CusickGallery.net: Henry Ian Cusick

July 1, 2014   

TV Choice Magazine

Interview Extra

Henry Ian Cusick  The 100

Aside from roles inScandal, Fringeand The Mentalist, Henry Ian Cusick is best-known for playing Desmond in the cult hit Lost. Now he’s back with another sci-fi show — The 100. With a nuclear apocalypse wiping out humanity, the only survivors are 400 people living on 12 space stations orbiting the planet. These 12 join together to form one large ship — The Ark. Fast forward 97 years, and those 400 are now 4000. But with the air supply failing, 100 juvenile prisoners are secretly jettisoned back to the Earth, to test whether it can support life again. Henry stars as Kane, one of The Ark’s ruling council members…

There are a lot of sci-fi shows around at the moment so what made The 100 stand out for you?
The show starts off really slowly but you get to episodes five, six and seven then the show really kicks off and it starts flying. You notice how the camera work is different and it becomes a lot more gritty, a lot more bloody and a lot more claustrophobic. But this kind of genre is something I’ve always been attracted to. The big questions that these kinds of shows pose always get me excited.

Do you know why it’s 97 years and not rounded up to 100 since the nuclear apocalypse?
That’s a good question although I don’t think it’s an important question. I would guess that 100 would be too compact and neat. But if you’re thinking along those lines, then I’m sure you’re also wondering how did it happen? And hopefully these things will be addressed if we get a season two, because those were exactly the same questions that I had — who was fighting, who would survive and what countries were involved? I like the way you think.

The drama has elements of Lost, The Hunger Games andLord Of The Flies. Would you agree?
Yes, I think our show does touch on The Hunger Games, Lost andThe Walking Dead, and that’s not an accident. I think a lot of television picks from other shows and those shows have all been hugely successful. I think you can always take what’s good from a show and make it your own, mould it into something different and then the show takes a life of its own. So hopefully that will happen with ours.

There are two focus points in the show — the teenagers on Earth and the adults in The Ark. Does everyone in The Ark make it to Earth?
I don’t want to ruin it for everyone, but I think people are bright enough to work out what’s going to happen. It’s inevitable I think and it’s not ruining it, but the thing is, who will make it and who won’t? The body count is quite high! They’re quite brutal with killing characters off. You have a bit of both worlds though, and they parallel each other really well as you see how they’re trying to survive in their different ways.

You’ve got a big young cast. Do you, Paige Turco and Isaiah Washington take on parental type roles to the teen actors and offer advice?
Never! We never see them because they shoot out in the forest in beautiful British Columba and we’re tucked away in a nice warm studio in Vancouver so we never see them — apart from press conferences and stuff like that.

Have you ever taken acting advice from an older actor?
Nothing in particular.  I was very lucky that I got to work with people like Michael Bryant, when I was at the RSC and The National. But I got to work with some fantastic actors and I remember just standing in the wings, watching them and just being amazed at their work. For me, that was the best training I ever had, I think — just from watching.

As a former member of the Lost cast, have you ever been to any fan conventions?
Yes! I went to one in Milton Keynes. But other ones that I’ve wanted to go to have always come when other work pops up. But I really enjoyed it and would love to go to some more — especially in the UK.

The cast of Lost all lived in Hawaii while the show was being filmed, and you’ve stayed there?
Yes I have. I’m pretty settled here. I have three boys, [Elijah, 20, Lucas, 16 and Esau, 14]. One’s gone back to school on the mainland at University and the other two are at school here in Hawaii. It’s a lifestyle that I really enjoy. I call it home.

Am I right that your former co-star, Daniel Dae Kim, still lives there?
Yes we’re very good friends. We see each other quite a lot and Jorge Garcia is moving back to the island, so I’ll get to see a lot more of him.

You mentioned doing a lot of theatre while you were in the UK. Do you miss treading the boards, or does TV give you enough of a thrill to keep you going?
Just recently I had a longing to go back to the theatre. For a long time, I was fine just doing television work but recently I started thinking about it. My wife Annie is heavily involved in theatre on the island, and my middle son does a lot of theatre, and I was looking at it and thinking I wouldn’t mind just taking a little tread on those boards just to get a feeling of what that would be like.

You could do a family thing with the three of you.
Perhaps. Who knows? Maybe we’ll do it in Hawaii.

E4, Monday

Elaine Penn

**The 100 premieres in the UK on July 7**