some stuff. The hardest thing that Jack and I talk about is that we have to say a lot of scientific jargon, and it’s really hard to remember it, to memorize it, if you don’t know what any of it is. It’s real stuff, I would assume – you’d have to ask the writers, but it’s real stuff, and there’s a lot of “plasma, pulse, afterburner, quantum physics blah, blah.” So unless you know some place to put the intonation of your voice, it’s just not going to make any sense. We compare lines [in terms of difficulty].

iF: There seems to have been some anticipation about FLASHFORWARD …

MONAGHAN: At Comic-Con, we met some people who were already kind of invested in the show before it even aired and they seemed to be rabid and into it and helping us out with word of mouth and all that kind of stuff.

iF: If you could flash forward in real life, would you want to, and if so, what would you like to learn?

MONAGHAN: Yeah, I would. I would like to see my family and how they’re doing and who’s well and who’s in need of help and who’s happy and who’s healthy.

iF: Is there anything else you’d particularly like to say about FLASHFORWARD at this time?

MONAGHAN: Well, there are things that I would like to answer about FLASHFORWARD, but I’m not allowed to because of the nature of the show. But no, not really. I think I’m doing some of my favorite work that I’ve ever done right now, [playing] an extremely dark man. He’s not a boy, he’s not a teenager, he’s a man, and he kind of demands your attention. So I’m really happy with the work I’m doing and I’m excited for people to see it.