Boston Common - Niche Media - A side of Boston that's anything but common.
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FANTASTIC MR. FOX With a new movie out this summer, an acclaimed London theater run under his belt, and a determination to keep reaching new heights, Deerfield Academy alum Matthew Fox is anything but Lost. BY JENNIFER DEMERITT PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRIAN BOWEN SMITH M atthew Fox is a heartthrob, but of a very particular kind. He's handsome, no doubt, but without the rakish, dangerous edge of, say, Josh Holloway, who played his foil Sawyer on the hit TV show Lost. Fox is best known for playing reluctant heroes—dependable, seriousminded fellows who furrow their brows and take care of the people around them. His character Jack Shephard, the doctor who became the unofficial leader of the shipwrecked community on Lost, was very much in this mold, as was his breakout role as Charlie Salinger on the TV family drama Party of Five in the 1990s. When Fox talked with Boston Common, it was easy to see why. He speaks slowly, deliberately, with more than a few long pauses, as if he's carefully gathering his thoughts. He admits to being a bit of a bookworm (and even a little shy), with little interest in the trappings of Hollywood glamour. He seems like someone you could trust. Since Lost finished its wildly successful sixyear run in 2010, Fox has deliberately broken away from that familiar mold. Many TV and movie actors try to prove their chops by taking a turn in the theater, but Fox chose to work with one of today's most challenging playwrights, Neil LaBute, in the London production of In a Forest, Dark and Deep, playing a troubled character who lacks the ready likability of Jack Shephard. After that he played a sadistic 94 murderer in the movie Alex Cross. This summer he returns to form, playing a Navy SEAL in the zombie apocalypse movie World War Z, based on the cult-hit books by Max Brooks. With a big budget, big special effects, and an army of sprinting zombies, it's classic blockbuster fare. But Fox seems unfazed by the hoopla surrounding the movie. He talks about it, and his other accomplishments, in the same low-key, thoughtful manner, as if to say that, yes, stardom is all fine and good, but he'd rather be back on his ranch in Oregon, piloting his airplane over the mountains, or just reading a good book with his kids. What was it like growing up on a ranch in Wyoming? I grew up pretty far out in the middle of nowhere. I spent most of my time outside of school with my brothers, doing stuff around the ranch, getting into trouble. Around the 4th of July we'd always get into lighting off fireworks, and that inevitably would turn into Roman candle wars…. Ranch life is dictated by markets, so there was a period when my dad raised cattle, and periods when he was pasturing other people's horses or growing barley for beer companies like Coors. It required working outdoors around the clock to a harvest moon, and those are really nostalgic times for me. Did you ever imagine that you would go into acting? I didn't get the idea for acting until I was graduating from college…. But while growing up I was always into stories. I read a lot when I was younger, and reading is still something I love, especially fiction. Which books made a mark on you? When I was 8, my older brother read The Hobbit to me, and I fell in love with that world. So the J.R.R. Tolkien books became a big part of my early reading. I also read a ton of westerns by Louis L'Amour, and one of the first more adult, classic books that I remember digging was Ivanhoe. What made you decide to attend Deerfield Academy for a year after high school? That was my dad's idea. He was raised on the East Coast and went to the Brunswick School in Connecticut. That year was a major turning point in my life. I had spent most of my life in Crowheart, Wyoming, so it was a real eye-opener to meet kids from all over the world. The academic schedule was very intense, and I struggled with that for the first few months. It was the first time that the bar was raised high for me, and it opened my eyes to a much bigger world. When you were at Columbia University, what sparked your interest in acting? It wasn't that I reached my senior year at Columbia and suddenly had an epiphany that I wanted to be an actor. I just realized I didn't want to work on Wall Street. I got a degree in economics, and a lot of kids at Columbia were pursuing careers in the financial world, so Wall Street was a default. But acting was something I was curious BOSTONCOMMON-MAGAZINE.COM 094-097_BC_F_CS_LateSpring13_NEW.indd 94 4/10/13 12:36 PM